The End (For Now)

Thanks for a wonderful semester! 

Important Announcement: Our end-of-semester celebration will meet at Hard Times cafe at 9:30p.m. on Wednesday 12/7. Not required, but all are invited. The address is 4069 Chain Bridge Road, in downtown Fairfax just before the intersection with Main Street. You can park in the SunTrust Bank lot because it will be after hours. You can see the map here. If anyone needs a ride to the subway, etc. afterwards, I can provide. 

Deadline Reminder: Submit your proposal for the BIS committee by Sunday 12/11 at 11:59 p.m. Please contact me ASAP if this deadline appears problematic given your upcoming schedule. Early submission is virtuous and shall be rewarded by a warm feeling of accomplishment. Proposals should be submitted to Aaron only, though you are welcome to c.c. your faculty mentor as long as you make it clear to him/her that you are not asking for last minute editing advice. (The poor darlings.)

Proposal Elements Reminder: Email a Word or PDF file by the Sunday 12/11 deadline. (Most people find that Docs isn't all that useful for final stage publication, but you're welcome to try it if your formatting demands are simple.) Make sure the following are included in one document: project description, background literature review, methodology, hypothesis/outline, synopsis, timeline, bibliography. Note that bibliography includes only sources cited in the proposal and does not include annotations. Nor do you need to include research logs or other training-wheels exercises we did. 

Reminders for Class #9

Salvador Dali's take on deadline anxiety

Believe it or not, we are fast approaching the final class meeting of the semester! All the stockings proposals are hung by the chimney with care, etc. etc. 

Super Important Changing-My-Mind Announcement: The people have spoken, and the final class meeting has been moved back to its originally scheduled time and place, which is Krug Hall 5 at 4:30 on Monday 12/5. We will likely dismiss at 6:30.

And-What-Will-Happen-in-this-Final-Class Cliffhanger: Surveys, polls, and evaluations galore. An edifying visit with the Sentence Doctor, the Paragraph Transitions Doctor, and the Citation Doctor. Informal and ungraded state of the project speeches. Tidings of comfort and joy.

How-Do-I-Make-the-Acquaintance-of-These-Doctors Clarification: Send me your patients for diagnosis anytime before the final class. (You can email individual sentences/paragraphs or point me to a particular section of your documents.)

Call for Help: If anyone has suggestions about a good place to have our after-class party on Wednesday 12/7, please advise. It will be somewhere close by the campus in Fairfax starting at 9:30. 

Hey-Wait-A-Minute-What-Is-the-Synopsis-Section Clarification: The synopsis section is a brief closing section of 3-6 sentences. I try not to use the word "conclusion" because you can hardly conclude things about a project that you haven't started yet. So what you are doing is re-capping what has been said in the proposal itself. This is your opportunity to get the last word in to convince the committee that this is going to be a great 490 project. 

The Last Booth Reading (this semester): Chapters 14-16

The Last Research Log: The 9th and final research log is designated by the syllabus as a reflection on: "what you learned in this course, the progress you feel you’ve made in framing your topic as a concise research problem, the effort you’ve put into the class and the assignments, and/or the areas that need further work once you begin your actual project." Check out this website for a Jeannie-recommended explanation of what is meant by "reflection." Post in the comments here.

If You Missed Today's Class Exercise: On the final pages of your printed 390 course syllabus, or alternatively here you will find the rubric that the BIS program uses to assess/approve the proposals for continuation to 490. We took a classmate's proposal and evaluated it according to those 7 categories, rating more than satisfactory / satisfactory / less than satisfactory / unsatisfactory for each. Additionally... For 1, highlight elements of your partner's proposal that pertain to the interdisciplinary statement in blue. Or show where they might go if they are absent. For 2, highlight the problem statement, etc. in red. For 3, rephrase your partner's thesis into a brief they say / I say statement. (Your partner is "I.") For 4, rephrase your partner's methods and objectives into a brief statement ("Suzy will do XYZ..."). For 5, highlight two effective uses of supporting information in yellow and two ineffective/lacking uses of supporting information in yellow. Indicate somehow which is which; perhaps use plus/minus or smile/frown. For 6, highlight two effective paragraph transitions in green and two ineffective/lacking paragraph transitions in green. Indicate which is which. For 7, highlight the two best written sentences in pink and the two sentences most in need of rewriting in pink. Indicate which is which. You do not need to complete the "overall score" part. Let me know if you need me to pair you with a partner.

