Research Strategy Checklist

Present Rethink / Modify

Plan Search

Plan :
Your research will go better if you start with a good clear idea of what youre looking for. -

Synthesise

View / Select Evaluate

Timescale Complete By

Analyse the topic ! What interests you about this topic / what is your hypothesis / angle ! Concept mapping : key words, names, time periods, ! Possible research methods ! Likely information sources !

Search :
library catalogue (+ Ebrary) which printed journals? ! which e-journals? ! which indexes/databases? ! using what words / phrases? ! read abstracts/summaries of likely-looking articles to assess relevance use search limits such as document type to narrow down your results use any subject headings in the article record to help you assess relevance, and also to give you ideas for useful key words use book reviews to help you decide whether a book will be relevant, and also to help you to discover authors with different critical positions Are your key words getting good results? Is there enough relevant material in the resources youve looked at? Are the same key words working for different resources? Are your results at the right academic level? If youre not finding what you want, why do you think this is? Do you need to look elsewhere other resources? Do you need to try alternative key words? Do you need to reconsider any aspect of your topic?

Select :

Evaluate :
-

Modify :

Synthesise (+ Write) :
Use the help for writing that is available on the webpages and from the Learning Development Tutors - 3 golden rules of referencing: Do it thoroughly, Do it once, Do it right now, for every paper you read! - Treat illustrations the same way!

Present / Hand in
Allow extra time for printing & binding there may be a lot of other people relying on doing these at the last minute and machinery sometimes breaks down!