Effective communication skills, both verbal and written, are essen.docx

Effective communication skills, both verbal and written, are
essential for human services professionals. By effectively
communicating with clients and other professionals, you better
meet client needs and influence change. In this course and
throughout the program, you have the opportunity to hone these
communication skills through Discussions and Assignments.For
this Assignment, view the webinar “Developing a Paper: From
Discussion Post to Course Paper” in this week’s Learning
Resources. Consider how you might use this week’s Discussion
posting to create a cohesive paper and effectively communicate
your ideas.
To complete this Assignment:
Write a 2- to 3- page paper.
With the “Developing a Paper: From Discussion Post to Course
Paper” webinar in mind, use this week’s Discussion posting to
develop and write a 2- to 3-page paper on service strategies.
Reminder:
Proper formatting and APA citations are required. Refer to the
Writing Template for Course Papers for additional guidance.
Audio: [not on the recording]
Melissa: Hello, everyone. And welcome. I'm Melissa Sharpe,
and I'm a writing instructor here at the Walden Writing Center.
Before we begin and I hand the session over to Michael, I want
to go over a few housekeeping items. First, we are recording
this webinar. Although, it helps when you push the button.
Okay.
Hi, everybody. We are now recording the webinar. And, so, you
are welcome to access it at a later date through the webinar

archive. In fact, note that we record all of our webinars so you
are welcome to look through that archive for other recordings
that may interest you. Also, whether you are attending this
webinar live or watching the recording, you will find that we
have some interactive elements like links and chats, as well as
files which you can find in the file pod. If you look on the
bottom of the screen, you'll see the PowerPoint slides Michael
will be sharing today and you are welcome to download those.
You can interact with all of the links and chats throughout
tonight’s webinar. We also welcome questions and comments
throughout the session, and you can use the Q & A box for
these. Both Kacy and myself will be watching this Q & A box.
And we are happy and excited to answer questions throughout
the session as Michael is talking. You are also welcome to send
any technical issues you have to us here as well. Although note,
there is a help option in the top right corner of your screen. This
is Adobe's technical support, so that is the best place to go if
you need technical help. All right. And with that, I will hand it
over to Michael.
Visual:
Slide changes to the title of the webinar, “
Developing Your Writing:
Creating a Paper From a Discussion Post” and the speakers
name and information:
Michael Dusek
,
Writing Instructor, Walden Writing Center
Audio:
Michael: Great! Thank you, Melissa, for that lovely
introduction. My name is Michael Dusek. I'm a writing
instructor here at Walden University. You can see my picture
there on this first slide. I think I'm contemplating if winter will
ever end in the Midwest, but I can’t be sure. Anyway, today the
webinar that I'm going to be delivering, the topic for this

webinar about developing your writing and really creating a
paper from a discussion post. Now, I guess I want to couch this.
Before we get going, I just want to couch our discussion here or
my lecture here in the idea that academic writing, all parts of
academic writing, all genres of academic writing share certain
conventions. So, taking something like a discussion post, there's
going to be a main idea. There's going to be some paint points
that are elaborated upon briefly there, and this webinar is really
about expanding that discussion post and making it into a more
formal academic essay or course paper. Sure. But again, before
I move on, I want you to kind of think that the elements that are
present within an academic essay are also present within a
discussion post and vice versa. And this can even be
extrapolated to something like a doctoral project or a
dissertation.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: Learning Objectives
Talk about the
role
a discussion post and paper has in a course
Understand how a discussion post can be a
basis
for a course paper
Identify the
steps
for developing a paper from a post
Audio:
Yeah, today in this webinar, we're going to talk about the role
of a discussion post and paper that these two elements have in a

course. Kind of how they fit into a general course. We're going
to be looking to understand how a discussion post can be a basis
for a course paper. So, yeah, as I've mentioned, kind of using
the discussion post as a jumping off point to expand on those
ideas and craft it into a more formal academic paper or course
paper. And lastly, we're going to identify the steps for
developing a paper from a post. So, we're not just going to talk
about how to do this, we're going to give you guys some steps
for actually doing this should you choose to.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: Weekly Course Assignment and
Writing Process
Course resources
Begin:
Discussion post and responses
Take the Next Step:
Research, explore, & learn
Expand:
Write your paper
Instructor feedback
Audio:
So, here's kind of where these two elements fit into your
general weekly course here at Walden. You start on top by
looking at some course resources, you know, digging into some
of this research, some of the course content that your professor
has laid out for you. As a way of interacting with that course
content, you're going to write a discussion post oftentimes, and

you're often going to be required to respond to the post of your
colleagues. Obviously, here, this is about cultivating a kind of
an academic intellectual discussion around the content of the
course that's delivered that week. Next, when you're looking at
perhaps expanding this into a larger piece, into an academic
essay, you're going to then return to the research, explore this
topic, and learn as much as you can about it. Generally, you can
think of the course content as kind of a jumping off point if
you're going to focus in on this topic and write an essay. If
that's something you choose to do, you're going to need to
return to your research to bring depth and breadth to your
knowledge on that subject. Next step from there, is you're going
to expand these ideas, go into more detail, elaborate on some of
the points being made in that content area and write actually a
paper. Lastly, you're going to turn this in for some instructor
feedback, perhaps a grade on this. But, yeah, these are kind of
how these two elements are situated within a Walden course.
Yeah, as you can see, going from a post to a paper as this
webinar is titled, this is going to be kind of the middle steps,
right? You can see on the top, we start with kind of the
instructor driven course resources, and we end with this
instructor feedback. So, the loop comes all the way around.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: Chat
How do you develop ideas for your academic writing – what
techniques do you use or how do you get your ideas?
Audio:
Okay, then, let's talk about this as a group. In the chat box, you
can see this just come up. I want to you to offer your answer
and let's talk amongst ourselves. So, what I'm looking for is
how develop ideas for academic writing? What techniques do
you use or how do you get your ideas? Yes, so when you're

