Digital Research Paper

Life in the Making Digital Research Paper.html

Project Objective:

The purpose of this assignment is to create a digital research paper based on the information presented on your Life in the Making team and individual wikis. You should consider using the information from the team page to begin your paper, and then move to one of your individual pages [or you may use up to 3 of your sub-topics] to create your digital research paper. In approaching this digital research project, you should:

1. Remember: What do you recall about the LITM topic or topics you researched?
2. Understand: What important information does a student need to know in considering your topic?
3. Apply: What steps can a student take now for the future? How should a student make a decision about his/her career pathway?
4. Analyze: Create a chart to represent the data collected from your survey. What did you learn? What surprised you? What can you do beyond the wiki project and the digital research paper to help students around the world make life-changing decisions about their futures? [see Shari's project]
5. Synthesize: What did you learn about yourself and your thinking that would help other students facing similar questions about career choices? What things did your research suggest as solutions in the decision-making process? If you did this project again, what would help you to be more effective in your learning? You would have liked the project more if....?
6. Create: Build a process that students can use to solve the problem of making a career decision in their lives.

Project components, online resources, daily assignments, homework, and the rubric will be posted to Lesson Plans. Any room changes will be posted on Room 120 door.

Project Components:

1. 5 paragraphs with 8 sentences in each paragraph; a minimum only; you may exceed 8 but not more than 12
2. New research posted on the appropriate Life in the Making wiki pages
3. After last paragraph, create a Works Cited section
4. eSources should be hyperlinked within text; NO NAKED LINKS
5. eSources should include any/all of the following that you included on your wikis and mid-term exams:
   • website articles
   • a survey
   • survey results in chart or graph
   • podcast interviews
   • a blog
   • still images and moving images
   • a video clip
   • websites
   • Google This [will be explained in class]

Paragraph Guidelines:

Introductory Paragraph:

1. Establish the career topic you will revisit [e.g. One of the issues that confronts most students in high school is e.g. career planning, selecting a college, financial planning for their futures, selecting a military career, choosing a vocational school.....]
2. Identify your first support [e.g. career cruising]
3. Discuss your first support [e.g. use research to discuss how career cruising can help you select a pathway or vocation]
4. Identify your second support [e.g. graduation project]
5. Discuss your second support [e.g. use your research to discuss how participating in GP can reinforce your decision in a career, or show you it's not the career for you]
6. Identify your third support [e.g. determining future goals]
7. Discuss your third support [e.g. research supports that goal setting...]]
8. Create a plan that will help students [in career planning--if all you said would fail to help students, what else could they do? [e.g. By creating...]

Paragraph 2: Must have 3 links and 1 image. You SHOULD LINK TO YOUR WIKI PAGE OR ANOTHER TEAM MEMBER'S WIKI INFORMATION PAGE FOR ONE OF YOUR LINKS. A still or animated image will satisfy the requirements. If you create a slideshow, find a video, or create a poll, you will receive extra credit points.

1. Discuss your first support.
2. Using research, define your support.
3. Examine research that adds to your 1st support. What else did you find in your research?
4. What are some of the problems students face in this 1st support?
5. How can your research resolve some of the problems student face?
6. If there is a resource [e.g. hotline number, website, contact, or person in school or the community?....] this sentence would be a great place to identify it.
7. Include one more piece of information that will help a reader understand more about this first support.
8. Conclude your 8th sentence with a summary, and a transition to next paragraph [e.g. Although career cruising can help direct you in a future path, beginning work on the Graduation Project is a hand-on project that can help you make a decision about your future.

Paragraphs 3 and 4: Must have 3 links and 1 image. You SHOULD LINK TO YOUR WIKI PAGE OR ANOTHER TEAM MEMBER'S WIKI INFORMATION PAGE FOR ONE OF YOUR LINKS. A still or animated image will satisfy the requirements. If you create a slideshow, find a video, or create a poll, you will receive extra credit points. YOU MUST MEET THESE REQUIREMENTS FOR PARAGRAPH 3 AND PARAGRAPH 4.

1. These two paragraphs should repeat the process of Paragraph 2, using, for example, Graduation Project for Paragraph 3 and Determining Future Goals for Paragraph 4.

Paragraph 5: Must have 3 links and 1 image. You SHOULD LINK TO YOUR WIKI PAGE OR ANOTHER TEAM MEMBER'S WIKI INFORMATION PAGE FOR ONE OF YOUR LINKS. A still or animated image will satisfy the requirements. If you create a slideshow, find a video, or create a poll, you will receive extra credit points

1. This paragraph should focus on a short summary of the main topic, approximately 2-3 sentences.
2. Then, you should spend the rest of this paragraph describing your possible additional solutions or ways students could benefit that was not included in all the work up to and including the mid-term exam.
3. Think of this plan as what you would tell someone, step by step, if they came to you for advice.
4. Make certain that you make your final sentence positive. What could a teen learn as result of reading your wiki, your research paper? What is the last thing you want students to remember after reading your digital research paper?

Works Cited:

1. The last section of your Digital Research Paper [unless you do Extra Credit] is the Works Cited section.
2. A Works Cited section is an alphabetical listing of all works cited by author's last name.

Works Cited Resources:

1. easybib Citation Maker -- the easiest, and my favorite
2. Sample of MLA Style Electronic Formats (good place to start)
3. Online Electronic Citation Models (more complex variety but excellent)
4. refdesk.com (check this site's research tools)
5. workscited4u (MLA Bibliography Composer / Citation Maker) -- also excellent!
6. Online Citation (check this website to learn how to format your Works Cited section)
7. tech4learning Citation Maker (creates a correct MLA Works Cited citation)
8. studentABC Citation Maker

Extra Credit Resources:

1. Quimble (fast, free, and easy to create survey polls ; read about it here)
2. PollDaddy (for more advanced survey polls; more customization but slightly more complex to use; read about it here)
3. vozMe (converts text to an mp3 file you can add to your wiki because sometimes you just want to be read to; read about it here)
4. Grab a headphone set and listen to the vozMe of the directions above.