An Interesting Opportunity: The GMU Review publishes student research, and even makes prize money available. 

reminder: Monday's class

Hey everyone, I hope it's been a nice Thanksgiving holiday for you.

This is a reminder that, after a long delay, we will finally have a full class meeting again. See you at the regular time (Monday 4:30) in the computer lab we've been meeting in (Enterprise 420).

Also... because most of you are pretty far along with your project, I would like to devote much of the class session to peer editing of the proposals. This will help your classmates, obviously, but also help you because it will be an opportunity to reflect on the standards that BIS uses to approve the proposals.

This means you need to have your full proposal available, in its most recent stage of completion. (Whatever that is.) Preferably in Google Docs or another electronic format since we will be in the lab.

Other possible topic for the class will conclusions and bibliographies. See you soon!

Reminders for Personal Conference #2 and Class #8

[Breaking News] Office Hour Availability: I know things have been moving pretty fast lately, so if anyone wants to have some office hours time next week I will be available on campus at the following times:
-Monday 11/7... after 3:00 but please call or email if you plan to visit because if nobody's around I'll just go home! 4:00, going home :)
-Tuesday 11/8... anytime between 12:00 - 6:00 but please call or email first as I may be on the other side of campus 

Remaining Classes: Please note the changes here.
-Class #8 will meet on Monday, 11/28 from 4:30-7:10 in Enterprise 420.
-Class #9 will meet on Wednesday, 12/7 from 4:10-6:50 in Enterprise 420.

-Alternate meeting for Class #9 is on Wednesday, 12/7 from 7:20-10:00 in Enterprise 174.

Personal Conference: I will post a sign-up sheet on Google Docs sometime next week and notify you by email. The likely dates are Monday 11/14, Tuesday 11/15, Friday 11/18, and Monday 11/21. But I will work to accommodate your schedule. 

Reading Assignments:

-Craft of Research chapters 14-16. 

-You may also find it helpful to review They Say I Say chapters 7, 8, and 10.

Small Writing Assignments: 

-Research Log #7 is the anonymous mid-term evaluation given in class this week. If you were absent from class, the survey is here.
-Research Log #8 is an "anything goes" blog entry that you should complete prior to your personal conference... I see it serving as an ice-breaker.

Big Writing Assignments: 

-If you haven't completed the annotated bibliography (10 entries), the background literature review (1st draft), or the methodology (1st draft), those take priority.
-The deadline to expand your annotated bibliography to 25 sources is Wednesday night 11/2. (15 for creative projects.) This assignment will be graded.
-The deadline for revising/expanding your background literature review is Monday night 11/7.
-We will then add two further pieces as we continue to work our way to a completed proposal. The deadline for both of these will be Sunday night 11/13 at 8pm.
-The first addition is a section that is officially known in the BIS program as the "evidence" section (for investigative projects) or the "technique" section (for creative projects). I prefer to think of it as a hypothesis and outline section, because I feel calling it anything else is really premature. The main function it serves is to help you create a mental plan for what is going to go in the main body of your essay next semester once you start carrying out your research methodology. So my requirement is a 2-4 sentence (hypo)thesis and then a 3-6 roman number or bullet point outline of potential ideas, sections, or arguments. Remember, this will be the content that follows your background literature review and methodology section, so no need to duplicate those. For creative projects, I would suggest this deadline as an opportunity to rewrite your separate technique section or the more technical elements of your methodology section.
-The second addition is a project timeline. The starting date should be "12/21 - proposal approved" and the ending date should be "5/9 - final presentation." All the dates in between are yours to determine according to the needs of your project. (Note that that approval date is very pessimistic and it will probably come much earlier. And that the presentation date is more of a ballpark estimate.)

Mark Your Calendar: BIS 490 fall capstone presentations will be held in the Johnson Center's 3rd Floor Meeting Rooms on Thursday, December 15, 2011, from 4:30 to 7:30 p.m., with refreshments to follow. Attendance is strongly recommended for 390 students.

Reminders for Class #7

The next two classes (10/31 and 11/14) will also meet in the computer lab in Enterprise 420. 

Reading: 

-Read Craft of Research chapters 7-10 and 12-13.
-If your research methods will include interviews, surveys, or behavioral observation, click here to read this short article by Kim Eby. 
 -If you still feel unclear about what a scholarly source is, this brief handout might be helpful. 