looking in that idea generation point within your writing when
you're just starting off, how do you get your ideas? Where do
you get these from and what techniques do you pull them out of
your head to write about? I'm going to mute here for a second,
but I'll return in couple of minutes and we can talk about some
of these different techniques that you guys use.
[Pause as students type]
All right, I'm seeing really, really great responses here. Some
people are saying they enjoy brainstorming. One that I thought
was particularly good was this person who talked about looking
within the course resources and thinking about what interest
them. That's a great way to do it. You know, follow your
interest. A lot of research and a lot of academic writing is really
curiosity-based. So, following your own interest is a really
great way to find topics to write about. The assignment prompt.
So, because I'm directed to do so would be kind of that answer.
Sure, that's a good practical answer. Reading and brainstorming,
okay, great. Past experiences. That's an interesting way to let
your own interest or your own experiences kind of guide you.
Yeah. I think we've covered kind of the big ones here. I mean,
when I sit down to write an essay, I think brainstorming is a
really good way to go about this. Mind mapping which would be
somewhere between a brainstorm and outline is a great way to
do this. Outlining was mentioned in this chat also. I would
certainly recommend that for larger pieces.
One that I didn't see that I would offer to you guys is a method
pioneered by composition scholar Peter Elbow. He would say
that freewriting is a great way to kind of come to a topic that
interest you or find something to write about, which is kind of
funny, you know. Writing about anything, leading you to write
about something, but I think freewriting is another really good
technique to use when you're trying to generate ideas. Cool,

thanks for that, guys.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: Begin: Writing and Responding
to a Discussion Post
Submit your Assignment by Day 4
To participate in this Assignment.
Class Cafe
Audio:
So, yes, to begin, looking at crafting a discussion post into a
course paper. Let's look at Writing and Responding to
Discussion Posts. This is going to be a really elemental part of
your time at Walden and your studies here. Being that we are in
an asynchronous environment, posting your thoughts about a
topic and responding to the thoughts of your colleagues about
that topic is really our main form of interaction. So, this is kind
of, think of it as getting a discussion going. Right? That's why
we call them discussion post. But, again, we're going to look at
writing and responding to discussion post here in the next few
slides.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: Students write discussion posts
to…
Evaluate authors
Develop ideas and arguments
Show understanding of resources

Explore questions
All to prepare for papers
Audio:
Students write discussion posts for a number of reasons here.
right? One, it is to evaluate the author. Sure, you're looking at
some of the minds within your field who are offering their take
or their findings of their research, evaluating that and looking
perhaps for gaps in research would be the next step there.
Students write discussion posts to develop ideas and arguments.
Yeah. This is a really interesting idea, because the
conversations that arise from discussion posts are from
intellectual conversation in general often have a way of
sharpening our ideas and even refining it into something like an
argument, right? Having an intellectual or informed discussion
with a colleague about an idea can really tell you what you
think about that idea in an interesting way. We use discussion
post or students write discussion post to show understanding of
resources. Yeah, to show that you've gained this knowledge and
a discussion post in that context would be displaying this
knowledge. And lastly, students write discussion posts to
explore questions. Yeah, to look into these questions that are
within your field and from the course resources perhaps offer
some sort of solution to that, right?
Now, what maybe obvious here but maybe not, is that all of
these intellectual activities really lead up to writing a paper.
Right? This all have to do with having your ideas challenged,
refining your ideas, and really coming to a point where you
know what is out there that's said about your topic, and what
you want to argue, or how you want to lend your voice to this
larger conversation that goes on in each field. So, again think of
it like this, think about the discussion post as in some ways,
laying the foundation, this intellectual foundation for you to

actually write a paper of your own and add your voice to this
larger discussion.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: In the post….
Practice academic writing:
Make a claim
Organize logically & develop paragraphs
Support with evidence
Proof for grammar and APA
Avoid informal language
Test out ideas:
Reflect on your own experience
Apply the learning resources to a new context
Analyze and critique what you’re learning
More tips:
“Writing and Responding to Discussion Posts”

Audio:
Yeah, in a post, there are some other things going on here,
right? In terms of practicing academic writing, how this relates
to perhaps a larger piece, you're making claims. You're offering
your opinion, right? Or the opinion that's based on the resources
that you've encountered. You're going to organize logically and
develop paragraphs. Yeah, this is still within a discussion post
context here. You're going to craft full paragraphs. You're going
to support your point with evidence. Absolutely. This is
elemental in academic writing. We need to support our points
with strong evidence so that the reader beliefs what we're
talking about and recognizes that we are an authority in this
topic area. It will help you proof for grammar and APA. Yeah,
absolutely. This is kind of a low stakes way for you to try on
using APA formatting or some grammar concepts that may not
be super familiar to you, right? Before we go into a large
academic essay, it's nice to be able to try on some of these rules
if you don't know them by heart.
And practice academic writing, it also includes avoiding
informal language. We want to speak with a scholarly
authoritative tone. Yeah, as many things within academic
writing, this builds your authority to the reader. It shows to the
reader that you know what you're talking about, and they can
believe what you're saying. Yeah. In terms of testing out ideas
within a discussion post, it really gives you some space to
reflect on your own experience. Whereas, your experience might
be less applicable in a course paper, a discussion post lets you
bring that in. That is a more anecdotal area that you can use
your own experience in. Sure. Apply the learning resources to a
new context. Absolutely. So, taking some of the resources that
the professor has given you and applying them to new
situations, the application of that knowledge is definitely
something that happens within a discussion post. And it allows
you to analyze and critique what you've learned. And this is,

