Assignment: Critical Thinking, Academic Writing, and APA Form and Style

Critical thinking and academic writing are two of the most important skills required to complete your Dissertation.

Critical thinking. Your use of criticalthinking throughout the Dissertation process will help you select atheoretical framework for your study, make arguments about why yourstudy is important, analyze your data, and assess the implications ofyour results.

From previous work, you may be familiar withBloom’s Taxonomy of critical thinking. The revised version is describedin three links in this week’s Learning Resources. Each of the threelinks provides a different slant, visual, and list of resources. Ineverything you write in this course, as well as your other Ph.D. coursesand, of course, your Premise, Prospectus, Proposal, and Dissertation,you are required to demonstrate higher levels of thinking. The levels ofthinking in the revised version are: Remembering, understanding,applying, analyzing, evaluating, and creating. It is at the highestthree levels—analyzing, evaluating, and creating—that scholarly thinkingand writing take place, including the development of your Prospectus.

Academic writing. Your use of academicwriting will ensure that you communicate effectively in all sections ofyour Dissertation, both to your committee and the academic community atlarge. Being able to demonstrate academic writing generally means thatyou can convey your ideas, thoughts, and findings clearly, succinctly,and coherently.

APA format and style. Part of academicwriting is being able to write in correct APA style and format, and thisis a requirement in this course and all others, for each document youwrite. Academic, scholarly writing and the correct APA style and formatextend far beyond citing in the text correctly and writing a referencelist in correct APA style and format.

Academic writing is a skill you will continue tohone throughout the rest of your academic and professional career. TheAPA Manual contains a wealth and depth of information on writing. It isrecommended that you read the entire manual.

To prepare for this Assignment, review thisweek’s Learning Resources. Pay special attention to the “Walden’sDoctoral Capstone Resources” and review Useem B. (1997), “Choosing aDissertation Topic” found in the Walden Library databases as wellas Walden University Library. (n.d.). What is a good topic? Retrieved from http://academicguides.waldenu.edu/topic

Write 2–3 pages on the topic you are consideringfor your Dissertation. How did you come to select the topic? What isyour interest in studying it? What is the problem that makes it worthstudying? What is its significance?

Then, in another half page, briefly explain howyour topic relates to criminal justice. Appropriate use of the APAformat and style is required and expected for this assignment.

Supportyour Assignment with specific references to all resources used in itspreparation. You are asked to provide a reference list for allresources, including those in the Learning Resources for this course.