Week 3: Homework exercise – no studio due to Ekka holiday#
There is no studios this week due to the Ekka holiday.
However, we ask teams to do a short task together either during their studio time, or at another time.
Interviews#
Read the chapter on interviews. We will experiment a bit with some interview questions.
Recall the difference between closed and open questions: closed questions have a yes/no/maybe/don’t know answer, while open questions invite a response.
Closed: “Do you like studying computer science at university?”
Open: “Tell me one thing that you like about studying computer science at university”
Exercise 1: Defining open vs closed questions#
By now, you should be considering what challenges you may be considering. If not, this may help you decide!
As a team, choose one (or more!) of the challenges, and write two general questions about each challenge that you have chosen: one open and one closed.
For example:
Closed: “When you were doing X at UQ, did you encounter any difficulties in …?”
Open: “Tell me about any difficulties you encountered while you were doing X at UQ.”
Exercise 2: Testing open vs closed questions#
You will need a mobile phone with audio recording capabilities for this exercise (or some other recording device).
You can do this independently, as a pair, or as a team.
Each team member should approach two different students (outside of their team) and ask each of them a question: one open and one closed. This can be a friend, but you shouldn’t reveal the purpose of the exercise.
First, introduce yourself (as outlined in interviews) and state that you just want to ask one question for a course.
Second, ask for permission to audio record their answers, as outlined in the chapter on interviews. Be sure to let participants know they can decline to answer or stop the recording at any time.
If they agree, ask the open or closed question, and record their response using the audio recorder.
Feel free to ask follow-up questions to learn more about their experience related to the challenge that you chose.
Thanks the participant, and move on.
Exercise 3: Compare#
Once each team member has approached two different people, you should have 4-5 responses to the closed question and 4-5 responses to the open question.
Find a platform that can transcribe your interview questions into text – there are many available online. Choose one that all team members will use.
Share the transcripts with each other.
As a team, compare the two.
In your comparison, use the following criteria:
Length: Is one longer than the other on average?
Context: Which response gave you more context or background?
Comfort: Did the interviewee seem more comfortable or willing to elaborate in response to one type of question?
Perspective: Which question helped you understand the interviewee’s perspective better?
Clarify: Did either question lead to a clearer understanding of the challenge?
Future practice: Based on this experience, how might you change your interview questions in future?
Exercise 4: Send!#
Send a brief report answering the above to your supervisor about your comparison on your MS Teams channel.
The response should be clear, but we do not care if your writing is not polished – this is an exercise about interviewing, not about writing.