7 Module 6

The purpose of Module Six is to delve into the third and final unit of the course – “Research Argument.”

Objectives

The Module Six assignments will guide you toward the following objectives:

• Engage in independent revision to create a strong final Essay #2 argument essay
• Identify a meaningful topic for a career-focused, research-based argument
• Locate and review credible sources to learn more about a topic
• Research a topic to become more informed and knowledgeable
• Assemble credible sources in an annotated bibliography
• Develop a working thesis for a research-based argument essay

Overview“Texture, Handwriting, Sutterlin, Vintage, Antique, Font” by cocoparisienne. CC-0.

We are now moving into the final unit of this WRT 101 course. In this unit, you will build on the skills you’ve gained related to analysis, argument, and writing and apply them to the development of an extended, research-based argument paper about a topic related to your career interest. This process will require two main stages – a research stage and a drafting stage:

1. Research stage: In the research stage, you will use research strategies and resources to gather a collection of credible sources related to your topic. You will then create an annotated bibliography.
2. Drafting stage:In the drafting stage, you will create an extended argument in which you integrate your research to provide support for your argument.

The readings and assignments for Module Six, then, focus mostly on research and source use.

Readings

The Module Six readings cover three subject areas: (1) Essay #3 (and Annotated Bibliography) Instructions, (2) Library Research, and (3) Plagiarism and Source Use.

Essay #3 (and Annotated Bibliography) Instructions

You will first want to become familiar with the instructions for the annotated bibliography and final essay you will complete in this unit. You can open these instructions and corresponding grading rubrics in separate browser windows by clicking the links below:

• Essay #3, Part I: Annotated Bibliography
• Essay #3, Part I: Annotated Bibliography Grading Rubric
• Essay #3, Part II: Research Argument
• Essay #3, Part II: Research Argument Grading Rubric

Oregon Writes Open Writing Text

• Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Avoiding Plagiarism
• Strategies for Gathering Reliable Information
• Seven Steps of the Research Process

MIT Comparative Media Studies – Writing

• Avoiding Plagiarism

Optional – Carteret Community College Library

• This “plagiarism” video is provided by Carteret Community College Library. Click the following link to open the video in a new browser window: “Plagiarism.”

Optional – Cornell University

• “Recognizing and Avoiding Plagiarism”: Go through the modules under the “Logistics” link and then test your knowledge by clicking “Exercises” and taking the quiz. (Note: your instructor will not receive these quiz results.)

Optional – Purdue University’s Online Writing Lab (OWL)

• Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Summarizing

Aside from the readings and tutorials above, your assigned readings include your research and resources that will help you revise your Essay #2 and develop your annotated bibliography.

Moving from Unit 2 to Unit 3: A Few Notes

Essay #2 Revision

Now that you have completed peer-review, you are ready to revise your essays. As with Essay #1, keep in mind that you do not need to input every suggestion and idea offered; rather, what you will want to do is consider and weigh all the feedback. Ultimately, what you will want to ask is, “Which of these suggestions will help me to strengthen this essay and fulfill my assignment goals?” By allowing this question to guide your revision process, you will stay focused and ensure your essay remains focused as well. Be sure, also, to review the “Essay #2” instructions and the Essay #2 Grading Rubric to make sure you are responding fully to the assignment goals. Use the peer-review form as a guide and consider self-reviewing your essay as well.

You will likely also want to read and reread past readings and certain online resources that will help you reach your objectives independently. One of the best ways to become a stronger writer is to learn to identify your weaknesses and use available resources to turn your weaknesses into strengths. This is important! For example, if feedback you received from group members and your instructor for Essay #2 lead you to understand you need to work on paragraph development, look at Purdue’s Online Writing Lab to locate sections that will help you to improve on paragraph development.

No one expects you to memorize all the “rules of writing,” but what you can be expected to do–and what will be most helpful for you to do – is to learn how to use all resources you have at your disposal to strengthen your skills independently. Developing your skills in this area will help you to become not just a stronger writer but a stronger thinker and learner.

Unit 3: “Research Argument”

As noted above, the big assignments for this unit include the following:

• Annotated Bibliography: An annotated bibliography that will contain at least six credible sources, at least two of which are scholarly sources, and
• Essay #3: A research-based argument essay of at least 1300 words

“Clinic, Doctor, Health” by Unsplash.CC-0.

