Category: LRNT 522

Research a research question

What makes a good research question is a good question?
First thoughts: it cannot be a yes or no question, and it should be involved, not easily answered or solved.

How to get there?

When considering your topic, think about what you enjoy and interests you, and what you want to explore further. You will spend a lot of time with this topic and question. I think that you would have to enjoy it!

Having strong foundational knowledge on the topic is also important, so you can find gaps and areas of necessities to explore and further examine. The subject of choice should not be too broad or unchartered (yikes), but rather something that has a path to inquire further. In having strong foundational knowledge about your topic, you can see or discover the gaps in other research help guide your particular issue.

  • Where does your problem exist? Or does it?
  • Who would be interested in knowing more about your issue?
  • Who is impacted by it?

Think about the perspective or lens in which you will guide your research and helps you formulate the question.

I hope with critically thinking in the early stages and having foundational knowledge of the chosen topic; the ability to narrow to for a question will be narrowed enough.

Last thought: research your research question – maybe there will be a similar thought or style to use as a mentor or as an example. Always good idea to read and reflect on well-written questions before you start!

Righting my writing practice.

 

Humbled and yet, keen.

self-reflection

I am so thankful for the detailed notes and personal pointers from my instructor in our last course, starting my out on an eye-opening journey of writing. I have déjà vu from university days when an instructor suggests the writing center, more revising/editing, and time…I need more time.

I appreciate discovering again how I learn and especially with writing – much more invested in seeing myself work through this process. Academic writing is straightforward. It is direct and clear. I need to work on this area. I am finding difficulty in synthesizing my thoughts to have efficiency in my writing, yet be effective. While I am trying to be efficient, such as in the briefing note where the word count was important, I cut out or did not elaborate on the important pieces. I thought I did at the time but realize that I was not thoughtful what I was saying, making connections for my reader and developing a line of reasoning in what I wrote. I made some assumptions in my writing, which hindered my clarity and ability.

I understand that writing takes time and there is a process that is different for everyone. Being aware of my writing process and honoring the time I need to tackle my tasks is what I have to work into my schedule–it is a goal. Time, a constant battle and unforgiving, makes me nervous as it is the one thing that will help me overall. I plan to work with the writing center more and to seek some help, which means…you guessed it, I have to be better planned to build in revision and editing time.

Besides the writing center for resources, I will refer to OWL Purdue. It is a wealth of information, and I have always had it in my bookmarks–writing and APA. I am a huge fan of Grammarly. It is useful and having to examine the suggested edits, forces me to reread closely. I also plan to take advantage of mentor texts. I use this tool with my students and find it very powerful and effective. Using academic texts that I read, styles and content, I will examine and note the efficiency in writing, the use of evidence—paraphrasing and evidence. Using a mentor text will allow me to emulate structure and model of good academic writing. I have collected introductions and conclusions, paragraphs, samples of sentence structure with sources used to help guide me to be a better writer. I also use academic articles to look at referencing and paying attention to the detail.

I continue to search the web and peruse my peers’ blogs for other suggestions.

So….