I'm so silly.

You know? I say something about not blogging and then something wacky will happen to me the next day and it gets me thinking that maybe blogging about this whole thesis process would be better for my sanity because having to store all these ideas for when I come BACK to my blog would be taking precious space in my brain. I think actually NOT writing would make me far more crazy than getting my thoughts out here.

That being said, last week I basically paid a statistician to make me cry. My sample size of my thesis groups were tiny (yes, I knew that) and she was very blunt about the fact that one of my tests couldn't be used. I was quite low for a couple days, doubting whether my research was worth anything at all.

But today I got a little ray of sunshine in the way of my graduate ESL professor. Taking that class was probably the single best idea I've had scholastically, 'cos I learned all kinds of things about second language acquisition theory and practice. I have been nominated for a graduate research award and have to get all kinds of stuff together for it, 3 letters of support, a curriculum vitae, and a narrative about why my research is important to the field...all this while getting ready for orals, for CBMT, and writing pretty much all day.

Anyway, what I needed was a letter of support from the ESL prof and though I was on a short timeline (the app is due Monday of next week) I thought that actually going in to see her and catch up would be much better than an Email saying "hey I know I haven't seen you in over 6 months could you do me this huge favor?" I know, the debutante in me will never die. It definitely paid off because she agreed to have the letter to me by this Thursday and really seemed to have appreciated that I took the more courteous route.

She gave me the BEST little pep talk...getting all excited about my ideas for future research and totally supporting my research because it's multidisciplinary, and really what the fields of ESL and music therapy needs. She even went so far as quoting Emily Dickinson who, when asked if she like to write said, "I like to have written." Meaning she likes to have it done. The prof also quoted her husband who said, "Just shut up and write." Which is SO what I needed to hear. The other really big thing that we discussed was that in her class I learned about the validity of alternative or authentic assessments, which are basically non-standardized tests used in the classroom by the teachers to gauge student progress. Suck it, statistician. Just because my research is a pilot study doesn't make it unworthy of stats. I could go on and on about doing research in music therapy and why most people in, say, psychology, look down their nose at it. Music therapy is such an individualized process that a lot of times the most significant (and by that I mean meaningful) research comes in the form of qualitative or case studies, anyway.

/rant.

Kyle also said the other night, "look - people a lot less smarter than you have published theses. It doesn't need to be perfect, it just needs to be done."

Send me all your writing vibes, I needs 'em.

ps: IT'S RAINING!

pps: MY NASTURIUM IS BLOOMING!!!