again, absolutely elemental thing within academic writing and
academic thought. Being a critical thinker and analyzing the
content that you ingest is what we do both in discussion post,
but to a larger extent in course papers as well.
For some more resources about Writing and Responding to
Discussion Post, you can take a look at this link in the bottom
right hand corner here. This is another resource that’s offered
by the Walden Writing Center. If you would like to get a little
bit more in-depth with this specific idea, go ahead and check
that out.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following:
Think of posts as dipping your toes into the pool in preparation
for jumping into your paper.
[Image of someone dipping their feet into a pool of water]
More tips:
Audio:
Yeah, think of a discussion post as dipping your toes into a
pool in preparation for jumping into the water. Now, this might
seem a little metaphorical. Right? And this picture illustrates
that idea of dipping a toe. But this is really kind of what it is.
Right? You're trying on these ideas, you're thinking through a
specific bit of course content before you go on to lend your
voice to this larger scholarly community. Again, at the bottom
right here, if you’d like to delve further into the idea of writing
and responding to discussion post, that is available for you right
there. Feel free to click on that link, hopefully after this
webinar.
Visual:

Slide changes to the following: Chat
Think about a time when a discussion post has been helpful to
you in your thinking or writing process. Complete the following
sentence:
The discussion post was helpful in my thinking or writing
process because _____________.
Audio:
Okay, then, let's talk again. I want to think about a time when a
discussion post has been helpful to you in your thinking and
writing process. Then, complete the following sentence. The
discussion post was helpful in my thinking or writing process
because... offer your interpretation there. What was helpful to
you about it? I'm going to go on mute for a minute or two, and
we'll come back and we’ll talk about this more as a larger
group.
All right. Cool. We have some of our first answers coming in
here. The first, few of them have to do with gaining a new
perspective. Yeah, this is what's really interesting about
discussions and intellectual conversation in general is, it allows
you to see what other people think about this and to try on their
views, to think critically about them, and to even to respond to
them. Sure. Yeah, I learned a lot from my classmates in terms of
new ideas. Yeah, great. Absolutely!
I see another response here. It gave me an idea how to organize
my thoughts. Sure. This is again a low stakes area for you to
start getting a coherent organization to your thoughts. That's
awesome! I see a few more people typing.

I'm just going to give you guys a little bit more time for those
of you who wish to participate.
Okay. Yeah, this has been some really good participation. So,
thank you, guys. But I think overwhelmingly, I saw people were
able to try on new ideas and new perspectives for a topic area.
Which is what discussion in academic interchange or
conversation is really all about. Some of the other points that I
saw here that are really good is working with in-text citation
and APA formatting. Absolutely. Or gave me an idea of where
to start. Some much of writing, I think there's a real anxiety in
writing around, where do I start? Where do I even begin to
discuss this large idea that I have so many thoughts about?
Discussion posts can kind of lead you into that. Right? Thank
you, guys.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: The Continuum
Discussion Post:
Post by Day 2 an evaluation of what you think is
the most significant positive aspect and most significant
negative aspect
of
Schmitt’s classroom management strategies.
Give examples
of where Schmitt’s methods might be effective in your
classroom and why.
Application Paper:
Consider a scenario in which you are recommending your entire

school take on a
classroom management approach
from your course readings. Submit by Day 7 a 3- to 4-page
paper that includes the following:
An explanation of the method you would use to educate fellow
faculty on your approach including:
how you would manage meetings,
what materials you would provide,
and how you would take resistance into consideration.
Audio:
So, then looking at a bit of how to expand this. Let's take a
look at couple of different assignment prompts here. The top
one is about a discussion post. And this should be, for those of
you who aren't new to Walden, who’ve been students for a
while, this is going to sound kind of familiar. So, the prompt
goes as follows. Post by day 2 and evaluation of what you think
is the most significant positive aspect and most significant
negative aspect of Schmitt's classroom management strategies.
Give examples of where Schmitt's method might be effective in
your classroom and why. So, what this discussion post is calling
for is for the student to look at Schmitt's writing about
classroom management strategies and to offer what they believe
is the most significant positive and the most significant
negative. Yeah, that seems pretty straightforward. Expanding
this then into a paper that ask you to apply this knowledge the
prompt changes quite a bit. Here's what an assignment prompt
could sound like for a short essay that would ask you to expand
upon this discussion post.
school take on a classroom management approach from your

course readings. Submit by day 7, a 3 to 4-page paper that
includes the following: An explanation of the method you would
use to educate fellow faculty on your approach including how
would you manage meetings? What materials you would
provide, and how you would take resistance into consideration.
So, one thing that becomes clear here is that you need to expand
on your discussion from the discussion post. The prompt itself
goes into more depth. Instead of asking for significant positive
aspects and specific negative aspects or significant -- excuse
me, negative aspects. It's really getting into more details with
that. It's asking how would you manage meetings? So that this
could possibly be either/or. Right? What materials you would
provide? So, it talks about preparation for these classroom
management approaches. And, again, how you would take
resistance into consideration. So, it's more nuanced, right?
There's more detail that's required to answer the second prompt
than there would be to answer the second. It's calling for more.
Visual:
Research:
Find more evidence
[Illustration of books in a library]
Audio:
Okay. Before we look at research and find more evidence and
returning to our research from a discussion post that we want to
expand and do a course paper. I'm going to pause here and see,
Kacy, Melissa, are there any questions that the group could
benefit from?
Melissa: Sure. We actually had couple of questions come in
regarding the length of discussion post. We had students
wondering if there was a limit to word count on discussion

