Research Matters Book

Research Matters
Table of Contents

Introduction: Why research matters

a. Knowing your world

b. Making new knowledge

c. Informing others

d. Solving problems
Part I: Preparing for research

1. Owning your research

a. Understand the benefits

b. Tap personal and professional interests

c. Develop an interest inventory

d. Find space in the assignment

e. Make room in your schedule

f. Read for discovery

g. Raise questions

h. Develop confidence: What do you already know?

i. Consider presenting your research in an alternate form

j. Discuss potential topics with friends and classmates

2. Reading sources

a. Reading to comprehend

b. Reading to reflect

c. Reading to write

3. Exploring and sharpening your topic

a. Exploring research topics

b. Focusing a topic

c. Developing a research question

4. Writing a research proposal

a. The typical components of a research proposal

b. Analyzing the rhetorical situation

c. Drafting research questions and hypotheses

d. Providing a rationale

e. Establishing methods

f. Setting a schedule

g. Choosing research sources strategically

h. Building a working bibliography

i. Annotating a working bibliography

j. Developing a literature review

k. Formatting the project proposal Sample project proposal
Part II: Finding and processing information

5. Gathering information

a. Choosing research sources strategically

b. Finding periodicals using databases and indexes

c. Finding reference works

d. Finding books

e. Finding government publications and other documents

f. Finding sources in special collections: Rare books, manuscripts, and archives

g. Finding multimedia sources

6. Meeting the challenges of online research

a. Web and database searches: Developing search strategies

b. Finding other electronic sources

c. Finding multimedia sources online

7. Evaluating information

a. Evaluating for relevance

b. Evaluating for credibility

c. Evaluating for reliability

d. Evaluating logic

e. Evaluating online texts

f. Evaluating visual sources

g. Evaluating oral presentations

8. Taking notes and keeping records

a. Choosing an organizer to fit your work style

b. Keeping the trail: your search notes

c. What to include in research notes

d. Taking content notes

e Taking notes to avoid plagiarizing and patchwriting

9. Citing your sources and avoiding plagiarism

a. What are a writer’s responsibilities?

b. What does acknowledging sources involve?

c. What you do have to cite

d. What you do not have to cite

e. Why are there so many ways to cite?

f. Drafting to avoid plagiarizing and patchwriting

g. Getting permissions

h. Collaboration and source use

10. Writing an annotated bibliography

a. What is an annotated bibliography and why write one?

b. The citation

c. The annotation

d. Formatting the annotated bibliography

e. Sample student annotated bibliography

11. Developing new information

a. Archives and primary documents

b. Interviews

c. Observation

d. Surveys
Part III: Getting organized

12. Writing and refining the thesis

a. Predrafting a hypothesis

b. Placing the hypothesis in dialogue with sources

c. Drafting a thesis statement

d. Refining the thesis

13. Organizing your research

a. Organize your materials and notes

b. Arrange your ideas into logical groupings

c. Consider the project's overall shape and genre

d. Choose an organizational strategy

Spatial order

Chronological (or time) order

General to specific or specific to general order

Problem to solution or solution to problem

Familiar to unfamiliar or unfamiliar to familiar

Climactic, journalists', or Nestorian order

e. Outlining

Informal

Formal

Check for unity and coherence

Outlining exercise

f. For the visual thinker

Clusters and maps

Arrange your ideas from general to specific: Trees

Storyboards (for multimedia presentations of research)

Site maps (for websites)
Part IV: Writing your project

14. Drafting your project

a. Writing a first draft

Getting ready: Allocating time and finding the right place

Starting to write

Overcoming writer's block

b. Working on paragraphs

Writing relevant paragraphs

Writing unified paragraphs

Focus the paragraph on a central idea and delete irrelevant details.

Place the topic sentence appropriately.

Leave the main idea unstated

c. Writing coherent paragraphs

Organize your paragraphs logically, spatially, or chronologically

Use transitions within paragraphs.

Repeat words, phrases, and sentence structures

Use pronouns and synonyms to refer to words used earlier.

Combine techniques

d. Writing fully developed paragraphs

Support general statements with specific details: Reasons, facts, statistics, examples.

Use rhetorical patterns to develop paragraphs

e.Writing introductory paragraphs

f. Writing concluding paragraphs

g. Connecting paragraphs

Making a visual appeal: Rational, ethical, emotional

Sample student draft

Creating a website

Publishing and maintaining a website

Drafting collaboratively

15. Supporting your claims and entering conversations

a. Explaining and supporting your ideas: reasons and evidence

Offering reasons to support your thesis

Providing evidence to defend your claims

Incorporating the counterevidence to your claims

b. Using visuals as support

c. Incorporating like an expert

Evaluation

Analysis

Synthesizing ideas and information

d. Quoting, paraphrasing, and summarizing

Signaling sources

Integrating quotations

Acknowledging sources

e. Creating transparent, elegant citations

16. Revising globally and locally

a. Revising globally: Learning to re-see

Gain distance

Reread your draft

Revise for focus

Revise for audience

Revise for organization

Revise for development

Reconsider your title

b. Revising locally: Words and sentences

Choose words with care

denotation

connotation

levels of formality and appropriate usage

general and specific language

Craft grammatically correct, clear, varied, and concise sentences

clear and correct sentences

sentence variety and conciseness

Make a personalized editing checklist

Quick reference: revising globally and locally

c. Revising visuals

Avoid visual clutter

Keep visuals clear and accurate

Avoid distorting omissions

Don't manipulate

Check placement

d. Revising with others

The writer's role

The reader's role

Working with a tutor or instructor

e. Revising and editing a website

f. Proofreading your text

17. Designing and presenting your project (10 single spaced pages)

a. Image matters

Image matters to meaning

Image matters to readability

Image matters to ethos

b. Making design decisions: purpose, audience, context, and genre

Purpose

Audience

Context

Genre

Looking at models

c. Understanding the principles: CRAP (contrast, repetition, alignment, proximity)

d. Applying the principles

Creating an overall impression

Planning the layout

Formatting the document

e. Designing a website

f. Adding visuals

planning for visuals

multimedia illustrations

Getting It Across: Storyboarding

Deciding whether to copy visuals or to create them

Obtaining permissions and fair use

g. Incorporating sound and video into multimedia research projects

h. Ten steps for presenting (about 3 pages on presenting), + slide samples
Part V: Documenting research

18. Conducting research in the disciplines (7 pp single spaced)

a. Comparing the Disciplines

b. Humanities

c. Social Sciences

d. Sciences

19. MLA

a. In-text citations

b. Works cited list

20. APA

a. In-text citations

b. Works cited list

21. Chicago

a. In-text citations

b. Works cited list

22. CSE

a. In-text citations

b. Works cited list