These assignments work together: Compiling the annotated bibliography will give you the chance to engage fully with the research process, and drafting the research-based argument essay will allow you to apply your research skills to the skills you have already gained concerning analysis, argumentation, and writing.

Both of these assignments should be focused on the same topic, and this topic should be some issue related to your career interests or, if you are unsure of your career focus, an issue related to a career that interests you.

You will start with a research question focused on that issue. Then, by researching information, you will slowly come to a more in-depth understanding of the issue and will become credible and informed enough to develop an answer, which will be your argument. Here are a few research questions students have tackled in the past:

Nursing/Medical Careers

• What is a solution for the nursing shortage?
• What is a solution for nursing burnout?
• Is the current healthcare system in the U.S. effective? If not, what could or should be done to improve it?
• Are prescription medication companies taking advantage of consumers? If so, what could or should be done to prevent this?

Business Careers

• What can be done to reduce Wall Street corruption?
• What can or should be done to improve wealth inequality?
• What can or should be done to prevent discrimination in the workplace?

Education Careers

• Should sexual education be part of high school curriculum in Arizona?
• What can be done to improve retention among K-12 teachers in Arizona?
• Is standardized testing helping or harming students in Arizona?

You are welcome to pursue any of these issues. Obviously, deciding on a topic as soon as possible will benefit you, as final drafts of annotated bibliographies are due next module. The sooner you decide, the better!

All of the Module Six assignments are geared toward helping you develop ideas and progress toward the annotated bibliography and essay.

Assignments

Discussions

CD6a: Generating Essay #3 Ideas

The purpose of this discussion is to begin generating ideas for this final “Research Argument” unit. As you are aware, this assignment contains the following pieces:

• Annotated Bibliography
• Essay Rough Draft
• Essay Final Draft

The class readings for this unit provide information about a variety of resources to use to do the research for the project. The next step is to begin identifying controversies related to your chosen fields and locating information that relates to them, and for this discussion, you will do just that. Specifically:

1. First Post: Identify a controversy related to your career field that interests you. Find two credible sources that relate to the controversy. One should come from the public web, and one should come from an online college library database. In your post, describe the controversy and the relevance of the sources you found (about 150 words). In addition, include citation information. See the example post for an idea of how to approach the assignment.
2. Replies: Reply/respond to at least three class members’ posts (about 50 words in each response). Ideally, you should respond to your group members’ posts, but you are welcome to respond to other classmates’ posts. In your replies/responses, offer your thoughts about the controversies and offer suggestions about places to find useful source information about the controversies.

Complete the above by the due date noted in the Course Schedule.

CD6b: Annotations Workshop

Use this forum to workshop two annotations for your annotated bibliography. Click here for a:

• Sample Annotations PDF document
• Sample Annotations RTF document

Use course readings to guide you as you work on summarizing, paraphrasing, and quoting source material. Quoting should be kept to a minimum in annotations (if quotes are used at all). By the due date noted in the Course Schedule, you should:

1. Post your two annotations
2. Post three replies. In your replies, strive for 75 – 100 words for each and address the following:
   1. What is a strength of the annotations?
   2. Are the citations formatted MLA style?
   3. Are the annotations thorough? Are they at least 150 words each? Does the writer provide a good summation and assess the credibility and usefulness of each source?

Use this forum as an opportunity to get a good start on your research and your annotated bibliography and to share your research with class members!

Dropbox

Essay #2: Final Draft

Submit your final draft of your Essay #2 via the Dropbox tool.

Quizzes

Quiz #3: In addition to participating in two online discussions, you will want to take Quiz #3, which contains ten questions and is worth twenty points. Material from the quiz is covered in library tutorials linked under “Readings” above. You can use any resources for the quiz, and you will have sixty minutes to complete it. Topics covered include:

• Databases (what they are and how to use them, tools for searching, etc.
• Methods of source use (paraphrasing, quoting, summarizing)
• Plagiarism (what it is and how to avoid it)

Looking Ahead

In Module Seven, we will move forward with Unit 3, “Research Argument.” You will continue researching your topic and compiling your annotated bibliography. You will also begin organizing your Essay #3.

Quiz #3

1. Which of the following are databases? (Select two.)

• a. Journal of Science
• b. PubMed
• c. ProQuest
• d. Google.com

Answers: ____________________

2. Which are benefits to general internet searching? (Select one.)

• a. Search results are peer-reviewed.
• b. Search engines list the most useful sources first.
• c. Searches can provide overviews of topics.
• d. Searches yield results that are unnecessary to evaluate.