post? Or how do they know if they’ve included too much in
their discussion post? So, could you speak to maybe the length
or content differences between posts and assignments?
Michael: Yeah, absolutely. So, how long should a discussion
post be? I'm going to give you a very writing instructor answer
here. It should be as long as it takes to fully discuss your point.
Okay? [Chuckles] Now again, I know that's not kind of a
concrete thing. But in a discussion post, you want to be more
direct, more to the point, and get your ideas out there so that
people can respond to them and you can respond to their ideas
vice versa, sure. Discussion posts are going to, in general, have
less detail, you're going to elaborate less on the ideas that
you’re putting forth. When looking at a course paper, you're
really breaking up parts of your discussion post and you're
expanding upon them. Something that would be a sentence in a
discussion post could easily be turned into a whole paragraph
within a short course paper. So how long is too long? I would
say if you're repeating yourself, if you find that you’re making
the same point that you've already made. Or that you're just
being overly wordy. Those are your indications that maybe
you're getting too, you're getting a discussion post that's too
long. Yeah, did that answer your question, Melissa?
Melissa: That did. Thank you. We have just one more question
which is about the formatting of the discussion post. We had a
question about how a discussion post should be formatted.
Michael: Okay. Yeah. There's some pretty significant APA
guidelines when you're looking at writing an essay, right? You
need to have a title page. You need to have page numbers. Your
reference, entry list needs to be on a page of its own. Within the
discussion post, kind of platform, it doesn't really allow for you
to do that. Right? It doesn't give you a lot of space to include
things like page breaks or a title page, or these kind of
conventional formatting needs from a course paper. So, it's

looser just in general. When I think about using APA in a
discussion post as a writing instructor, my mind generally goes
to citation and references. You still need to incorporate this
kind of APA citation formatting and reference entry formatting
into a discussion post. But the larger more general formatting
things that you would apply to a course paper, you're not able to
put them in essentially. So, I wouldn't worry too much about
omitting those.
Melissa: Okay, thank you, those are all the questions we have
for now.
Michael: Okay, great. Then I will move on.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: The Continuum
Discussion Post:
Post by Day 2 an evaluation of what you think is
the most significant positive aspect and most significant
negative aspect
of
Schmitt’s classroom management strategies.
Give examples
of where Schmitt’s methods might be effective in your
classroom and why.
Application Paper:
school take on a
classroom management approach
from your course readings. Submit by Day 7 a 3- to 4-page

paper that includes the following:
An explanation of the method you would use to educate fellow
faculty on your approach including:
how you would manage meetings,
what materials you would provide,
and how you would take resistance into consideration.
Audio:
As a reminder, we were looking at two different assignment
prompts. And thinking about expanding our discussion post into
an actual course paper, a short course paper.
Visual:
Research:
Find more evidence
[Illustration of books in a library]
Audio:
From there, as our circle mentioned in the beginning of the
webinar, you really need to delve in and find more evidence.
You need to return to your research. In the writing, in the
composition community, we talk a lot about research writing as
being a really recursive or iterative process. Right? You are
returning to your research at multiple times throughout your
essay writing, or throughout your research process. You might
start with a group of sources and then find that maybe half of
them don't really speak to the topic that you're writing about.
Then you return to your research and you find some more and
you start writing your draft, and you find that hey, this is a
really strong piece of evidence that I have here, or strong point

that I’d like to make, but I have no evidence for it. And then
you need to, again, return to your research to find something
that supports that idea. When crafting a course paper from a
discussion post, this works similarly well. You need to, again,
return to your research and deepen your knowledge on the topic
that you posted on for your discussion post.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: Outline Discussion Post
Do a reverse outline of the discussion post where you make a
bulleted list of main points.
Example:
Schmitt’s strategies, summary
Positive—creates trust between teacher and students
Negative—could isolate students
Ask yourself:
What parts of my post could I use in my paper?
Audio:
Yeah, outlining a discussion post. Yeah, do a reverse outline of
a discussion post where you make a bulleted list of the main
points. Reverse outlines are great, what you’re doing is you’re
picking apart a discussion post or even a paper and looking at
its main points. Similar to a traditional outline, you're looking
at how these ideas work together in terms of their organization.
A reverse outline as the title would suggest goes in reverse from
a normal outline. Oftentimes you outline a paper before you
write it. A reverse outline is done after you write it. When

you’re trying to, once again, pull the main ideas out. An
example of this is as follows. First paragraph or first few
sentences of a discussion post is looking at Schmitt's strategies
and summary of what Schmitt had to say.
Moving on, this hypothetical discussion post would then talk
about some of the positive things. Creates trust between the
teachers and students. And, again, talking about these classroom
management strategies. And the discussion post could then end
by talking about some of these negative, some of these
significant negative attributes of Schmitt's theory of classroom
management. Perhaps it could isolate students, perhaps it could
isolate students yes. This is how a discussion post could look if
we were pulling out some of the main ideas. Ask yourself: What
parts of my post could I use in my paper? Absolutely. This
format, this organization is really effective and could easily be
expanded into a larger paper. As you're looking at crafting a
academic piece, you know, a larger academic paper, this is kind
of how -- excuse me. This can inform your organization.
Starting with kind of a summary of Schmitt's strategies, then
looking at a number of positive attributes of these strategies or
of this theory, and then looking at some of the negative
attributes. It informs a potential organization, if you were to
expand it. That's why a reverse outline can be really useful
when looking at a discussion post.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: Outline Discussion Post
Practice
Sample paragraph:
I have used many of Schmitt’s (2016) classroom management
strategies in my own classroom. One strategy that has worked
well for me is allowing students to decide which assignment

