Research Process
8th Grade Career Study Model for
Grade Level Students
Topic

Careers

This topic is way too broad to cover in
one year, let alone in one research
paper, so we have to make it a more
specific topic.
Narrow the Topic
Careers in the Medical Field (this is still
too broad a topic as it encompasses
hundreds of authors).
 Chose one specific medical field career to
focus your research on.
For example:
 Pediatric Nurse

Statement of Controlling
Purpose


The purpose of this research is to outline my
chosen career path in Pediatric Nursing
noting the criteria and high school /college
or post-college education requirements to
become a Pediatric Nurse focusing on the
specific the monetary and geographical
opportunities available or limited for me.
Note that this statement can be revamped into a
thesis statement later to be included in your first
paragraph of your research paper.
Guiding Questions

What is a guiding question?

What is the purpose of a guiding
question?

What makes a good guiding question?
Questions cannot be

answered with yes or no

too broad

too narrow

vague

opinionated

irrelevant
Questions should be

open ended

clearly stated

relevant

answerable
PURPOSE
Guiding Questions are used to “guide”
your research and help you stay on
track.
 These questions eventually should help
you form your thesis.
 Your thesis contains specific examples
that support your statement of
controlling purpose.

Irrelevant Model Questions
What beaches can I work by as a
Pediatric Nurse?
 What cute doctors can I work with?
 Where can I get a bumper sticker about
being a Pediatric Nurse?
 Do Pediatric Nurses have a slogan?

Relevant Model Questions:









What are the job requirements?
Does the job require a high school education? College
education? Post-college eduation (internships or on the
job training?)
Which colleges in South Carolina offer the major. If none
do, which colleges in the US do?
What does it take to get into the program (at a college)
How much education is required
Where are the jobs?
What is the salary scale like and are there benefits?
What is the opportunity for advancement?
What is the job like on a daily basis?
Pediatric Nursing
The teacher breaks the class into fours and then paired off in twos within the
group of four.
2. Brainstorm with a partner one relevant guiding question about Pediatric
Nursing write it down with your partner.
3. Now turn to your group and share each guiding question that you came up
with.
4. Last, try to write two guiding question by yourself about Pediatric Nursing.
5. In a four people group, you should end up with 5 questions total. One for
each member the first time and one that you create in the end alone.
Guiding Questions about Genetic Pediatric Nursing
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
1.
Prime Questions
Why?
Why is Pediatric Nursing such an in demand career
in today’s society?
How?
How can you help to be proactive right now in the
eighth grade to align yourself with the career
goals that you have researched in Pediatric
Nursing?
Career Rationale


Choose a career
Research information on the following topics:
 Explanation of job
 High school education
 College requirements
 Which colleges in South Carolina offer the major. If none
do, which colleges in the US do?
 What does it take to get into the program (at a college)
 How much education is required
 Post College requirements (internships? On the job training?)
 Where are the jobs?
 Salary Scale, Benefits
 Opportunity for advancement
 What is the job like on a daily basis?
Research with Librarian
Website
Username
Password
Ebsco
horry
hcs
Discus
discus09
infonow
Streamline
fmmedia
123456
Destiny
Career
Research
Lexile
Search page
MLA
Citation
Maker
Click on this link and select Forestbrook Middle School, then select the second tab for the card catalog.
Print out the results for at least one of the quizzes and narrow your choices down to three different careers that you would like to pursue.
http://www.umanitoba.ca/counselling/careers.html
http://www.jobguide.thegoodguides.com.au/occupation/search
http://www.actstudent.org/wwm/index.html
http://myfuture.com/toolbox/workinterest.html (work interest quiz)
http://www.tctc.edu/career_survey/page1.asp (career interest survey)
http://career.usajobs.gov/cig/questions.asp (career interest survey)
** You are responsible for finding other websites and print sources for your project
My three career choices are: 1._____________________________ 2. __________________________ 3. _____________________________
You can search the Lexile Book Database using basic search parameters:
Title (including partial titles -- e.g., "moon" when looking for "Goodnight Moon")
Author (including partial names -- e.g., "rowl" when looking for Rowling)
Lexile Range (allows a variance around a reader's Lexile measure)
Keywords (searches both the book's title and its description)
ISBN (allows you to target a specific title)
This website will be a major aid to you after you have conducted your research and gathered your
information on your Source Information Form. You just select what type of source you would like to
create a citation for and you plug in data. The citation maker puts all of the information in the correct
order with punctuation. Of course you need to also practice this without the website. This is just a great
place to double check your work.
Possible end result
(focus of the research)

How will the research that you have
done on Pediatric Nursing shape your
outlook on what you have to
accomplish and the path you need to
begin right now?
THESIS STATEMENT

The purpose of this research is to outline my
chosen career path in Pediatric Nursing
noting (*A, B, C) the criteria and high school
/college or post-college education
requirements to become a Pediatric Nurse
focusing on the specific the monetary and
geographical opportunities available or
limited for me.
*A, B, C are the specific prerequisites in order to obtain
the credentials for the chosen profession.