Your project proposal is due 17 February
Your major project for this class will be a research proposal. This will mean that you are proposing a piece of research you would hypothetically like to conduct. You will not actually conduct the study so you do not need to be concerned that it is possible for you to conduct – e.g. get the participants, approvals etc. The Diseth and Martinsen (2003) paper in the unit on learning styles is a good example of a full research paper. For your complete proposal (due 4 May) you will need to include an "introduction" section - which is basically a thorough review of the relevant research literature. You will then give the "aims of the present study" - to include the question you are asking, and possible results. A "method" section to include the proposed participants, instruments and procedure you would use in the study. Your "results" section will include the manner in which you would analyze the data you collect.
There are several components to the Research Project Proposal – description (the assignment for the 17th
Feb), and all must be addressed for the description to be considered complete.
1 - Proposed title
2 - The major topic area you will be dealing with (e.g. education of gifted
students)
3 - The specific issues you will address (e.g. methods for teaching gifted
students math at the elementary level)
4 - Five references dealing with your topic.
Please note that items 2 and 3 should be covered in more depth than the examples above - that is just to give you an idea of the type of topic. You need to explain a little about what you actually want to study.
Overall you should give me enough information to show that
-- you
have a clear idea of what you want to research
-- you have done some searching
related to your topic
-- you are sure that there are
enough references to support your topic
-- the topic is directly related to
educational psychology.
Remember that at this point you are just asking a question - something you will research to discover the answer - you should not go into a research project with a clear cut answer in your mind.