they will complete from a list of choices. This approach ensures
students are engaged in the assignment while still maintaining
high standards (Schmitt, 2016). I have observed a negative
result of this strategy, however. Sometimes this strategy can
isolate students since each student is working on a different
project. Another strategy Schmitt recommended is sending
summary reports home to students’ guardians. While this
strategy creates more work for me, it also ensures students’
guardians are engaged in the classroom too.
Chat box:
What are the main points of this paragraph that we
can keep aside for a later assignment?
Audio:
Let's take look at this sample paragraph. I'm going to read this,
but then once we're done in the chat box, I want you to really
pick apart the main points that are here, right? The question that
I want you to keep in mind as I read this discussion post is this.
What are the main points of the paragraph that we can keep
aside for a later assignment? So, yes, without, further ado.
I have used many of Schmitt's 2016 classroom management
strategies in my own classroom. One strategy that has work well
for me is allowing students to decide which assignment they
will complete from the list of choices. This approach ensures
students are engaged in the assignment while maintaining high
standards. They have a hypothetical citation there. I have
observed a negative result of this strategy. Sometimes, this
strategy can isolate students since each student is working on a
different project. Another strategy Schmitt recommended is
sending summary reports home to students’ guardians. While
this strategy creates more work for me, it also ensures the
student's guardians are engaged in the classroom too.

So, again, in the chat box, let's talk about some of these main
points. What are the main points of this paragraph that we can
keep aside for a later assignment. What from this discussion
post can we expand upon? I'm going to mute myself for a couple
of seconds here and wait for you to offer your analysis.
Awesome. I'm seeing some great responses here. If you're still
working on this, no rush. By all means, take your time. I'm
going to go on mute again. But, again, you guys are doing a
great job!
Okay, cool. I'm seeing great answers here, talking about
engaging guardians. Talking about teaching methods here.
Student engagement certainly is an idea that this gets at.
Multiple strategies use as a subtopic for a final paper.
Absolutely, that's a great way to do this. Classroom strategies,
classroom management, students can be isolated. Sure. As I
look at a paragraph like this. I think that there are really 3 main
things that can be expanded upon here. One, is right at the
beginning when they talk about Schmitt's classroom
management strategies. In what follows they discuss two of
these strategies, but as a reader, I'm thinking to myself I’d like
to hear more about this. What other strategies does Schmitt
have? Then we're looking at specific strategies, one about
course assignments and giving the students choices about to
choose an assignment from. Here, we see a positive and a
negative. One, it can engage students more, because they can
follow their interest. Two, it can isolate them, because each
student is working on a different project. Yeah. The last thing I
think can be expanded upon here is this second strategy of
sending summaries home to a student’s guardian. This again has
some positive and negative attributes. It talks about how the

guardians or the student's support system at home is going to be
more engaged in their learning but it's also more work for the
teacher to do so. So, as I’m looking at these three, these would
be the points that I would pick out to then possibly to expand
upon. Good work, you guys. You guys most of them right off
the bat.
Visual:
Research:
Identify Gaps
Review learning resources
Visit the Library
Follow the reference list of what you’ve read
Consider your own experience (as applicable)
Ask a Librarian
:
[email protected]
Audio:
So, from though then, as I've mentioned before, we need to
return to our research to deepen our understanding. If to use our
example of Schmitt's classroom management strategies, we need
to learn more in-depth about these strategies and about some of
the positive and negative outcomes of them. If I were to be
researching this, I would go to the library and really look who
else is studying these classroom management strategies. What
do those studies find? Are these thought of as being positive?
Are these thought of as being perhaps negative or less useful?

To find this information though, you need to, again, return to
your research and identify gaps. You want to review your
learning resources before you do this, then visit the library, this
is a great place to find academic scholarly research, which
should always be the backbone of your academic argumentation.
You can follow the reference list of what you’ve read. Oh, this
is such a great strategy. A lot of the pieces that you're going to
encounter as scholars have extended reference lists, right?
Where they layout the publication information of the sources
that they use. These are just solid gold for doing research
because you can take those ideas and look up the actual piece
that the piece you're looking at used, and really engage with
that piece then as well. It kind of can point you in the right
direction for other voices within that conversation. Lastly,
considering your own experience as applicable. Sure, your own
experience can kind of inform your research. Yeah. As you can
see on the right-hand side of this slide though, we have a link
there to ask a librarian. This is something I really can't stress
enough. Research librarians, think of them as professional
researchers, right? When my in-person students come to me and
ask for research help. I'm pretty good. I can't point them in the
direction of some good resources. But the librarians at any
university, particularly at Walden are going to be able to find
you the best sources to use, within your topic area. They are
experts at finding these. So, by all means, I would really
encourage you to use research librarians. Again, they're pros at
doing this and they can find anything for you. So, take
advantage of them.
Visual:
Research:
Identify Gaps
Outline:

