Methodology

I knew going in that all the data I'd need couldn't be found on its own, especially since gen alpha is so young - I'd have to seek it out myself. Therefore, I wanted to cast a wider net through broader types of studies.

The data for this ethnography mostly came from two main sources: observational time in a seventh-grade classroom, and a survey with twelve respondents from the generation I was studying.

I chose to observe a seventh-grade classroom for many reasons. The biggest reason was that it would be the easiest and most convenient way for me to observe a wide variety of kids from this generation. It also helped that, the day I was observing them, it was a work day in which they needed to use their school computers to get image references for a project. Many kids were already finished, so I could see how they usually spent their free time as well.

With my interview, I simply found a kid nearby who was done with his work - he had been playing geometry dash to pass the time before I showed up. I asked if he had a computer and what he used it for. With photos, I took wide shots, focusing on including the screens of other devices that I found interesting. This was to represent how they used them in photo form.

I went with a survey to supplement my data. To encourage responses, I made it open to all grade levels, and ended up getting a relatively even amount of responses for each grade level, totalling up to 56 responses. Questions were very broad, mostly focusing on what they did on their computers when not doing schoolwork or video games, as well as asking if they knew how to do various things like printing a docx file or troubleshooting an error. I also asked if they owned their own computer and how often they'd use it outside of schoolwork. Before they got to any of these questions, though, I made sure that they gave informed consent so I could ethically use their responses as data.

My data was organized rather erratically. Observations were physically written on field notes, while the interview was recorded through audio and the photos were stored on a drive folder. After getting the data from my survey, I made a spreadsheet where I graded each responder individually based on their responses to certain questions.