Elementary education

RESEARCH FUNDAMENTALS

Competency 2000.1.11: Research Questions and Hypotheses – The graduate develops clear research questions that can be investigated and hypotheses that can be tested with empirical data.

Introduction:

In this task you will identify a research topic, examine relevant scholarly articles, write an annotated bibliography, and draft a research problem of interest related to the topic.

Note: Often in research, the words source and resource can be used interchangeably based on a person’s perspective. For the purpose of this task, source refers to the individual article, or dissertation that you are using. Resource refers to where you find that source (e.g., WGU Library, Google Scholar, book).

Requirements:

A. Identify an education-related research topic of interest to you (i.e., the broad subject matter area to be investigated).

B. Describe the process you use to search the literature for multiple abstracts relevant to your research topic by doing the following:
1. Identify at least 7 keywords (or precise strings of words) used for your initial information search.
2. Identify at least 2 resources you searched.
3. Identify at least 2 additional keywords (or precise strings of words) used to retrieve additional information after your initial search.
4. Identify the keywords (or precise strings of words) that yielded the most useful searches (i.e., that retrieved the articles most relevant to the research topic).

C. Develop an annotated bibliography with 10 relevant scholarly articles, 5 of which are empirical research scholarly articles (i.e., articles where data were collected, analyzed, and results were reported).

Note: You might need to read a large number of abstracts (approximately 20–40) to find the 10 that are most interesting and relevant to your research topic.

1. Include an annotation (suggested length of 3-4 sentences per annotation) for each of the 10 scholarly articles that includes the following:
a. complete citation in APA style
b. a brief summary of the article
c. identification of the type of article, including the research approach used if it is an empirical article
d. a brief description of the findings
e. a critique of the strengths and weaknesses of the article.

D. Create a research problem (i.e., the educational issue or problem within the broader topic area).
1. Discuss how this research problem relates to your professional setting or field of interest.
2. Discuss how searching the literature and developing an annotated bibliography can help you identify a research problem within a broader topic area.

E. Include all in-text citations and references in APA format.

Note: For definitions of terms commonly used in the rubric, see the Rubric Terms web link included in the Evaluation Procedures section.

Note: When using sources to support ideas and elements in an assessment, the submission MUST include APA formatted in-text citations with a corresponding reference list for any direct quotes or paraphrasing. It is not necessary to list sources that were consulted if they have not been quoted or paraphrased in the text of the assessment.

Note: No more than a combined total of 30% of a submission can be directly quoted or closely paraphrased from outside sources, even if cited correctly. For tips on using APA style, please refer to the APA Handout web link included in the APA Guidelines section.