Chapter 7 of The Bedford Reader

The seventh chapter of The Bedford Reader, titled Avoiding Plagiarism, is split into six parts. The first section talks about what plagiarism is, and splits up plagiarism into two different categories, intentional, and unintentional. This section also talked about how to share credit in a group project. The next section talks about research ethics. This section basically came down to accurately representing your sources in your project as well as the info that those sources contain, and by doing this, readers will take your work more seriously. The third section talked about what common knowledge is, and how anything that is considered common knowledge does not need to be cited or have a source.

The fourth section of the chapter discussed what fair use of a source is and when to ask for permission. Fair use came down to what a random person is allowed to do with copyrighted materials, such as allowing criticism and teaching, while not allowing a person to publish anything based off of that material without asking for permission from the author first. The fifth section talks about how to avoid plagiarism and what goes through writer’s head when they plagiarize, such as the writer running out of time or thinking that they are no good at writing. The final section talked about what to do when accused of plagiarism, basically saying to look through your document to see where the problem areas could be and bringing in notes to show your thoughts form the sources thoughts.

Chapter 5 of The Bedford Reader.

The fifth chapter of The Bedford Researcher, which is titled Evaluating Sources, is split into two halves. The first half goes into extreme detail about what to do to evaluate an article from a peer reviewed journal. This section begins with making sure that the relevance of the source, it’s helpfulness to the audience and yourself, and then goes into many other details to check about the source to make sure that any and all information that is in the source will be helpful, such as who the author is, who the publisher is, when  the article was written, what genre the source was written in, how comprehensive the source is , and the amount of evidence provided in the source.

The second half of this chapter focuses on other kinds of sources that are not written for a peer reviewed journal. This section begins with telling the reader that checking the relevance and credibility of digital sources is key, especially when the information you are getting is off of a blog or social networking site. especially in those cases, checking who the author is will show whether the information in the post will be helpful to you or not. This section ends on talking about checking the relevance and accuracy of any field sources, such as interviews and surveys, to make sure that they can be used in your project.

The Ten Sources

1. Sheese, Brad E., and William G. Graziano. "Deciding To Defect. The Effects Of Video-Game Violence On Cooperative Behavior." Psychological Science (2005): 354-57. Print.
2. Feng, Jing, Ian Spence, and Jay Pratt. "Playing An Action Video Game Reduces Gender Differences In Spatial Cognition." Psychological Science (2007): 850-55. Print.
3. Marie Evans Schmidt, and Elizabeth A. Vandewater. "Media And Attention, Cognition, And School Achievement." The Future of Children (2008): 63-85. Print.
4. Kühn, Simone, et al. "Positive Association Of Video Game Playing With Left Frontal Cortical Thickness In Adolescents." Plos ONE 9.3 (2014): 1-6.Academic Search Premier. Web. 21 Jan. 2015
5. Beserra, Vagner, et al. "Practising Arithmetic Using Educational Video Games With An Interpersonal Computer." Journal Of Educational Technology & Society 17.3 (2014): 343-358. Academic Search Premier. Web. 22 Jan. 2015.
6. Phetteplace, Eric, and Kyle Felker. "Gamification In Libraries." Reference & User Services Quarterly 54.2 (2014): 19-23. Academic Search Premier. Web. 22 Jan. 2015.
7. Manches, Andrew, et al. "Three Questions About The Internet Of Things And Children." Techtrends: Linking Research & Practice To Improve Learning 59.1 (2015): 76-83.Academic Search Premier. Web. 22 Jan. 2015.
8. Gershenfeld, Alan. "Mind Games." Scientific American 310.2 (2014): 54-59. Academic Search Premier. Web. 22 Jan. 2015.
9. Granic, Isabela, Adam Lobel, and Rutger C. M. E. Engels. "The Benefits Of Playing Video Games." American Psychologist 69.1 (2014): 66-78. Academic Search Premier. Web. 22 Jan. 2015.
10. Whitbourne, Susan Krauss, Stacy Ellenberg, and Kyoko Akimoto. "Reasons For Playing Casual Video Games And Perceived Benefits Among Adults 18 To 80 Years Old."Cyberpsychology, Behavior & Social Networking 16.12 (2013): 892-897. Academic Search Premier. Web. 22 Jan. 2015.

Chapter 8 of The Bedford Researcher

The eighth chapter of The Bedford Researcher, titled Searching for Information With Digital Sources, talks about looking through different online search engines and databases to find the information you require. This chapter is split into five sections. The first section goes into how to prepare your searches. To do this, the section tells us that we must review the research plan and proposal and look for key words to help decide what are the key words that must be looked for. This section also talks about how to put those words into a search engine to get favorable results. The second section talks about searching for sources with a library catalog, mentioning how using just a keyword or an author may not be effective, and that you may need to combine terms to get results.

The third section gets into how to look through different databases to find sources, and gives  a list of question to ask yourself about your topic to help narrow the search. The section also gives a list of different databases, such as Citation Indexes and Media Databases. The fourth section looks at how to use different web sites to get sources for your topic, including blog sites and sites like Google. Finally, the fifth section talks about how to search for sources that are not written sources, such as videos, pictures, and audio files.

Chapter 6 of The Bedford Researcher

The sixth chapter of The Bedford Researcher, titled Managing Information and Taking Notes, talks about how to take notes, and how to save those notes and the sources those notes came from. This chapter is split into four sections. The first section of the chapter goes over ways to save and organize any information that you have collected from your sources. This section specifically goes over how to save both physical and digital sources, and gives a number of ways to get information into a format that you can use. The second section of the chapter talks about why notes should be taken, saying that taking notes helps the reader understand the source better as well as lets them keep the information close by.

