Initial Coding

Data were initially coded on an incident-with-incident basis in accordance with the guidelines suggested by Charmaz (2014, pp.128-132). Initial coding was carried out in NVivo and involved systematically coding each interview, observation note and document on an incident-with-incident basis with as many codes as necessary to

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capture the richness of the data. This process was free, open and descriptive and I chose codes that I felt best reflected the data. Figure 3.1 shows an example excerpt of an interview transcript coded with initial codes. Sections of the transcript highlighted in bold are sections that correspond with memos written during initial coding (see section 3.8.3 for further information about memo writing).

Figure 3.1: Data Excerpt Coded with Initial Codes

Initial Codes Interview Transcript Asking about musicianship at

interview;

Not being able to afford ‘a discreet music teacher’

Having subject specialists for English and Maths;

Expecting class teachers to deliver everything; Needing skilled staff Finding that music disappears without skilled staff

Getting someone in; Making up for lack of staff skills

Trusting staff; Relying on specific staff members

Feeling embarrassed that she doesn’t know more about music in the school; Not wanting to do the interview; Not holding information well enough;

Doing what’s required by

government; Adhering to ‘normal education requirements’; Lacking regulation and accountability in music education; Seeing creative subjects disappear from mainstream curricula;

Feeling pressured to obtain certain standards; Having a philosophy;

HT: We have a generic question at the end of interviewing and because we can’t any longer afford to have a discreet music teacher we don’t recruit in that way, it’s very rare. The only subject specialists we have now are at the secondary partnership and we’ve got a maths specialist and an English specialist, everybody else is expected to be a class teacher and deliver everything. But you find that if you can’t do it the music disappears doesn’t it? You see? And that’s why we’ve sort-of added on and put back in really. You see, if you ask me what happens with music at the CMLN site, you can probably tell me better than I can tell you because they do get organised and because the Class 1 Teacher is there I don’t really worry about it; but whether the Class 1 Teacher does stuff with other groups or whether the staff do that, I obviously don’t know, you’d know better than me and that’s quite embarrassing really to say that; which is why none of us wanted to do this interview really because we clearly don’t hold that information well enough and the world that we work in now in terms of normal

education, the requirements, there’s not that much of a check on music it’s not held; and actually one of the really sad things I think is that those creative subjects, drama, music, art, are the things that are disappearing off the curriculum in mainstream because the pressure for the standards is just so high, whereas my philosophy is, in terms of those

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Seeing the benefits;

Developing students’ self-esteem; Feeling it’s important; Impacting other learning; Focusing on non- musical goals

Inspiring awe and wonder in pupils; Enjoying music; Enriching lives; Building self-esteem; Developing social interaction; Improving behaviour; Keeping things age- appropriate;

Feeling as though it’s hard for musicians to understand

sorts of things, it’s so enriching for our kids and their self-esteem comes from it. It’s just so, so important; and actually a lot of learning comes out of it as well, it’s not musical; I’m not interested in them being able to do A, B, or C in terms of musical outcomes, you know, [it’s] that awe, that wonder, that enjoyment, that enrichment in their lives and that self- esteem, and that social interaction, and that social ability, and the age-

appropriateness, and the behaviour is what’s more important out of that learning which for musicians that can be quite hard for them can’t it?

All initial codes took the form of gerunds which described, categorised and summarised each incident of data. Glaser (1978) notes that coding with gerunds assists researchers in identifying a theory of process from their data. This is achieved through the coding of actions rather than themes. Coding each incident in this way also helps to ensure that researchers remain close to their data. Charmaz (2014) explains:

[T]he initial grounded theory coding with gerunds, is a heuristic device to bring the researcher into the data, interact with them, and study each fragment of them. This type of coding helps to define implicit meanings and actions, gives

researchers directions to explore, spurs making comparisons between data, and suggests emergent links between processes in the data to pursue and check. (p.121, emphasis in original)

This iterative analytical process is supposed to take place alongside data collection so that the researcher is able to follow up on unresolved questions that arise from the data, clarify points of analysis with participants, and quickly move beyond description into interpretative analysis. As mentioned above, given the intensity of the administrative demands of data collection itself, most of the initial coding of data was carried out after the fieldwork had ended. Perhaps if the research had been carried out as part of a team, or if I had built longer breaks between ethnographic data collection at each field-site into the research design, concurrent data collection and initial coding would have been possible. However, there was simply not enough time to keep up with this pace of data

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collection and analysis as a single researcher within the decided research timeframe. The ethnographic diary was essential to ensure that this central component of grounded theory analysis was not omitted from the research entirely. Often, I found that

transcribing observation notes and interviews acted as a first stage of data analysis. As the data were, for the most part, transcribed at the same time as the research (only the interview data from Schools 2 and 3 were transcribed following the completion of the fieldwork). Missing information and points requiring clarification were able to be recorded in the ethnographic diary such that I was then able to follow these up with participants in real-time as the fieldwork progressed. For example, when typing up observation notes I would frequently think of questions that needed to be asked in interviews. One such example, written when typing up observation notes from School 1 on 10th November 2015, reads as follows:

Some questions from my observations so far:

What is progression in music for pupils at School 1 Site 1? Is there such a thing or is progression in music for pupils with PMLD tied up with overall progression?

How are pupils assessed? Do they need to be assessed? Are my thoughts too target-focused? What’s brought about this target-focused nature to my own thinking? Is experiential ok for these pupils?

(extract from ethnographic diary entry on 10.11.2015)

These questions were then included in interviews, or asked informally during the fieldwork. In this way, whilst concurrent data collection and initial coding of data could not be carried out, thoughts and questions arising from the data were still recorded and acted upon wherever possible.

A large quantity of unique codes were generated from the process of initial coding (over 6500). These were then compared and contrasted with one another using the grounded theory principles of constant comparative analysis (Birks & Mills, 2015; Charmaz, 2014; Corbin & Strauss, 2015; Glaser, 1978, 1992; Glaser & Strauss, 1967/1999) in order to integrate similar codes across settings and data type (i.e. observation/interview/document). Charmaz (2014) describes constant comparative analysis as follows:

A method of analysis that generates successively more abstract concepts and theories through inductive processes of comparing data with data, data with code,

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code with code, code with category, category with category, and category with concept. (p. 342)

This inductive process constituted the first stage of focused coding.