Choose an Interesting and Accessible Topic:
Follow your interests and choose a topic that matters--to you and your readers.
What are the real world connections?
Do you have some prior knowledge?
Can you find sources on this?
You Need Some Basic Knowledge to Ask Interesting Questions:
Sometimes you need more background information to ask a good research question. General sources that might not be good scholarly sources for your I.A. (such as encyclopedias and even Wikipedia), but they can help you understand your topic better.
Your First Question Is Probably Not your Research Question:
Once you have a preliminary research question you can pull out keywords and use them to search library databases. Know that as you learn more your question might change and that is ok!
Be Persistent! Research is Iterative and Nonlinear:
As we know more we can ask new and better questions that require new searches. This is a sign you are a curious and resilient researcher--nice work! Keep at it!
Be A Responsible & Ethical Scholar: As you dig in to your research make sure you are accurately representing knowledge and sources. Document sources in MLA Works Cited (recommendation: use Noodletools to cite sources and note taking).