Writing: 

-Obviously if I don't have your annotated bibliography (10 sources) and background literature review, those are absolute priorities at this point.
-Write the first draft of your methodology section by Sunday night Oct. 30th. Here are the sample methodologies we reviewed in class: A, B, C. Also remember to post your comment about one of the sample methodologies by Thursday Oct. 27th.

-Expand your annotated bibliography to 25 sources by Wednesday night Nov. 2nd (15 for "creative" projects). You can use the same format and just add to what you already have. Note for fair warning: according to the syllabus this is the point at which I will grade the annotated bibliography.

-The corresponding revision to the background literature review will be due on Monday night Nov. 7th.

That Crazy Movie About the Physics Dissertation: is here.

Reminders for Personal Conferences and Class #6

Class will not meet again until Monday 10/24. Here are some additional resources on primary vs. secondary sources and scholarly vs. popular sources, as promised. Jamie from Wednesday passed along another site you might find helpful.

Personal Conferences: Make sure you sign up for a time on the Google Doc I shared to you. The conference dates are 10/10, 10/11, 10/12, 10/17, and 10/19, but you should only sign up for one 20-minute slot. It's fine for you to sign up for one of the Wednesday slots if they fit your schedule better. Make sure the following are accessible in some manner to both of us during the conference: concept map, project description, annotated bibliography.

Reading Homework: Please read the sequels to our textbooks, Graff & Birkenstein's He Said / She Said and Booth et al.'s The Craft of Decorative Napkin-Folding. Just kidding, there's no reading homework. 

Random Google Docs note: They have apparently moved the "email collaborators" tab into the "File" menu.

Annotated Bibliography: Share me an A.B. with at least 10 entries. This needs to be done by the time of your conference meeting so we can take a look at it together. We will expand this to 25 entries by 10/30. Here is a sample of a pretty good A.B. from last year. As given today, the format is: 1) Bibliographic Citation for source according to the discipline-specific style standard you've selected. Then the annotation: 2) Thesis or main idea of source... WHAT is being argued. 3) Evidence or method of source... HOW is it being argued. 3) Audience of source... WHO are the readers it addresses. 4) Purpose of source... WHY is it written? What is the author trying to accomplish? These last four could be accomplished in 2-4 sentences. You can write more if it's helpful, but don't write a novel. 5) Is the source your "family," "friend," "enemy," or a "one-night-stand"? ("Strangers" and "help wanted" are important to classify but shouldn't be included in your annotated bibliography. Remember you will always reassess your sources, so even friends may become strangers. 6) What makes this source useful to you? 7) What are the limitations of the source, or reasons it might not be useful? 8) This source relates to one (or more) of your others sources how? Those last four could also be done in 2-4 sentences.

Background Literature Review: Share me your first draft of the Background Literature Review by Sunday 10/23 at 8:00 p.m. Remember, the Drafting an Investigative/Creative Proposal handout gives fairly specific instructions. The samples we looked at today are here. Naturally these first drafts cannot be complete because you need more time for research, but you can definitely make a good start.

Research Log #4: As previously assigned, please post a revised list of your 25 research questions by Friday 10/7. I want to make sure to get that in before the holiday weekend because it will guide you as you start doing your background literature research.
 
Research Log #5: During the Monday 10/3 class we did an exercise in which you discussed the types of sources that are commonly used in one/more of your disciplines, the standards of evidence or proof in one/more of your disciplines, and what critical thinking means in one/more of your disciplines... or answer for your partner as you arranged. Please follow up on this exercise and develop further for a blog post. Due by Thursday night 10/13.

Research Log #6: The topic should be the current status of your relationship with your faculty mentor, how you feel about that, etc. Most will want to do this blog post after corresponding with the mentor about their project description, so we'll let the deadline float to allow varying schedules. Let's say sometime before Thursday 10/20, but preferably sooner.

Reminders for Class #5

Next week's class meeting (10/3) will be back in the "dungeon" in Krug 5. 

