Research Skills
Overview
Anyone can find something. Finding something, deciding whether to believe it, saying why, and leaving a trail a stranger can follow back to it is a different skill, and it is the one this qualification pays for most heavily. Across both components, planning and research carries 34 per cent of the marks, more than any other assessment objective. In the individual project alone, twelve marks turn on whether your sources were selected for a clear and justified purpose and subjected to critical scrutiny.
This lesson covers the five research skills the specification names: finding and evaluating suitable sources, the ethics of research, formally acknowledged forms of referencing, the avoidance of plagiarism, and the creation of a bibliography. You will interrogate three sources that disagree about the same number, redesign a survey that would have failed an ethics test, and see exactly where a paraphrase stops being a paraphrase.
Objectives
- Finding and evaluating suitable sources.
- Ethics relating to research.
- Formally acknowledged forms of referencing.
- Avoidance of plagiarism.
- Creation of a bibliography.
Mind map
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Lesson Note
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Lesson Evaluation
Congratulations on completing the lesson on Research Skills. Now that youve explored the key concepts and ideas, its time to put your knowledge to the test. This section offers a variety of practice questions designed to reinforce your understanding and help you gauge your grasp of the material.
You will encounter a mix of question types, including multiple-choice questions, short answer questions, and essay questions. Each question is thoughtfully crafted to assess different aspects of your knowledge and critical thinking skills.
Use this evaluation section as an opportunity to reinforce your understanding of the topic and to identify any areas where you may need additional study. Don't be discouraged by any challenges you encounter; instead, view them as opportunities for growth and improvement.
- A survey of shoppers leaving one supermarket is used to describe the views of a whole town. Which quality of the evidence is most obviously weak? A. Its currency B. Its validity C. Its referencing D. Its readability Answer: B
- According to the specification, when is a citation valid? A. When it names a website B. When it appears at the end of a paragraph C. When it contains sufficient information for the reader to find the source in the reference list D. When it is in the same style as the rest of the report Answer: C
- A candidate rewrites a source's sentence by replacing several words with synonyms and keeping its structure, then adds a citation. This is: A. Acceptable paraphrasing B. Acceptable because a citation is present C. Patchwriting, which counts as plagiarism D. A direct quotation Answer: C
- Which of these does the specification list alongside books and the internet as a source that must not be used without acknowledgement and attribution? A. Interviews B. Artificial intelligence tools C. Photographs D. Textbooks Answer: B
- Which assessment objective carries the largest overall weighting in the qualification? A. AO1 Decide and define B. AO2 Planning and research C. AO3 Implementation and analysis D. AO4 Evaluation Answer: B
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Work through these questions in the app
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