F&M College Library

CNX 270: Extinction

The Research Process

Picking Your Topic is Research

This video was created by NCSU 

Concept Mapping

This video was created by the Belk Library, Appalachian State University. 

Brainstorming Activity

What?

What is the topic? What are some related subtopics?

 

 

 

Who?

Who are the stakeholders involved in this issue?

 

 

 

How?

How are the stakeholders involved?

How does this topic impact society, politics, etc.?

 

 

 

Why?

Why does this topic matter?

 

 

 

 

Keywords

Remember that you need to use keywords when searching in library resources. Keywords are simply the main words taken from your natural language query in Google. Think about keywords that might be used to describe your topic and brainstorm synonyms for those words to include in your searching as well. Use "" when you want to search multiple terms as a phrase. Keep in mind that some words may be spelled in different ways. 

Try using AND, OR, and NOT between your keywords to broaden or narrow your search. 

Examples:

"Native American"

indigenous

endangered

dead

language

"United States"

"Native American" or indigenous AND "United States" AND language