Reading:

-Booth: “Quick Tip” on page 83, and Chapter 6, and pages 271-276. (And Chapter 5 if you missed that last week.)
-Heffernan and Lincoln: “Guidelines for Critical Reading” from Writing: A College
Handbook (Course Reader).
-Katzer and Cook: “A Step-by-Step Guide for Evaluation” and “Questions to Ask” from Evaluating Information: A Guide for Users of Social Science Research (Course Reader).
-The last reading assignment is a bit complicated... The original assignment was Facione: 2006 update preface from Critical Thinking: What It Is & Why it Counts (Course Reader). However, I am putting this on the chopping block and possibly removing it from next year's 390 Reader. You guys are going to help me decide. Click this link for an alternate article on the same topic. Basically what you can do is start reading the first page or two of both of them (Facione vs. Fisher), or skim along in them both a bit, and decide which one you like better. Then you can finish reading the one you like in more detail. I'll put up a poll and we'll weigh their relative merits in class. 

Writing (yes, these are different than the original syllabus deadlines)

-Share (or email) me a draft of your Project Description ASAP if you haven't done so. I have already given some of you the green light to send this along to your mentor. The second draft should be shared to me before Monday's class (10/3); I anticipate giving that green light to the rest after I read that second draft.
-As previously announced, Research Log #3 will be a follow up to the library session, and should be posted to the course blog by Tuesday night (9/27)
-Post Research Log #4 to the course blog by the Friday night after the next class (10/7). This should be a revised list of your 25 research questions. I want to make sure to get that in before the holiday weekend because it will guide you as you start doing your background literature research. 
-Work further on your concept map if you're finding that helpful. We'll take a look at it in the next class and in our personal conferences, so don't lose it.

Bonus Opportunity: In addition to being the BIS director, Dr. Leonard also organizes an annual lecture series called "Moments of Truth." This year's lecture is next Tuesday (10/4), from 3:00-4:30 in the lobby of the GMU Center for the Arts. The speaker is Chris Myers Asch, who wrote an excellent book about the history of the civil rights movement in Mississippi called, The Senator and the Sharecropper. I can offer an extra credit opportunity of sorts for those who go to the lecture - you can post a brief review/response that will replace one of your nine research log entries.

Fine Print:  

As a follow-up to the library session, I will demonstrate how I found the Boix Mansilla article I posted here a week or two back. So this can be another example of how to use research databases. It is my speculation that Dr. Leonard left the article citation out of the original BIS 390 syllabus as a sort of treasure hunt exercise, but I felt we didn't have the time before. So I just found it myself.

Putting myself in the lazy student's position, because I am one, I go straight to Google for the article citation. I know I probably won't be able to get the article itself, which is likely to be a paid library resource. So the third hit on the article title appears to be the right one, and I get this citation: Change, v37 n1 p14 Jan-Feb 2005 . The first two hits seem to be earlier versions of the article that might have been given as conference speeches. I'm guessing Change magazine refers to its purpose rather than its cost, but that could work either way, ha ha. OK so now I know which magazine/journal I need, so I'll go to the main library page (library.gmu.edu). I click on e-journals because I'm optimistic and then type in the journal's title, and click search. It appears to be that first one, published in New York. So then I click on the JSTOR link, which is a database service that university libraries pay for (with your money), then I get a proxy access password prompt, which is way easier than this process used to be at my old university. At this point, I've apparently been granted access by GMU's electronic library elves. But I'm stumped, because this access stops at volume 36, or year 2004. But wait, why did I look for it on JSTOR when it was available in several other places? Now I'll go back and try Education Full Text, which sounds like what I'm looking for and purports to cover until "present," which should include 2005 unless there is some kind of hot tub time machine involved. Eureka. Now I'm into Volume 37, Number 1. I click full text PDF for the article I was seeking. I save it under a silly filename to my desktop, and then blah blah blah I put it on the blog. Lather, rinse, repeat that process about 10,000 times with more frustration, dead ends, work, and pressure, and that's your research project.

A student asked me a great question that will become pertinent in the coming weeks: If I am writing a project description for an investigative research project, does it make more sense to write an explanatory thesis rather that an argumentative thesis? I always thought that an "investigation" would have very little argument or none at all.

This is the answer I gave: Sorry that the terminology is confusing here. I want to make it clear that the investigative projects are all meant to develop an argumentative thesis. I suppose the background literature review that both investigative and creative projects do could be deemed "explanatory," but even there you are generally selecting, organizing, and framing the explanation to suit the nature of your project. There is no such thing as an explanatory thesis. An explanatory thesis would be, "I claim that in the pages that follow, I will be giving you pertinent information about the topic." That's not what we're going for here. You do need to make a value-added contribution to the interdisciplinary research conversation about the topic. Remember, no "book reports."