The third section gets into how you should take notes. Overall, this section just gave a number of ways to record specific quotes and told the reader that if you take notes, you should find a way to record the data that works for you, and then stick with it. Towards the end of the section, it began to transition to labeling your sources in some way so that you know what information that source provided. The fourth section talks about how to create a bibliography, and mentions that annotating a bibliography can help with keeping track of what information came from which source.

Chapter 4 of The Bedford Researcher

The fourth chapter of The Bedford Researcher, titled Reading Critically, goes into detail about how to read a text and generate questions from that text. This chapter is split into six smaller sections, each going into how to read critically. The first section talks about the difference between reading critically, and evaluating, a source. It makes this distinction by saying that evaluating focuses on finding the source reliable, while reading critically is about questioning what the text says and wondering what it means. The second section goes into using you research question to make a position statement, which is described as almost a thesis but still too vague, to help research your topic. The third section of the chapter begins to talk about how to read critically, saying that you have to always question your sources, and that you should keep in mind what the reader’s needs and your needs for the project will be.

The fourth section talks about different strategies for actively reading, including that you should highlight important information and annotate why it is important. The fifth section goes into what specifically you should pay attention to as you read, such as what genre the source is, whether the source is a primary or secondary source, and identifying whether data in the source is usable or not. And finally, the sixth section says that you must read a source three times, each time looking for what information you will need and marking it to find it again later.

Source Evaluation

Source one

1. Sheese, Brad E., and William G. Graziano. "Deciding To Defect. The Effects Of Video-Game Violence On Cooperative Behavior." Psychological Science (2005): 354-57. Print.
2. The material from this source point to how violent video games cause those who play them to be less cooperative with others.
3. The line of argument used by the source is well supported, and I can use this information as a concession to the opposing view.  
4. That the science behind the facts is sound as both authors are teachers of Psychology at Purdue
5. That the document is still fairly relevant, as it was published in 2005
6. This source is supposed to be of the side opposing my own in this issue, so I accept it’s view on the matter
7. The genre lets me know that it was written for a psychological journal, so that improves my thoughts as to it’s help helpfulness
8. It can be an opposing view in the paper
9. I am likely to use it as an opposing view

Source two

1. Feng, Jing, Ian Spence, and Jay Pratt. "Playing An Action Video Game Reduces Gender Differences In Spatial Cognition." Psychological Science (2007): 850-55. Print.
2. The material in this source discusses about how action video games reduces gender difference in spatial cognition
3. The line of argument used by this source is well supported, and I can use this to show how video games are beneficial
4. The authors of this source are all psychology teachers for universities in Canada, which helps the source’s credentials
5. The publication date makes this article relevant still as it was published in 2007
6. This source is very focused in its study, but the results still assist with my report
7. The genre lets me know that this source is very relevant for my project
8. This article would help support that video games are beneficial
9. as supporting evidence for how beneficial video games are

Source three

1. Marie Evans Schmidt, and Elizabeth A. Vandewater. "Media And Attention, Cognition, And School Achievement." The Future of Children (2008): 63-85. Print.
2. The material in this source discuss how electronic media’s effects depend on the content
3. The argument given by the source is well supported and I can use this to show how video games are beneficial
4. I have learned that the authors are both from school that specialize in medicine, which helps to solidify their claims
5. It makes the source relevant as it was published in 2008
6. The source takes a look at many different kinds of media, not just video games, so not all of the data is relevant
7. The genre of the source lets me know that this is a relevant source for my project
8. This source could help supply more information for the good effects of video games
9. I am likely to use this source to support that video games are beneficial

Chapter 2 of The Bedford Researcher

The second chapter of The Bedford Researcher, which is titled Exploring and Focusing, is again split into two halves. The first half goes into exploring the topic that has been chosen for your research topic. This half begins with creating a plan for the topic chosen, which includes gathering people who know about the topic and discussing the topic with them. The first half of the chapter then goes into looking through many different places, such as libraries, bookstores, and online databases for more information on your topic, as well as to take notes from each of your sources.

The second half of the chapter then goes into focusing on your topic. This half begins with trying to find repeated ideas between your different sources, such as central concepts, broad themes, and disagreements that occur within your sources. The chapter continues with reassessing your interest in the issues raised within the sources that you have been looking through. The chapter closes with choosing which of the issues raised from your sources would be good choices to discuss in your paper, and has the reader take into consideration a number of evaluations for which issues would be better, such as readers interest in the issue or if the issue is appropriate topic for the project.

Chapter 1 of The Bedford Researcher

The first chapter of The Bedford Researcher, which is titled Getting Started, is split into two halves. The first half of the chapter asks how you can research and write with confidence. It begins to answer this question throughout this half, mentioning that taking ownership of the project is a crucial part of writing with confidence. After that, this half of the chapter then goes into the process of writing a research paper, listing of the steps and mentioning some helpful hints as how to write a research paper, such as understanding how the genre and design of a document help your reader, and understanding how context will affect your readers.

The second half of the chapter goes into appropriate topic selection for a research paper. The chapter goes into steps for how to choose a topic. It splits this task up into three sub chapters, the first of which goes into studying the assignment to find what the topic would be, as well as the audience and their reasons for reading this assignment. After going into some details about this, it then goes into how brainstorming your assignment is helpful, and some of the ways to brainstorm. The chapter wraps up by having the reader consider the writing situation and the level of interest that the writer has in this topic versus the level of interest the readers will have in a topic.