Answer: _____

3. Which are questions used to determine source reliability?  (Select two.)

• a. Is the author a credible source on the topic?
• b. Does the author cite source information?
• c. Is the writing interesting?
• d. Are graphics colorful and animated?

Answer: _____

4. In which of the following situations would a researcher searching a database want to use Boolean operators to combine a previous search term with an additional keyword using “and” or “+”?  (Select one.)

• a. The researcher’s searches yield few results, none of which are relevant or useful.
• b. The researcher’s searches yield thousands of results, any of which could be relevant.
• c. The researcher’s searches yield a handful of useful, relevant results.
• d. All of the above.

Answer: _____

5. Why would a writer benefit from paraphrasing rather than quoting when notetaking?  (Select two.)

• a. Paraphrasing ensures that the writer will cite the information accurately in a final research paper.
• b. Paraphrasing requires the writer to understand a source well enough to translate it into the writer’s own words.
• c. Paraphrasing allows for a writer to record word-for-word passages quickly and easily for use later.
• d. Paraphrasing increases the writer’s level of engagement with the source material.

Answer: _____

6. Select the statement that is “true” below.

• a. Information in library databases is free information that no one has to pay for.
• b. All articles that can be found via library databases can also be found through Google.
• c. Library databases channel students to commercial websites that seem to provide informative articles but actually advertise and sell products.
• d. Articles available through library databases have been reviewed for veracity and credibility.

Answer: _____

7. Imagine a writer is writing a paper on library trends and wants to reference the following quote from a textbook titled Good Reasons, by Lester Faigley and Jack Selzer:

Select the version below that is plagiarism.

• a. Faigley and Selzer recognize that the process of research is changing in the information age: “The distinction between doing research online and in the library is blurring as more and more libraries put their collections online” (254).
• b. Many scholars contend that the information age is having an impact on research: “The distinction between doing research online and in the library is blurring as more and more libraries put their collections online” (Faigley and Selzer 254).
• c. The difference between doing online research and research in the library is becoming distorted as more and more libraries put their collections online. This is causing students and libraries to have to adapt to the changes and challenges (Faigley and Selzer 254).
• d. What we think of as research is changing now that libraries are adapting to the online realm (Faigley and Selzer 254).

Answer: _____

8. Consider the following original passage from “Chapter Six” of The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B. Du DuBois:

I sit with Shakespeare and he winces not. Across the color line I move arm in arm with Balzac and Dumas, where smiling men and welcoming women glide in gilded halls. From out the caves of evening that swing between the strong-limbed earth and the tracery of the stars, I summon Aristotle and Aurelius and what soul I will, and they come all graciously with no scorn nor condescension. So, wed with Truth, I dwell above the Veil. Is this the life you grudge us, O knightly America? Is this the life you long to change into the dull red hideousness of Georgia? Are you so afraid lest peering from this high Pisgah, between Philistine and Amalekite, we sight the Promised Land?

Which of the following is an acceptable method of source use (non-plagiarism)? Select one. (NOTE: The source does not contain page numbers.)

• a. Du Bois describes the feeling of acceptance he experiences in the world of literature and philosophy and then transitions into describing an opposite feeling he experiences in America by asking, “Is this the life you grudge us, O knightly America?”
• b. Du Bois sits with Shakespeare and other authors and philosophers and ultimately dwells “above the veil.”
• c. From the caves of night that swing between the earth and the stars, Du Bois summons “Aristotle and Aurelius and what soul [he will], and they come all graciously with no scorn nor condescension.”
• d. According to Shakespeare, Balzac, and Dumas, Aristotle and Aurelius “come all graciously with no scorn nor condescension” (Du Bois).

Answer: _____

9. Which of the following search options will help ensure that only results that provide access to entire texts of articles will come up in the search?

• a. Date
• b. Peer-Reviewed
• c. Publication
• d. Full-Text

Answer: _____

10. Which of the following situations is considered plagiarism? (Select ALL that apply.)

• a. A writer referencing facts that are commonly known.
• b. A writer not placing quotation marks around word-for-word language from a source.
• c. A writer paraphrasing without including a citation.
• d. A writer referencing and asserting his or her own unique ideas.

Answers: ____________________