To What Extent

Experienced AP Seminar teachers know that kids use "to what extent" like a toddler with free access to a ketchup bottle. I'm not here to put ole TWE on blast (ketchup has it's uses), but I did think it would be useful to make a post for my new AP Sem homies where I evaluate the questions my kids just submitted.

Writing research questions is a skill I recommend going over early and often. I usually teach it in the first couple weeks and it's something that is regularly revisited as we do practice units and mock projects. Just for context on what's below, my students have already written a couple practice ones that I didn't grade, but this is the first time I'm grading their questions. 5 points for each of the five qualities of a good research question for a 25 point grade.

Additionally, right before they did this, I gave them three additional tips to guide their writing:

1. Go LOCAL - think about community and audience
2. Get REAL – be concrete and tangible
3. Have AGENCY – choose an issue that your audience can take achievable action on

So, let's get into what makes a good research question and hopefully looking at how I respond to students will help new AP Sem teachers get comfortable with what can be a difficult task that requires a lot of experience to know what works and what doesn't. Below each question is the actual feedback that I provided to my students, copy and pasted for your enjoyment.

Digital art industry is vague and could mean a lot of things. Involved is also vague and really skirts the potential controversy here about AI potentially replacing human artists and depriving people of their livelihoods. In AP Seminar, you don't want to skirt the controversy; you want to pursue it. Additionally, how is this local? Who is your audience?

While there is certainly overlap between prevention and impact reduction, this is textbook nested questions. Choose one or find a word that encompasses both elements. That's really the only problem here. Love that you went local and that you've chosen something that is clearly ongoing. My question is (and you may learn this as you begin researching) what current policies in this state are under debate/scrutiny? Once you know that, I would revise your question to be even more specific.

As it's worded, this is not explicitly an argumentative question; you could answer this just be listing the impacts. However, it's a great issue with lots of specificity coded into it. As along as when you go to write/present, you acknowledge debates over that impact and how AI should or should not be used, you'll be good.

lol - proofreading. 

Even, assuming you choose one of these two verbs, this is too broad a subject. What academic stereotypes? Pick a group that is being stereotyped. For example: "How does academic stereotyping impact the mental health of Asian American high school students?"

The only real problem here is with academic language that leads to greater specificity. This is clearly a controversial topic that invites lots of perspectives (perhaps too many) and can be researched (from lots of different angles). The solution to the problem of too much here lies in enhancing the word "let." "To what degree should America intervene in the development of Iran's nuclear program?" draws the research toward action and invites discussion of controversial extremes such as military action. "To what extent is America responsible for policing Iran's nuclear program?" raises the geo-political questions of isolationism and sovereignty in a specific context and drives the research in another direction entirely. I appreciate the simplicity of this question, but "should we let them" is simply not very specific or academic.

I'm not sure why you specified "directly" but overall, this does not seem like it would be researchable because I doubt Florida's students are that unique from students elsewhere, this does not look debatable to me but rather merely informational in that it would not require a debate, and it generally seems overly broad. I appreciate the attempt to go local, but this one isn't working yet.

You've got a nested question with short and long term effects. This will almost assuredly lead to information but not genuine points of ongoing debate nor does it require a judgement to answer.

I would describe this as a nice try at going local but a misfire. How are Floridian teens different than teens elsewhere? There are many answers to that question, but I doubt there is research targeting Florida's teens and social media and I doubt that that research would differ greatly if it did exist from studies of students from other parts of the country and the world. Without the word, Florida, this question starts to sound a little vague.

Also, is there a debate about the extent that it affects them? I worry that research into this question would not lead to genuine points of ongoing debate, though perhaps the solution to this problem is under debate.

Gee, if only there was a recent law passed about this in Florida that everyone and their mother has an opinion about... gee...

A lot of groups are taking my advice to go local and just inserting the word Florida into their question. I think this question could be much more improved by replacing Florida with our specific school district, which would give you the opportunity to research what other districts have done and then interview local school officials about what seems doable.

Be careful with "how" questions. On first glance, this could look like a simple expository prompt, but this is most definitely an argumentative topic that will require a judgment to answer because the jury is very much out on this issue. This question is good, just don't fall into that trap of treating it like a straight-factual topic when researching. Look for the controversies and for the complexities. They are there.

This is a bit of a mess and I'm not even talking about the lack of question mark. "elected political parties" is not how our government works. We elect individuals, not parties. "Employment disparities" could mean about three and a half dozen different things and "minorities" can also refer to a lot of different groups who are all treated differently and face their own struggles. Just about every term in this question needs to be given great specificity.

I like that you've specified Instagram rather than just saying social media and as we talked about in class, young women is a term that you'll want to narrow down but you can do that once you start digging through research. I think mental health is where this becomes very broad. Why not specify body image or something else?

"To what degree" is a fine alternative to "to what extent" but what about starting with "what is the impact of"?

I like this quite a bit. I think you'll need to define terms like wealthier and global economy in your presentation/paper and you'll need to begin with some context that proves the presumption that underlies this question: that the responsibility lies with developed, wealthy, industrialized nations.

There is an alternative perspective that needs to be explored, however: that action on climate change is WORTH economic harm.

I graded the purple one. It's great. You could play with some wording, ("restrict" might reveal some researcher bias and "own" death is a little odd, though I guess it gets the point across) but overall this is clear, focused, researchable, and debatable.

I like the specificity here and I bet this is researchable, but I doubt there is much in the way of ongoing debate. Perspectives, yes. From ranchers to slaughterhouses to environmental groups, you can find plenty of perspectives here, but I doubt there is much ongoing debate (feel free to prove me wrong) and the way the question is worded lends itself to simple explanation of the ways factory farming affects the environment. Also, why? Why the great plains when you could go local? And is factory cattle farming in the great plains region different than in other regions? And why the word "directly"? Why are we excluding indirect effects? This question raises a lot of questions. It could work, but I wonder if a clearer controversy crystalizes as you begin to research.

I think this question does a good job of poking at the intersection of two different controversial topics: affordable housing and UBI. This provides much needed specificity to both, though I think there are some ways to punch this up still. The question implies federal but there's very little call for or evidence regarding a nationwide UBI. Also, the affordable housing crisis is hitting some areas much worse than others. I might advise that this get narrowed down to a specific state or community.

What kinds of coaches? What do you mean by address? "Critical views" is particularly confounding and cryptic: are you referring to bullying?

Ah, my sweet little embryo... lol... why not just say child or baby? Obviously. you guys want to talk about designer babies and that's a great issue, but I think you've made three weird wording choices. "Able" is different than "allowed." One implies capacity and perhaps lends itself to the scientific and ethical whereas the other takes you in a more legal, cultural, and futuristic direction. Also, "should" raises a question of who owns this decision. Are you interested in parents making this decision for themselves or are you interested in debating regulation? As someone who doesn't know a lot about this topic, I'm curious how readily available this technology already is. You've got a good direction, but do some research and then revise this with some more intentional wording.

There's something incredibly odd about the wording here but the more I stare at this one, the more it works! You're taking on the broad subject of gun rights but looking explicitly at the arguments around the second amendments applicability. This lends itself to legal arguments, historical perspectives, and the cultural and social lens. Weird wording or not, it checks all the boxes.

This is such an interesting question because we don't see a lot of multiple-choice questions in AP Sem but this one pretty much works. I think this could suffer from there being TOO much to research. There are so many different forms of renewable energy, and the question presupposes that we should switch to one. Perhaps adding to the question's end something along the lines of "...to best combat the climate crisis" or "...to most effectively reduce foreign energy dependence?"