March 7

Today we will go over the Unit 2 – Reflective Annotated Bibliography assignment.  An important point I want you to keep in mind is that this is not an opinion essay (“Why marijuana should be legalized nationally”) but an investigative essay (“How did prohibition laws affect marijuana laws, and with that in mind, how likely is it that marijuana will be legalized on a national level?”).

The library has made us THIS helpful research guide for writing an annotated bibliography.

 

 

HW due Thursday, March 10th:

WRITE: Post under “Discussions/Unit 2” and title it “Unit 2 Draft Introduction.”

Write a blog post (at least 400 words) in which you introduce your research question.

You may find your topic anywhere– from Unit 1 to the blog posts we wrote last week, to your peers’ blog posts! (It’s really okay if two people write about the same topic– I promise you.)

What is important here– and I can’t stress this enough– is that you research something you want to know more about, not something you think you already know the answer to.  You may be curious to know why there are so few African American ballerinas in major companies, or you may want to know how much “housing projects” have changed in New York since James Baldwin wrote “A Talk to Teachers” in 1963, or you may want to know what we really learn from playing computer games.  Just be curious.  REMEMBER YOU MUST GET YOUR TOPIC APPROVED BY ME!

Write it in question form (it can’t be a yes-or-no question, though) You must cover all of the questions in bold:

  • Why are you interested in this question?  (Feel free to talk about your own personal experience with the topic, or to tell an anecdote about your experience with this subject matter)
  • What do you expect to find in your research? (Why do you expect to find this?)
  • What will you do if you find information that goes completely against what you had expected to find? (Will you throw it out? Will you write about it anyway? Will you challenge your own assumptions?)

 

Spend some time on this because this will serve as the first draft of the introduction for your annotated bibliography!