Research is the fine art of organizing our curiosity to find out what other people have already seen so we can use it to think things that no one else has thought. It is a life skill as well as an intellectual one: there are always things we need to learn in order to do the things we want to do. In this course we put curiosity at the center, learning to ask good questions and find good answers, empower ourselves with information literacy, and become confident thinkers and writers who can back up what they think and say with solid evidence.

This year-long course is organized into three themes: "Organized Curiosity," "See Something / Say Something," and "The R&D Lab."

Organized Curiosity: What is research really, and what’s the point of doing it? In the first section of the course we will look at a different elements of research to find out what they are, why they matter, and how to do them. Working with a range of topics, some of which will originate from the people taking the class, we will explore research by doing and documenting it. Along the way, we will be asking questions like:

What makes good research good? Can we learn anything from bad research?
What kind of information sources do researchers use and why? Are some sources better than others? What makes them better?
How do you know that a research source is valid? What do you do if it isn’t?
What’s wrong with Wikipedia? Why do people have a beef about AI? Should you use things like AI and Wikipedia anyway?
How do researchers keep track of the information they find?
Why do we cite sources? What are the best ways to do it?
Is academic research different from non-academic research?

See Something / Say Something: In this section of the class we will be doing research together as a research team, sharing what we find and figuring out what we can do with what we learn. We’ll learn and get hands-on experience with multiple modes of research and research methods including written source research, interviewing, direct observation, and quantitative research. As a group, we’ll also experiment with academic and non-academic ways of telling other people about what we’ve discovered. In the process, we will consider issues including:

How do we make sense of the information we find, especially if not all our sources agree?
What can we say using the information we gather? What do we want to say? What’s the difference?
How much information do we need to give when we present research? How do we decide?
What’s the difference between presenting your research and making an argument?
What are the conventions of academic research writing and why do they exist? What other ways of presenting research are there?
How do we explain to other people where the information we use comes from and why that matters?

The R&D Lab: “R&D” stands for “research and development,” a phrase corporations use to describe the parts of their organizations that do the research to develop new ideas for products, services, and so on. It’s also the process we use to go from being curious about something to finding out about it (research) and from there to developing our thoughts and a way to present what we know and what we think to other people. In this phase of the class, you’ll be developing and executing an independent research project and sharing it in a presentation format of your choice. (No public speaking is required.) As part of the process we’ll be:

forming a community of independent researchers
creating a peer review process and learning how to give and receive constructive research feedback
choosing presentation formats for our research and executing presentations
confidently sharing the results of our research

Instructor: Hanne Blank Boyd

DETAILS:

Suggested age range: 13+

Outside work: Because research is a skill that requires experience and time to learn, all students will be asked to complete work outside of class as well as short in-class assignments. There are no required formal essays, but written assignments are required. Students who choose to take this class for a grade will have a choice of longer out-of-class writing assignments of various types and will have one required formal essay.

When & where: Sundays on Zoom from 3:00-4:30 Eastern Time. 1st trimester: Sept. 7 - Nov. 23, 2025. 2nd trimester: Jan. 11 - Mar. 29, 2026. 3rd trimester: Apr. 12 - June 28, 2025.

Materials: Please purchase They Say / I Say: The Moves That Matter In Academic Writing, by by Gerald Graff and Cathy Berkenstein . For selected assignments, students will also need access to a physical library (public or campus), although we can explore alternatives if there is no accessible library.

Fee: $1,200 ungraded/$1,350 graded for the full year; this includes a non-refundable registration fee of $10. Payment due in three installments ($300 per term). We offer discounts for groups, siblings, and students who enroll in multiple classes. (Discount information.) Payment plans available. Fees waived for families with financial need. (Waivers and payment plan information.) Questions about how classes work? Read our course FAQ.

Photo credit: Laura Fokkena

The Pleasure of Finding Things Out