Before delving into this topic further, please have a look at this blog by Belgian philosophy professor Stijn Bruers: http://stijnbruers.wordpress.com/2012/06/24/the-five-fingers-of-ethics/

Whether you like this blog or not, the blog does provide a lovely example of philosophy and academic writing based on a conceptual framework. You as writers may start thinking about how you might shape your thoughts into such a framework. In the case of Bruers, he uses a hand and fingers metaphor to organize his thoughts.

Now it’s your turn! You are asked to read one peer-reviewed article concerning the topics at hand. For example, in the first week, we will be examining learner theory from a behaviorist point of view. You are asked to find peer reviewed journals and select an article that examines or researches one of the week’s topics. They must then present to us in the “annotated bibliography” discussion group the annotation and a description of the article in no fewer than 3 sentences. In other words, you must paraphrase the article’s abstract.

The annotated bibliography grade will consist of two aspects: 1) the annotation itself, and 2) students’ reaction to others’ annotations.

To achieve a grade of 4 on the annotation, students will want to give us the following elements in any annotations:

•The motivation for writing the article
•The research question
•A very brief description of how the question was answered
•The findings.
Reference to literature, course discussion, and pedagogical theory will be vital toward garnering a grade of 4. Personal experiences are encouraged, but they will not merit any grade higher than 3 without support of the pedagogy and higher order interactions. Superficial entries of a sentence or two will garner a grade no higher than 2.

You should also be prepared to report to us at the beginning of Tuesday classes at least one of their articles.

You will then be asked to comment on other students’ annotations. Each annotation must be addressed; thus, if you see that a colleague has already commented on someone’s annotation, you must then comment on another one. However, if on the deadline day, there are too few annotations offered, you are welcome to comment on an annotation that already sports a comment.