Wed. Oct. 4th

Unit 2

Reflective Annotated Bibliography

DAY 8

Check In

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• Have you chosen a topic for Project 2?

Today

• Continue with Project 2: Step 1 - Choose a Topic -- We are going to Generate 5-8 research questions on the topic to guide your research. These questions should be questions that inspire your curiosity, drive your interest on the topic and will help you narrow down your research.
• Discuss what type of sources might help answer those questions. Remember you need 3 different genres of sources!
• Read “Freewriting Exercises” by Peter Elbow and discuss why free writes are helpful and what we include in a free write

Choosing a Topic

Project 2: Step 1

A review of some ideas!

Education: NYC school segregation, gifted and talented programs, specialized high schools, charter schools, college tuition/ loans, is a college education worth it, school lunch options, school safety

Transportation: bike vs. pedestrian vs. car safety, bus/ subway fares and repairs, access to transportation, congestion pricing

Community Issues: Policing (cameras, stop and frisk, bail, funding/ defunding), community prisons, voter engagement/ suppression, supermarkets/ bodegas/ delis and healthy food, gentrification, fashion and body image

Environment: NYC seagate, cost of healthy food/ environmentally friendly products (environment vs. income inequity), clean water, Congestion pricing,

Other: Should carriage horses be banned? Should everyone eat vegetarian?

Technology: Teens and screens, does technology in classroom enhance student learning, does technology make us more alone, do violent computer games make kids violent, should social media posts cost you your job? Is information collected from students an invasion of student privacy?

Sports: Coed sports, safety and sports (helmets, restrictions), should college athletes get paid

NOW, you choose a topic and write it down

On the Project 2 Topic and Research Question Sheet, please write down your topic.

• Why this topic? What makes it interesting to you?
• Then, in the first column write down ANYTHING you already know about this topic!
• Now let’s start to think about Questions. What are some questions you might have on this topic? Some things you might be interested in learning more about?
• Now, quickly Google the topic, see what comes up. Anything interesting? What did you learn that you might not have know before?

Generating Research Questions

Project 2: Step 1

Research Questions

What are research questions? Why and how do we use research questions?

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Let’s watch this short video and discuss!

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Research Questions

Research question are the questions that you want to ask as you begin your research into your topic.

They can help identify the problem you might be researching (gentrification in Williamsburg, online learning in college, etc)

They help determine the scope of your research project (how big or small a focus will you have---are you looking at gentrification in just Williamsburg or all of bk)

They help you figure out the sub-topics or areas that you want to research (will you look at how gentrification affections housing and cost of living and community relationships)

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Steps

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• Consider the scope-- how broad can your topic be-- it really can’t be that broad.
• Background research-- what are the key terms and key ideas that you need to know in order to really understand your topic?

4. What are the subtopics, causes, effects, people or organizations that are impacted by your topic/ issue? These are what are going to really become your research questions!

5. Narrow the scope--what kinds of research do you want to include?

6. Write down your MAIN question! And really think about it, can you really answer this question, is it a matter of opinion? Is there enough data out there to answer it?

7. Come up with additional questions that will help you answer that main question!

Research Questions

Freewriting

“Freewriting Exercises” by Peter Elbow

Let’s read this text and discuss!

What is a free write? According to Peter Elbow in what ways can freewriting help? How does he recommend going about freewriting? What do you think? Have you ever done a free write before? What was it like?

What is the genre of this text (Be specific! Not just nonfiction/ informative)? Who is the intended audience (Be specific) ? What is the purpose? What is his tone (formal, informal, academic, serious, humorous, satirical, etc.)?

Freewrite!

Now, free write!

Homework

• Read “School Is Killing Curiosity” by Wendy Berliner and write a response to the questions on OpenLab

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