The Research Data and Design course introduces students to quantitative and qualitative methods for conducting meaningful inquiry and research. The course will provide an overview of the important concepts of research design, data collection, statistical and interpretative analysis, and final report presentation. Students will gain an overview of research intent and design, methodology and technique, format and presentation, and data management and analysis informed by commonly used statistical methods. The course will develop each student’s ability to use this knowledge in academic level research assignments. Students will work on gathering research enough for a 4,000-5.000 word research paper, compiling a literature review, and a 10-15 minute oral presentation with oral defense.

Unit 1:Students will learn different methods on how to conduct research and take notes. This unit will set a guideline and give the students a base for conducting research. They will be creating research plans, asking questions, gathering data, and getting comfortable doing research. Students will need to identify/define research methods using these to create the best method to accomplish their goal or aid in their contribution. Students will practice doing research for shorter assignments and will learn that research does not always show one answer but instead helps paint a bigger picture on a subject. In this unit students will begin the staging process for their journal. 

Unit 2: In this unit students will be developing Overarching Research Questions and supporting evidence. They will learn how to properly state and develop a research question in both Qualitative and Quantitative data.  The purpose of this unit is to begin asking curiosity questions and exploring potential answers and gaps to those questions. By the end of the unit, students should have at least one but no more than two questions that drive their research. Additionally, students should be open to discovery versus driven by one “answer.”

Unit 3: This unit will focus on benefitting the students on their senior capstone project. This will involve practicing different research methods, learning new strategies, and applying them to their project. In this unit students will learn different types of research approaches, how to conduct qualitative inquiry, and understand common themes found in research. Students will learn why research is so important and why these different approaches are conducted to get the most accurate information possible.

Unit 4: This unit will focus on benefitting the students on their senior capstone project. This will involve preparing the student’s research results for their final paper and presentation. The students will analyze their results to determine if their hypothesis is supported. Their data they collected in the previous unit will be organized and simplified to show the results gathered. The data collected will aid the students in their final project with feature changes and community outreach. The students will also prepare their project for their final presentation bringing their product to the furthest point to completion as possible. Their presentation will highlight their research process from start to finish exemplifying their work and process throughout the year.

Course Objectives 

Note Taking: Taking effective and accurate notes is the first step in gather quality research. During this course students will learn different styles of note taking to find the best method for them. This will be worked on and refined so that students will have an effective way of taking notes that work best for them.

Sourcing and Situation: Analyze sourcing and situation of primary and secondary sources is key in this course. Being able to identify a source’s point of view, purpose, historical situation, and/or audience is the next step in understanding an historical event. Students will learn how to explain the point of view, its purpose, historical situation, and the intended audience of the source. In doing so, the students will learn the significance of the source and its limitations.

Claims and Evidence in Sources: When examining sources analyzing the arguments in primary and secondary sources is critical. Learning to identify and describe the claim or argument of a document is important to research. By examining the evidence used in a source the students will see how it supports the argument made in the source. Learning to then compare the arguments in other sources is the next step. By comparing and contrasting the same arguments throughout different sources, the students will notice a trend in supporting evidence. That same evidence can be used to rebuke a counter argument to the same source. Explaining how claims/evidence support a source will be important in this course.

Making Connections: By gathering information, our goal is to make research connections. This will be done through comparison, causation, continuity and change. We will analyze patterns and the connections between them. Identifying patterns broad and small is critical in forming connections between research. Once done, students will be able to prove their connections through research done.

Argumentation: Students will be able to support an argument using specific and relevant evidence. Students will explain how these specific examples are relevant to their argument. Students will use historical reasoning to explain the relationships of their historical evidence, showing the context and connections they have. By using multiple sources, students can show the depth of an historical issue and broader connections the historical piece may have. Creating an historical argument is the cumulation of all the above skills and one that will add personal thoughts to that of other historical scholars.

Learning Skills and Strategies: Decision-making (identifying situations, securing information, defining criteria, making decisions, taking action to implement the decisions, and examining and evaluating the consequences of those decisions); inquiry learning (being curious, asking powerful and complex questions, observing, investigating, and exploring to develop understanding, discussing and comparing with other works, and self-evaluating and reflecting to monitor progress);  issue analysis (defining issues and identifying key opposing positions, determining conflicting values or beliefs, summarizing opposing positions, and stating ways to persuade others to adopt your position); and, problem-based learning (introducing and discussing a real world problem, collaboratively determining what is known and what must be learned, developing and articulating a problem statement, identifying possible solutions, researching, analyzing and resolving potential solutions; and, presenting solutions with supporting documentation).