What Meaning Can We Make Together? On Learning to Code Qualitative Research Data with Graduate Students in Education

Abstract

Graduate students in education are often expected to collect and code data, but the practice of how to do this with qualitative data is not often made visible. In October 2022, we gathered as a collective of graduate students and a professor to address this gap. We asked, what might it look like to learn about coding together? What informs the decisions we make during the coding process? Drawing on a workshop where we coded data from Dr. Burkholder’s research with 2SLGBTQI+ youth, we discussed how we approached the data from multiple lenses and perspectives. In this inquiry, we have traced the growth of our collective understanding of coding practices and show how we made sense of the data as we engaged in dialogue with each other. This paper reveals the intersections of our learning and creates a space for our accumulated knowledge using collaborative modes of inquiry. We argue that there is pedagogical value for graduate students in education and for qualitative researchers in making coding practices explicit.