Unit 5: Extract

Home Page: Together Step by STEP: A Collaborative Approach for Writing a Research Paper
Portfolio: Brenda Rhyne Portfolio

Unit 1: Establishing the Learning Community  Unit 2: Grammar Building	Unit 3: Search	Unit 4: Transpose	Unit 6: Prepare

Target Objective

• Learners will identify text to be used in the research paper and employ computer skills to move it to another doc

Unit Objective

• The learner will identify a strategy to assist the student with extracting materials.
• The learner will create job descriptions for the roles that students will assume in the Extract phase.

Mini Lecture

From a cursory point of view the objectives for Step 2: Transpose, seem very similar to those for Step 3: Extract. The fundamental difference between these two steps are:

• In Step 2 (Transpose) students not only move text, but they change its arrangement, whereas in Step 3 (Extract) all of the major revisions have been made. Students have completed most of the paraphrasing and categorizing information. So essentially in this phase students simply identify the text that should be retained for the paper. It is important to stress that not all material written on a note card will find its way into the research paper.

That said, here are a few suggestions for creating an environment where students can determine what should be retained for the paper. Essentially, the teacher can do the following.

1. Assign Roles for team members

• Proofreader
  
• Recorder
  
• Facilitator
  
• Reader
  

Proofreader

The proofreader will examine the content to locate errors in the document, and also provide suggestions concerning the best way to organize the paper.

Recorder

The Recorder will write down the decisions of the group and inform everyone via email of any changes that were agreed upon and made to improve the research paper.

Facilitator

The role of the Facilitator is to keep the team on track (i.e. bringing the conversation back to the topic at hand).

Reader All members of the team serve as readers. It is their individual and collective responsibility to review the research paper and report to the team via e-mail any observations they have made that would improve the quality of the paper.

2. In addition to assigning roles, the instructor should provide the students with a rubric. The rubric will help them to identify which statements best meet the criteria outlined in the rubric.

3. Provide examples of what excellence looks like, so they can imitate that.

Another strategy is to use the outline and assign each team member a portion of it to evaluate. However, it should be stressed that students only evaluate they do not make any changes to the document. This occurs only after the team has met and discussed the issue.

Extract

Once students have made a decision, the actual work will begin. Using word processing skills students will move the text by copying it to a new location. I stress copy as opposed to cutting, because it is a good idea to retain all original work. I have found that in many instances pieces of information that I initially deemed as useless turned out to be key statements that brought an idea to life.

Reflection

As you consider your class, which roles do you deem? Are there roles not mentioned above, that you think should be included? If so what are they?

Please write your response on the tab for this page.

Activity

Create a job description for each role. Post these on the wiki, and assign team members to specific roles.

Move on to Unit 6: Prepare

Home Page: Together Step by STEP: A Collaborative Approach for Writing a Research Paper
Portfolio: Brenda Rhyne Portfolio

Unit 1: Establishing the Learning Community  Unit 2: Grammar Building	Unit 3: Search	Unit 4: Transpose	Unit 6: Prepare