Mapping your ideas is a process that can help you brainstorm and focus your topic.
- Take a blank sheet of paper and in the middle write your topic. Choose something you are passionate about.
- Draw a circle around that topic
- Around the outside of the circle, write all the questions you have about your topic.
- Use a variety of words and phrases
- Pick some of the question that are particularly interesting and add more questions to them.
- Focusing on themes can help you narrow your topic.
- Ask specific question that you are curious about to narrow your topic.
- Pick key words and concepts from your map to create a research question you want to explore.
- Double check to be sure your question fits into the assignment and is interesting to you.
- Use you keywords to begin searching in library database resources for information about your topic.
A video about the process is here.