I-Search: A Personal Research Journey
Section 1: What I Wanted to Know and Why
This section should hook your reader with an engaging introduction. Explain what your
topic is, what you already know (or think you know) about your topic, and finally, why
and how you chose this topic. This section should capture your thoughts about the
topic BEFORE doing any research. (1-2 paragraphs)
Section 2: The Focus of My Research
This section should clearly state your research questions. This is one brief paragraph
that shows the focus of (and plan for) your research. First state your one BIG
RESEARCH QUESTION, then your three supporting questions that will help to answer,
or “unpack” that big question. (1 paragraph)
Section 3: The Research Process
This section is the most important (and longest) part of your paper. In this section, you
will reflect on the steps of your search and where it led you for each of your questions.
You will be writing about how you conducted research for each question, and what
you learned about the research process AS WELL AS your topic. You will include
evidence from the sources you find to show what you have learned. You will have one
paragraph for each supporting research question (3 paragraphs total for section 3)
Section 4: Conclusions I Drew from this Experience
In this section, you will draw conclusions from your research to answer your big
question. You will also reflect on the research process and explain what you learned
from the experience as well as how your understanding of the topic you chose has
changed. (1 paragraph)
Section 5: Works Cited
This section is where you will list all the sources you used to gather facts and
information about your topic. This list has to follow the very specific rules of MLA
Format, which you will learn in this unit. This is how we avoid plagiarism. You should
have at least 3 sources; one source may be a video, and one source must be from
an academic database.