Difference between revisions of "BTH740 Research Essay 20113"

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(Survey and Critique)
(Survey and Critique)
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* Open-ended searches by the team members
 
* Open-ended searches by the team members
 
* Selections of interest to the team members
 
* Selections of interest to the team members
* Discussion amongst team members to identify conditions that might be sufficient and economical for an observation
+
* Discussion amongst team members to identify conditions that might be sufficient and economical in explaining an observation or a set of observations
  
 
== Thesis Statement==
 
== Thesis Statement==

Revision as of 16:33, 5 October 2011


BTH740 | Weekly Schedule | Research Projects | Research Essay | Student Resources

How To Write a Research Essay

Five Stages of Research

  • Survey and Critique
  • Thesis Statement
  • Research
  • Writing
  • Presentation

Survey and Critique

This is the abductive stage of forming hypotheses. There is no single logical form to apply here - we guess at what might be the case for the observations that we are making

  • Open-ended searches by the team members
  • Selections of interest to the team members
  • Discussion amongst team members to identify conditions that might be sufficient and economical in explaining an observation or a set of observations

Thesis Statement

Requirements For the Final Essay

set by the instructor - what you need to know before starting to prepare the thesis statement

  • number of sources
    • primary >= 2
    • secondary >= 4
    • tertiary - summarize
  • length 1600-2400 words
  • late penalties 20%
  • timeline:
    • thesis statement - due November 1
    • preliminary research - due November 8
    • recording details - due November 15
    • writing - due November 29
    • publication - due December 6

Narrowing the Focus

select the topic

  • sources
    • encyclopedias
    • textbooks
    • dictionaries
    • videos
  • process
    • jot down ideas
    • discuss ideas
    • circle one that are of interest
    • select one from a short-list
    • select another as the alternative

Searching for Sources

create working bibliography

  • questions to answer
    • are there sufficient sources
    • is each one relevant to the focus
    • are the sources diverse
    • are the sources quality sources
    • are there twice as many sources as required
  • process
    • read
      • abstracts
      • conclusions
      • reviews
    • balance
      • books
      • articles
      • electronic
      • audio-visual
      • old
      • new
    • list publication details accurately

Defining the Purpose

  • single sentence plus keywords
  • discuss the thesis
    • discuss with two peers
    • refine the focus
    • define the scope
  • pose the research question
    • sufficient sources
    • narrow enough topic
    • avoid
      • bibliographical
      • narrative
      • descriptive
      • unfounded assumptions
    • how successful not why successful
  • formulate one precise sentence
  • task is to answer the question <- sole purpose
  • make short list of sub-tasks
  • identify keywords

Submission

  • thesis statement
  • keywords
  • bibliography

Research

Writing

Presentation/Publication

Resources