In this class, you will maintain an annotated bibliography that will accompany your research paper instead of the usual Works Cited section.
A Works Cited or References section contains only the sources that you actually mention in your paper. A bibliography is a collection of all the sources that you read and found useful in understanding your research focus better. An annotated bibliography is a bibliography in which each source has a paragraph or more summarizing the source. It may also have a response to the source. In our class, the annotated bibliography will have the source citation (you may use EasyBib or StyleWizard to help in creating your citations) and at least two paragraphs (the first paragraph summarizing the source and the second one responding to the source). See the examples below.
Example 1:
Nelson, C. (2004). Building blocks and learning. Complicity: An International Journal of Complexity and Education 1, 39-56. Retrieved June 22, 2009, from the Complexity website: http://www.complexityandeducation.ualberta.ca/COMPLICITY1/Complicity.htm
In a qualitative case study, Nelson applies a complex systems understanding to interpreting how ESL students in a U.S. research university learned to write in a first-year composition course. Drawing upon Holland's model of complexity, he shows that learning is similar to the biological processes of reproduction, cross-over, and recombination in cell division. That is, similar to the building blocks of DNA, learning is a process of reproducing processes of writing at one level and recombining different processes and understandings to reach a more complex level of understanding. Accordingly, Nelson concludes that instructors should determine the "core conceptual building blocks" of a particular course and design their lessons in ways that these ideas can be recombined into new and deeper conceptual understandings of course concepts.
The notion of "core conceptual building blocks" is not new. It resembles the concept of ascending from the abstract to the concrete in activity theory. One advantage, however, is that a complexity science approach can connect to more varied phenomena that can the sociocultural focus of activity theory and thus potentially provide new understandings of learning from various perspectives. The major problem in applying these concepts to learning is determining which concepts should be core and most fruitful for recombining in ways that lead to deeper understanding. In particular, the concepts need to cross over into other types of writing.
Example 2:
Munger, D. (2005, December 14). High IQ: Not as good for you as you thought. Retrieved from Cognitive Daily website: http://scienceblogs.com/cognitivedaily/2005/12/high_iq_not_as_good_for_you_as.php
David Munger reports on a two-year study of eighth-graders by Angela Duckworth and Martin Seligman that compared the influence of intelligence and self-discipline on academic achievement. Both IQ and self-discipline correlated with GPA; however, self-discipline was significantly more important that IQ in academic achievement. According to the study, "Most impressive was the whopping .67 correlation between self-discipline and final GPA, compared to a .32 correlation for IQ."
In other words, self-discipline leads to more time in studying, which results in better grades. Or it could be said that practice makes perfect, and the more one practices, the more perfect one becames. That makes sense. One wouldn't expect an Olympic athlete to not put in lots of hours of practice and work-outs if s/he wanted to win a gold medal. However, self-discipline in academic pursuits does not come easily. So, as Munger wonders, "Perhaps the most important question which remains is how best to teach children self-discipline—or whether it can be taught at all."