Student choice in assignment = engaged students
Student choice can also lead to isolation
Summary reports to guardians = engaged guardians
Summary reports = more work for the teacher
More Research:
How could I avoid student isolation when giving students
choice in assignment?
Is there a way to make summary reports quicker to create?
Is there research to show how
not
using these strategies negatively affects student and guardian
engagement?
Audio:
Continuing our discussion about identifying gaps and
expanding our research then, let's return to this kind of
Schmitt's classroom management strategies. If we're looking at
student choice in assignments, this can kind of relate to the idea
of engaging students that can open up a further vein of research
for you and potentially even a gap that have not been
researched. Which is what we're always looking for to add our
voice to these larger academic discussions. Student choice can
also lead to isolation. So, this is another potentially a gap
within the research. The only way to find out if it's a gap is to

go and look at the research that's been done in this topic area, to
actually pound the pavement and see what's been published out
there. Summary reports to guardians engage guardians. Yeah,
again, this works similarly well. Summary reports equal make
more work for teachers. Yeah. Totally. These, again, can be
potential gaps in literature. After more research, you know,
looking at developing these research questions to guide our
research. You can think about how can I avoid student isolation
when giving students a choice in assignments? Yeah. This
would be a perfectly good question to guide your research. As
always, we want to start with research questions and look for
answers to those questions. We don't want to start with a
perspective thesis and then try to prove that thesis. We want to
let our research guide our writing. Be open to where your
research takes you. Another possible research question could
be, is there a way to make summary reports quicker to create?
Sure. This could be something that you then turn to the
databases, turn to the librarians, and really try to find an answer
to. Lastly, is there research to show how not using these
strategies negatively affect students and guardian engagement?
Yeah. Again, the point I'm getting at here is that from these
specific main points in a discussion post, if you were to expand
this into a larger research paper, you would then take some of
these, or gather some of these research questions, maybe one,
maybe two that are really good, and look for the answer to those
to then inform your research as you move forward.
Visual:
Explore:
Generate more ideas
[Image of a compass and a camera]
Audio:
And this exploration, as I just mentioned is really the next step

here, right? You need to generate more ideas, follow your
research, see what's out there, explore the scholarly world as it
relates to that topic.
Visual:
Explore
Ideas
Chat box:
What strategies do you currently use
to brainstorm, develop, and expand your ideas?
Audio:
So, yeah, let's chat again. In the chat box, I want you to
respond to this question. What strategies do you currently use to
brainstorm, develop, and expand your ideas? So, once you've
kind of got a notion in your mind of I want to write about this
idea, how do you expand on that? How do you bring -- yeah, I'll
just leave it there. How do you expand on that? Brainstorm and
develop and expand those ideas to then put them into a larger
paper. I'll give you guys couple of minutes to respond here.
Okay. I'm seeing some really, really awesome answers come in
here. I'm going to give you guys one more minute before I start
discussing the trends I'm seeing for those who are writing. So,
don't rush. You've got another minute.
All right. Cool. I'm seeing really good responses here. One that
particularly catches my eyes is about mind mapping and how it's

a great approach because you break the idea into sub-ideas and
look at the organizational principles and themes that emerge
that can inform the structure of your paper. That kind of took
the words right out of my mouth there, absolutely. Breaking
things down into certain buckets, right? Mind mapping these
things into subtopics can really help to inform your overall
essay organization. Before this process, if you're earlier in the
process, another response that really kind of caught my eye
would be to Google search this topic. Google this idea and see
what pops up. You know, although this isn't scholarly, and a lot
of what you find might not be appropriate to use in an academic
essay, it's going to give you a pretty good idea of some of the
conversations that are out there in this topic area. That some of
the things that come up in this Google search, this general open
Internet search is going to be some of the things most likely that
the scholars are actually writing about. The difference is the
popular sources that you find on Google are going to be
summaries of some of these larger conversations. While the
scholarly sources you find at the library are going to be the
people who are actually doing the research. They are actually
lending their voice to this conversation. So, they're not
commenting on the conversation, they are joining the
conversation. There's kind of a big difference there. But, again,
these are really good strategies. From there then, this general
Google search, you can move into the library database and look
for some evidentiary research or some research, some scholarly
research, excuse me, scholarly research is the way to put that,
that is addressing these same ideas that you found in a Google
search. So, yeah, those are some great strategies. Thanks for
participating, you guys.
Visual:
Explore
Ideas

Freewrite
Outline
Mindmap
Take a break
Learn more:
“Prewriting Techniques: Taking the Next Steps”
and
Prewriting page
Audio:
Here are some other methods that some I've mentioned, some I
haven't, about exploring your ideas. One, and this is one I love.
I use all the time with my in-person students. Freewriting.
Freewriting is simply sitting down and forcing yourself to write
non-stop for 10 minutes. Now, Peter Elbow would say, that if
you can't think of anything more to write, that you should just
repeat the last word you wrote over and over again. Or write I
have nothing to say. Or no, no. This is a good strategy in my
opinion, because it kind of takes some of these ideas that are in
your brain and gets them on paper without you having to
worrying about some of the mechanical trapping of academic
writing. When you're freewriting, you're not worried about
where that comma goes, you're not worried about if I’m creating
complete sentences or complete thoughts. This is not what
you’re doing. This is not the focus is. You're just taking what's
in your mind and getting it on the page. Elbow would say
that freewriting is a vehicle to show us what we already know.
It's a way of articulating our views on paper and getting them
from in our head onto a page. I know we've spent a lot of time

talking about this, but it’s very close to my heart. I would
recommend freewriting to anyone, absolutely.
Outlining, or mind mapping very similar. Thinking about some
of these subpoints and subtopics within this topic that you're
working with. And seeing maybe how they can fit together.
Sure. Take a break is another good way to explore these ideas.
There could be kind of this like Eureka moment, right? Where
you sit down to do something completely unrelated to writing,
and you realize, that hey, I want to make this point. This is
perhaps my strongest point. Or this is an idea I definitely need
to expand upon in my research. Taking a break and moving
away from your writing is a really good way to generate new
ideas and to kind of recharge your batteries as a scholar. I've
often found that my best ideas, my most poignant writing comes
from a place when I'm doing something that has nothing to do
with writing. Right? And I'm just doing that kind of intellectual
work to be able to then return to my writing and articulate those
on paper.
For some more or another couple of resources that is we have
that discusses these kind of freewriting techniques are in the
bottom right-hand corner here. We have one that talks about
pre-writing techniques, taking the next steps and one that’s just
a pre-writing page. So, it has number of other resources there.
For those of you who are interested in kind of how these works
and learning more about freewriting techniques, I would
definitely encourage you to take a look at these. Walden has a
number of resources to help you as you get started.
Visual:
Explore
Idea
New Paper Outline

