Summary of class on Oct 8, 2008

There are about 20 students participated the lively discussion on Oct 8 during the class from 8 to 11:30 in the morning. There were only three people submitted the required homework. We discussed the ways to overcome the potential obstacles of working on the homework.

1. We have discussed how to choose a topic. The end product of the class requires each student write a literature review in regarding to their self selected topic. It is difficult for some students in the class to find a topic. We have suggested the following points to ease the problem: with the adviser's permission, the student choose a topic that can potentially be the topic of their research during their graduate study; choose to study their adviser's research topic; or choose a topic according to the student's professional interest.
   
2. We have discussed how to justify your choice of the research topic when presenting to the class. First, the significance of the topic need to be established. Only the things that worth to do, worth to do well. Then present your understanding of the related literature - theories, concepts, methodology and potential applications.
3. We have also discussed how to search literature using online tools. We have focused our discussion on the use of Google Scholar - key word search, including the selection of key words, the use of the "cited by...", "related article" and "all xx version" tabs under each search result. In addition, we have discussed the use of Medline (the online database from nlm.nih.gov).
   

Please note that we will NOT have class next week on oct 15. I will attend the Annual Meeting of Chinese Association of Biomechanics in Sports next week. Our next class is on Oct 22. We might need to change the classroom if there were meeting scheduled in the conference room we have been using.

I encourage the participating students to use this Blog space to communicate with me and with each other.