Dr. Kimberly Rombach's Courses
 State University of New York College at Cortland
Childhood/Early Childhood
 
 

EDU 510 Inquiry into Teaching, Technology and Research
Small-scale Literature Review
Assignment description and corresponding grading rubric:
Small-Scale Literature Review Assignment

A literature review is a descriptive summary of research on a topic that has previously been studied. The purpose of a literature review is to inform readers of the significant knowledge and ideas that have been established on a topic. Its purpose is to compare, contrast and/or connect findings that were identified when reviewing researchers' work. Oftentimes, literature reviews are written to ground a study in a particular context of what is known about a subject in order to establish a foundation for the topic (or question) being researched.

The purpose of this assignment is to facilitate your abilities to research a topic of study so you can learn to (1) identify and formulate an inquiry question that defines what you'd like to learn, (2) apply your knowledge on reading research that you've learned in class, (3) analyze information found in educational journal articles, and (4) synthesize new knowledge into a written small-scale literature review.

Assignment Description:
For this assignment you are asked to complete a small-scale literature review on an educational topic of your choice. You are asked to locate at least 5 educational journal articles on your topic and write a 4 -5 page literature review on the articles you've selected. 

Steps to complete your small-scale literature review:

1. Choose an educational topic that you are interested in studying.

2. Formulate an inquiry question that specifically describes what would like to know about your educational topic.

3. Go to the library to search for and locate journals that include your topic's information.

4. Find articles, read the abstracts and skim the articles to determine if they correspond well to your topic AND inquiry question. 

5. Select at least 5 journal articles and photocopy them for your project.

6. Read your articles and begin to sort and classify them according to their findings.

7. Organize your subtopics in a meaningful way, always considering your original topic and inquiry question.

8. Write an outline for your small-scale literature review.

9. Write your review.

Outline for writing your small-scale literature review:

1. Introduction
The introduction is used to establish the context of your review to the reader. To establish the context, it is important to do the following in this opening paragraph:

a. Define the topic of your study and provide any background information that helps your reader to understand the topic. 

b. Explain your reason (perspective) for reviewing the literature on this topic. 

c. State your inquiry question for this review.

2. Body 
This section of your paper begins with an explanation of how you have organized your small-scale literature review and describes findings from articles that provide answers to your inquiry question. Before you begin this section, be sure that you have sorted your articles into different themes based on the articles' findings (sometimes called results).  After you sort your articles, it is important to give your sorted groups a descriptive name. The names of the sorted articles will become your headings for each of the paragraphs that you write in the body of your review. To write the body of your small-scale literature review, it is important to include the following:

a. Write an introduction paragraph for the body of your review. This
paragraph tells the reader specific information on how many articles you reviewed and how you sorted the articles into common themes. 

b. This will be a paragraph that describes the first theme that you identified and compare, contrast and/or connect the articles you've selected.

c. This will be a paragraph that describes the second theme that you identified and compare, contrast and/or connect the articles you've selected.

d. This will be a paragraph that describes the third theme that you identified and compare, contrast and/or connect the articles you've selected.

3. Summary 
This is the last paragraph of your small-scale literature review. In this paragraph, it is important to summarize the main findings from the articles that you reviewed and to point out the information that you found particularly important to know that answered the inquiry question that you established in the first paragraph of your review. Try to conclude your paper by connecting your inquiry question back to the context of the general topic of study.

4. References
This is the last page of your review. It serves as a listing of all references that you mentioned in your paper. Please use APA style when completing this list.

Small-Scale Literature Review Grading Rubric

The following chart will be used to grade your small-scale literature review:

 

Target

Acceptable

Unacceptable

Content

The inquiry question was well established in the broader context of an educational topic.


(2 points)

The inquiry question was established in the context of an educational topic.
(2 - 1 point)

The inquiry question was not established in the context of an educational topic.


(0 point)

At least five articles were selected and each specifically related to the initial inquiry question.

(5 points)

At least five articles were selected and related to the initial inquiry question.
(5 - 4 points)

At least five articles were selected; some minimally related to the inquiry question.

(3 - 0 points)

The findings/summaries of articles were thoughtfully compared, contrasted and/or connected to each other.

(5 points)

The findings of articles were compared, contrasted and/or connected to each other.

(4 points)

The findings of articles were mentioned with little and or no comparison or connection to each other.

(3 - 0 points)

The conclusion of the review summarized the knowledge found from this review and related the knowledge gain to the inquiry question.
(2 points)

The conclusion of the review summarized the knowledge found from this review.


(1 point)

The conclusion of the review did not summarize the knowledge found from this review.


(0 point)

The references were cited using APA style.

(2 points)

The references were listed.

(1 point)

The references were not listed.

(0 point)

Organization

The review was organized using subheadings. The review was suitably organized considering the contents of the selected articles.
(2 points)

The review was suitably organized considering the contents of the selected articles.

(1 point)

The review was minimally organized and writing was difficult to follow throughout.


(0 point)

Mechanics

There were no grammatical, spelling and/or punctuation errors and transitional phrases were used to guide the reader throughout the text.


(2 points)

There was an occasional grammatical, spelling and/or punctuation error that did not distract the reader.

(1 point)

There were many grammatical, spelling and/or punctuation errors that distracted the reader from the content of the writing.

(1 point)