Thesis:
Schmitt’s (2016) strategies of student choice in assignment and
summary reports lead to increased student and guardian
engagement in the classroom.
Student choice in assignment
Summary, description (Schmitt, 2016; Carter, 2017)
Advantages (engagement, better learning)
Disadvantages (isolation)
Mitigating isolation—Refer to new articles I found (Soto &
Gonzalez, 2016)
Summary repots to guardians
Summary, description (Schmitt, 2016; Mathur, 2015)
Advantages (engagement, better informed)
Disadvantages (more work)
Mitigating more work (Department of Education suggestions)

Audio:
Exploring your ideas. So here, we have kind of a paper outline.
And, we're going to return again to this Schmitt's theory or
Schmitt's strategies of classroom management. To break this up
into a larger, maybe end of the week style course paper, this is
perhaps an effective outline for this. Thesis could be something
like Schmitt's 2016 strategies of student choice in assignment
and summary reports lead to increase student and guardian
engagement in the classrooms. So, this is making the point that
Schmitt's strategies lead to more engagement. Right? And what
it's doing here, as you can see in the organization, is it's
breaking these into two. It's breaking them up by allowing
student choice and one by sending these reports home to the
guardian. This is a perfectly good way to break this up. In both
of these then, it's going to breakdown some of the advantages,
some of the disadvantages, and it also includes some of the
sources that this author is going to bring to these paragraphs.
Yeah. This is a good way to go about outlining. I often
encourage my students to include source material in their
outline, because then you don't have to go searching for it when
it comes time to actually write. I think part of the battle with
writing is looking at things logistically, right? Saving yourself
time becomes an important writing skill and a larger research
piece. So, if you can do that by cataloging some of your sources
in an outline, that's a great move and I would definitely
recommend it. The other advantage that an outline gives you, it
allows you to change things, big things, like organization or
paragraph placement around in a really small low stake place.
As I'm looking at this, if I wanted to switch these two
paragraphs around and see if that was more or less effective for
my overall argument, I can do that really easily. As opposed to

when you write the whole essay out, you then need to, you
know, work on your transitions and work on working this
information that was once towards the end of your paper in
towards the beginning. And this can be trickier, right? This can
take longer to do that in an eloquent and succinct way. When
you use an outline, it's just a copy and paste. You can easily do
that and look at how your line of thought is being developed in
that essay. So, I really like outlines for that reason.
Visual:
Expand:
Write!
Audio:
As you write, you will expand on these ideas. Right? Offering
your own analysis. Working with source material that supports
your point. Showing the reader how you mean for them to
interpret the source material. And really expanding on your
ideas and what you think. This is what writing is really about.
Right? We're elaborating on our views.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: Write your Paper
Use your mind mapping, outlining, freewriting, notes, etc.
Be sure to include an introduction, body, and conclusion
Take time to revise and proofread
Return to your discussion post if needed
Ask your instructor questions

Learn more:
Life Cycle of a Paper
and
Revising
Audio:
In writing your paper, yeah, use your mind mapping,
outlining, freewriting notes, etcetera. Once you turn to write, it
doesn't mean that you have to throw your outline away. Right?
You can always refer back to that. If you’re forgetting, what I
was going to say in paragraph 3? I remember, I had something
that I needed to do here, there you go, you can just look back at
your notes, Right? And see exactly what you meant to
accomplish there. Be sure to include an introduction, a body,
and a conclusion. Yeah, this is good advice for any academic
piece, especially, a course paper. You want to have a beginning,
a middle, and an end for your reader. You want to lead your
reader in with an introduction, show them the main argument at
the end of your introduction and your thesis statement, then
expand upon these sub points in your body and lastly lead the
reader out in a conclusion giving them that kind of that circular
feel that you’ve talked about this topic at length and I'm ready
to not talk about it anymore, because I covered it fully. Take
time to revise and proofread. Absolutely. Revision, proof
reading, returning to your draft once you’ve got it on paper.
This is how you make a good essay. I think students often think
that writers will wake up in the morning and be really, really
happy with what they have to say and be confident with their
message and sit down from beginning to end and write this. But,
this is really not how it goes. The best writers that you know the
best writers that you read, return and revise and proofread at
length. Sometimes for months on end. So, don't think that you
need to write something perfect the first time. Be ready to
revise and proofread.

