Defining: What do I really want to find out? Why do I need to find this out? What are the key words and ideas of my assignment? What do I need to do? Do I need to ask my teacher to explain this to me in a different way? Is there anything about the assignment that confuses me?
Do I understand?
A Keyword is a word that represents the main idea or feature of your topic question. There may be up to 5 keywords in your topic which you should highlight and then develop a list of similar words (synonyms) for each keyword.
Keywords are connected with synonyms. A synonym is a word that has the same meaning as another word. For example "College" and "school". You should create synonym lists for each keyword.
Keywords and synonyms are essential when searching for information.
Example:
"The driving age should be raised to 21 years of age" The words in yellow become your key words
Synonyms: Driving age = licence, driver's licence, car licence
Raised = elevated, extended, heightened, higher
21 years = adult
To select keywords to use for your research, start by writing out the question. Highlight the important words and then think of similar words or synonyms (these other words will help with searching the net and databases)
Example:
"The driving age should be raised to 21 years of age" The words in yellow become your key words
Synonyms: Driving age = licence, driver's licence, car licence
Raised = elevated, extended, heightened, higher
21 years = adult
