Full course description
Start Date
Enroll Now!
Price
$249.00
Credential
Foundations for Graduate School Success
Non-Credit Badge
Length
5 Weeks
Commitment
3-4 Hours Weekly
Format
Asynchronous
Leveling Up Your Academic Writing and Research Skills
Course Description
This course is designed to help participants strengthen their scholarly writing skills, with a focus on critical reading and effective summary. In this course, students take a step towards developing their reading and writing skills for scholarly work. Students read a research article and summarize its parts, thus becoming more familiar with the language, structure, and style of the academic conversation.
Throughout the course, participants will engage with research articles, gaining insights into the language, structure, and stylistic nuances of academic discourse. Students will learn to read and comprehend scholarly text, take notes more effectively, and summarize complex texts, all of which are foundational skills for scholarly writing. To get the most out of the course, students should already have solid writing skills and be ready to take the next step.
The total length of time required to complete the course is approximately 5 weeks. Students should expect to spend about 3-4 hours per week working with the materials and assignments.
The course is made up of 5 modules:
- Introduction to Research
- Sources and Citations
- Annotation and Evaluation
- Refining Research and Writing Skills
- Synthesizing and Reflecting on Research
Each module consists of lessons, opportunities for practicing academic skills, interactive discussion boards, and graded activities. The course is asynchronous, which means that the lessons and their activities can be completed at any time of day or night.
Learning Objectives
- Develop the ability to formulate critical reading and academic discussion questions to analyze and assess articles and videos effectively
- Identify key topics in a field or sub-field and efficiently analyze academic articles using skimming and scanning strategies.
- Evaluate and critique academic research articles through considering argument, research methods or inquiry design, and results/conclusions
- Compile a list of key secondary research articles on a focused sub-topic of your field of study
- Analyze academic citations to assess accuracy and adherence to scholarly conventions
- Review and revise personal texts for clarity in rhetoric, organization, tone, and grammar, professional language
- Evaluate and critique research annotations to identify strengths, weaknesses, and areas for improvement
Target Learner
Ideal for individuals preparing to enter a Master’s or Doctoral (Ph.D.) program who want to strengthen their scholarly research and writing skills, including those who may feel uncertain about the demands of graduate-level coursework.
Course Topics
- Academic Writing
- Research Methodologies
- Citation Formatting
- Information Synthesis
- Literature Reviews
Meet the Course Developers
Policies
This non-credit course is offered online using the Canvas LMS, over a 5-week period. It is asynchronous, but not self-paced. You will have a total of 49 days to complete the course. The 49 days to complete begins on the day of enrollment and under no circumstances will extensions be given. The course is approximately 15 hours. You should plan to spend about 3 hours per week on the course. You will be assessed throughout the course to demonstrate proficiency on the subject matter. You must pass all assessments before receiving the course badge.