You can return to your discussion post if needed, if you had like
a really good point that you made there, that you think is
getting buried as your drafting this larger piece, by all means
return and you can always ask your instructor questions. They're
going to be a good resource for you and for clarification. You
know? But I'm sure that it would be okay to run some of these
ideas by your instructor. They are going to be the authority in
their field. Right? So, if you're thinking about does this point
really fit within this discussion, that would be a question that
you could ask your instructor.
For those of you interested in more and learning more about
crafting a paper, we have a link here at the bottom right corner
that talks about the lifecycle of a paper and another one talks
about revising and some important things to keep in mind as
you return to your draft to make it better.
Visual
: Slide changes to the following:
Final Recommendation
: Give yourself Time
Course resources
Begin:
Discussion post and responses
Take the Next Step:
Research, explore and learn
Expand:
Write your paper
Instructor feedback

Audio:
Final recommendation. Give yourself time. Time is the word
that’s right back there behind the top little course resources
box. Yeah. As I've mentioned, one of the big challenges of
writing is logistical. It's thinking about time. It's fitting that in.
So, in going from your course resources to your discussion post,
to your research, and expanding into a paper to turn into your
instructor, think about time here. Right? When can I find the
time to do this? When am I fitting this into my life? And be
ready to return to certain steps throughout the process to expand
your knowledge base to remind yourself of where you wanted to
go with this piece and then to eventually craft something that
you feel strongly about and you feel is an effective piece of
writing.
Visual:
Slide changes to the following: Activity & Chat
Consider a discussion post you wrote recently--last week or the
week before.
Did you use it to develop ideas or complete that week’s paper?
If so, how did you use it? If not, how could you use this
webinar’s strategies to use it?
Audio:
Okay. Lastly. Let's take about two to three minutes to do this
one so that we have a little bit of time for questions at the end.
But I want you to consider a discussion post you wrote recently,
last week or the week before. Did you use it to develop ideas or
complete that week's paper? If so, how did you use it? If not,
how could you use this webinar, the webinar strategies, the

webinar I’ve been delivering to use that, and expand that into
your week's paper? So again, think about a discussion post that
you crafted. Did you expand that into a paper? If yes, how? If
no, how could have you done that? We're going to think about
this and we'll be back in couple of minutes here.
Okay, then in the interest of time, we're going to move on here.
But I see many of you have never done this. You haven’t taken
a discussion post and expanded it. I’d recommend doing this.
You're deepening your knowledge to do this. I'm seeing some
people saying they would create an outline or return to their
research before they do so. Yeah, this is kind of what this
question was meant to get after. Returning to your research,
deepening your knowledge about what you wrote about in your
discussion post and then crafting that, picking that apart into
subtopics and expanding upon those subtopics. Sure.
Visual:
Questions
Now: Let us know! · Anytime:
[email protected]
Continue the conversation on Twitter with
#WaldenU
Looking for more tips on writing a discussion post?
Check out the recorded webinar
and
“Life Cycle of a Paper”

Audio:
So, if have your questions, go ahead and put those in the Q & A
box at the moment. I'll field a couple of them in the last few
minutes here in this webinar. If you have questions after the
webinar, feel free to reach out to us at
[email protected]
This is our general writing support email and we will respond
to you with a thoughtful answer or perhaps a resource that can
be helpful to you in exploring ideas of academic writing. For
more tips, for more resources regarding writing discussion
posts, you can take a look at the webinar on Writing and
Responding to Discussion Posts. That would be a great one to
listen to. Or Lifecycle of a Paper. I think both of these were
linked to earlier in this webinar, but I'm going to pitch them
again here because they're really good resources. And if this is
something you struggle with or like to learn more about, I
would point you in this discretion.
Melissa: Thank you so much.
Michael: Go ahead, Melissa. Sorry.
Melissa: We have just two questions for you if you have time.
Michael: Sure.
Melissa: The first one is about are there any, I guess, maybe not
rules, but recommendations for how many sources you should
use in a discussion post versus a course paper?
Michael: Sure. That's a great, great question. In looking at the
place of a discussion post within a Walden course, oftentimes
you're going to be using the course resources that were provided
to you that week, right? You're going to be responding to,
analyzing, critiquing those course resources. So, it's appropriate

to kind of stay on just those course resources there, maybe
bringing in one or two more resource that is you've done the
research on yourself. As you're expanding into a course paper,
you want to bring in more sources, right? You want to expand
your knowledge in this topic area. I'm not going to give you a
number, because that's just not my style. But I would say this
needs to be significantly more. So maybe twice as many? Or
maybe something like that for those of who you really want to
pin this down. But, again, discussion posts are really meant to
engage you with the course content and to cultivate a discussion
with your peers and colleagues about that course content. When
you're moving into writing a paper, you need to expand your
resources and gather more, to become more informed on that
topic.
Melissa: Thank you. And on the topic of expanding a post into a
full paper, we had few questions come in about using a
discussion post as part of a later assignment. Can students take
a discussion post and recycle it as maybe the beginning or
middle of some other assignment?
Michael: Thank you, Melissa, this is a good question. Right?
But the answer is no. No, you can't. So, here's how this works,
right? When you turn a piece of writing to a class for a grade,
this is technically considered a publication, right? This is kind
of on the books as it were as something that you've submitted.
So, if you were to take that and recycle that, put that into a
larger piece, not changing it at all or expanding upon it, that is
considered a form of plagiarism, right? So again, if you want to,
if you're going to use a discussion post in a course paper, you
want to expand upon that and bring in more critical thought,
bring in more sources and elaborating more on the ideas that
you kind of touched on in your discussion post. I'll point you
back to the slide about dipping your toe versus jumping in. This
is a good way to think about this. Yeah. I'll leave it there.

Melissa: Okay, that's a great answer. Thank you so much for
clearing that up. Well, Michael, I want to thank you for your
time presenting tonight. This was such a useful webinar about
developing a paper moving from your post to that course paper.
And I want to thank everybody for attending. The recording will
be part of our webinar archive if you want to come back and
view this at a later date and as Michael said, if you have any
questions, please feel free to use that email address
[email protected]
. Thanks! Have a great day, everyone.
[End Transcript]

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