Project

Overview

Now is the time to dive into your passion project! This is the phase you'll spend the most time in if you are doing a learning project or a service project. Even if you're doing a design project, you'll need to spend some time here getting the background knowledge you need to learn for your project.

Your Tasks

Research

For this step, you need to complete whatever research you need to understand your topic. You should have identified your topics to research and some possible sources as part of your plan. Now's the time to do that research. You will record what you learn in Trello as cards in the What I Learned list. If you have more notes that will fit easily in Trello, you can keep notes in Google Docs and link the Google Doc file(s) in the Trello cards. As you record what you learn, also record your SOURCES so when you document your project, you can have the correct citation without having to go back and find it all again.

It is important when you are researching to make sure you have quality, reliable sources. If you need to learn about how to evaluate a source, check out the resources section below. You will complete the Analyzing Internet Sources form to evaluate two of your sources to make sure they are good quality.

Research - Analyzing Internet Sources

Interview Your Outside Experts

For part of your research, you will interview an expert related to your topic. Before you can interview them, you will need to ask them if they are willing to be interviewed. DO NOT CONTACT THEM YOURSELF. You teacher will contact them for you after you complete the interview form below.

A template for the letter is on the interview form. You can start with that template and modify it so it reflects your needs and your voice. As you are writing your letter, you need to remember that you should not provide any identifying information. Some things that should NOT be in your letter are:

Your last name
Your school
Your address or your email address
Your picture

Because you only have 30 minutes with your outside expert, you need to have your list of interview questions prepared in advance. On the interview form below, create a list of 10 questions that you want to ask your outside expert. There are some questions to get you started, but you will need to add questions that are specific to your project and delete some of the questions that are less helpful to you. Your most important questions should appear first because you may not get to ask all 10 questions.

Complete one Outside Expert Interview Form for each outside expert that you want to contact.

Outside Expert Interview Form

Document your Work

Don't forget that each time you work on your Passion Project, you should update Trello with things that you have done and things that you have learned. Also, add things to your To Do and Learn list as you think of things that need to be done.

Resources

How to Create Interview Questions

Sources for conducting quality research, other than through an interview with an outside expert:

Nepris - Recorded interviews about different careers
Ask a librarian - Our school and community librarians can help you find sources to tricky questions. Or, you can ask a librarian at the New York Public Library.
Online Databases - These have been evaluated to make sure you are getting reliable information.
Quora - This is a site where you can post questions and other people can answer them. Users provide credentials so can evaluate if their information is reliable or not.
Stack Exchange - Focuses on computer programming and technology
Twitter - This is a way to connect with people working in their field, but you should NOT use Twitter on your own. Talk with your teacher if you'd like to use this resource.
SweetSearch - A search engine with quality results, just don't click on one of the ads in the top of the search results
Google Scholar - Use Google to search for published scholarly articles
Hack your search terms

How can you tell if a website is reliable?

Done with this phase?

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