Transcript Journal Entry 2

Today’s Goals
 Continue generating ideas for research (By the end of
this class period, every student should have at least
one general research topic idea and one backup or
secondary idea)
 Learn/practice how to use the FIU Library databases
Group Activity: Research
Brainstorm
 Take a few minutes to finish up this activity from
Friday
 In your unit 1 groups (make sure to write down your
group number!)
 Select 10 (or two per student) possible research topics
that you could use in this class. These can be ideas you
mentioned on Monday, things from our class
discussion, or even ideas we just discussed
 For each topic, identify one specific problem that
needs to be resolved or a question that needs to be
answered.
Journal Entry 2
 Focus: Research Experience Reflection
 Take a few minutes to reflect on your experience with research in the
past. Focus on academic research that you did in high school or college
 Do you have a preference for primary or secondary research? Do you
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find one more interesting than another? Why?
How do you think you will use research in your current major or career
of choice?
Was there any particular research experience that stood out to you for
being particularly interesting, difficult, or unique?
Have you employed rhetorical reading, resistant reading, reading with
the grain, and/or reading against the grain in the past?
What do you anticipate this research experience will be like now that
you have the freedom to research a topic of your choice?
Library Databases
Advantages
Disadvantages
 Easiest way to find/access peer
 The sheer number of sources
reviewed sources
 Access to thousands of
expensive academic journals for
free
 The most credible
databases/sources you will find
anywhere
 (You will be required to use at
least 3 peer reviewed sources
from licensed databases for your
Exploratory Narrative)
can be overwhelming
 Many sources will have
pedantic language that is
hard to read or decipher
 Different databases will have
different criteria and search
protocols that will produce
varied results and take
individual time to learn to
use
Recommended Library Databases
 Easy to use
 Academic Search Complete
 OmniFile Full Text Mega
 Academic OneFile
 LexisNexis: Academic
 ProQuest
 Specific topics/subject
 Use “Browse by Subject” in the left pane of the Research Sources
page
 Recommended if you know of a particular journal you would like to
access
 Comprehensive (but harder to use)
 JSTOR
 Project MUSE
Research Strategies
 Use Boolean operators: special words that affect
search conditions. Do not use these except for their
listed function and never as part of a sentence
 AND: only sources containing both words before and
after it
 OR: sources containing either or both of the words it
separates
 NOT: narrow search to show results with the first word
that do not contain the second word
Research Strategies
 Eliminate function words or words that will appear in
too many contexts, such as “the” or “a” or “first”
 When you want to find an exact phrase, enter it in
quotation marks (Note: this will severely limit search
results)
 Enter search terms in their order of importance rather
than the order they will appear in the sentence (This
prioritizes the first words for certain search engines)
Research Strategies
 Working Bibliography
 As you find sources, write down relevant information so you can
find them again when necessary
 Make sure to indicate title, author, and in what search engine or
location you found the article
 EW p. 183 has suggestions for additional material
 Quote Bank
 Read through each article highlighting and annotating information
relevant to your argument. More information here is always better.
You can eliminate extraneous material later.
 After you read each article, write a shortened version of any quote or
important information in your quote bank
 After you have gone through all sources, read through your quote
bank and see if you have sufficient material to make your argument
MLA Citations
Best references:
 Purdue Online Writing Lab (recommended):
http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/747/01/
 Everyday Writer
 MLA Handbook
 MLA Citations Quick Reference PPT available on class
website
Group Activity : Finding Sources
 In your unit 1 groups
 For each student’s topic, find one source from the library
database that the student could use for their exploratory
narrative. (There should be one source found for each
person in the group)
 For each source, answer the following:
What is the title and who is the author of the source?
What is the main argument or thesis of the source? (The
abstract may be helpful here)
3. What database did you find the source in?
4. How would you classify this source? (Would it be
considered primary or secondary? Is its stance objective or
subjective? )
1.
2.
Homework
 Find the first source you can use for your Exploratory
Narrative.
 Bring a printed copy of the source to class on Friday
 Note: this should be a different source than you found in
class today. However, feel free to save the source you
found in class for later use with your Exploratory
Narrative
 Read A&B p. 251-258