Transition into research skills Jane Challinor School of Social Sciences

Stereotype of student carrying out research at University

Where we want/ need them to be researching?

On line searching requires new skills

Building skills....from the inside

Stage 1 First go to the Diigo group site and choose ONE article which you are going to use as your starting point. You should read this article and make notes identifying the main themes. Stage 2 Next you should identify key words associated with this article and use these as search terms. Enter these search terms into e-search to identify a further two related articles. In Stage 3, once you have collected your resources, you should read through or watch/listen to these and once again make notes about the key themes. Stage 4 - This is where you start to evaluate and analyse each of the sources you have read. What research is it based on? What is the aim of the author? How convincing or valid are the arguments used? How does the conclusion differ from – or how similar is it to – another resource?

Stage 5 – start to structure your essay. Create a title or question which your essay should answer You should start with a short and concise introduction which tells the reader the theme of your essay, the main areas you are going to explore and, briefly, what your conclusion will be. The main body of your essay should compare and contrast the articles you have used as your sources. This is not about simply DESCRIBING what each article has said, but pulling out the main arguments and evaluating them. Finally you should draw a conclusion from what you have read. This is not just what YOU think about the issue, it is the culmination of your research and reading, your analysis of the articles and your comparison of the different views. Stage 6 involves citing and referencing all your resources correctly and compiling a Reference List which will go at the end of your assignment.

Starting with bookmarked articles & other web based resources using DIIGO

Screen Capture tutorial on using Library One Search

A first step towards designing a research question ……..

More support: step by step audio/video reminders on structure, referencing, research strategies

Outcomes: module evaluation students’ assignments

Outcomes: module evaluation students’ assignments

Outcomes: module evaluation students’ assignments

Mature student (access to HE course): mid 1 st class

Traditional (<21 yrs) student, straight from school – mid 2:2

Referencing is something I had never needed to use before ; therefore I found this area of academic writing a huge challenge and indeed time consuming. Although I do recognise the need for this. I have found this difficult to grasp and hopefully over the forthcoming years I will find much easier to do. Reading journal articles I have found to be quite difficult and have felt I have not grasped this way of reading correctly. This is something I would definitely like to enhance and hopefully I will learn to do effectively…….. Final portfolio: reflections on the year….

…. and on the module Mature student returning to study after 10 year gap ……[the module] has helped me develop my research skills by learning about different methods of collecting data, writing styles, analysing findings and organising workloads to understand literature by breaking it down to easily get a better understanding. The research skills I have developed from this module have widened my way of using IT in order to achieve valuable outcome and interesting ways of researching.