The Ethnography Book: Students use ethnographic tools to reflect on the details of life in their classroom

As MaryEileen and students in her fifth-grade social studies class began writing ethnographic fieldnotes, they explored what researchers do. In the process, they learned how to speak from evidence and to observe from multiple perspectives. Using ethnographic methods, they created a log of fieldnotes that were written up each day by different students and called it The Ethnography Book. They developed more awareness as they noticed and reflected back on their experiences and recorded their community life as fifth-graders. The events of their academic lives took on more meaning as they stood back and reflected on what they did at school, who they did it with, what was said, what actions they took, and why they acted as they did. Involving these students as co-researchers in this inquiry meant that they assumed the identity of ethnographers by engaging in the social practices of observing, writing fieldnotes, asking questions, recording events, and discussing their findings with others.