Week 1 Assignment
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Application: 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 critical thinking throughout the Dissertation process will help you select a theoretical framework for your study, make arguments about why your study is important, analyze your data, and assess the implications of your results.

From previous work, you may be familiar with Blooms Taxonomy of critical thinking. The revised version is described in three links in this weeks Learning Resources.  Each of the three links provides a different slant, visual, and list of resources. In everything you write in this course, as well as your other Ph.D. courses and, of course, your Premise, Prospectus, Proposal, and Dissertation, you are required to demonstrate higher levels of thinking. The levels of thinking in the revised version are:  Remembering, understanding, applying, analyzing, evaluating, and creating. It is at the highest three levelsanalyzing, evaluating, and creatingthat scholarly thinking and writing take place, including the development of your Prospectus.

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

APA format and style. Part of academic writing is being able to write in correct APA style and format, and this is a requirement in this course and all others, for each document you write.  Academic, scholarly writing and the correct APA style and format extend far beyond citing in the text correctly and writing a reference list in correct APA style and format.

Academic writing is a skill you will continue to hone throughout the rest of your academic and professional career. The APA Manual contains a wealth and depth of information on writing. It is recommended that you read the entire manual.

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

Write 23 pages on the topic you are considering for your Dissertation. How did you come to select the topic? What is your interest in studying it? What is the problem that makes it worth studying? What is its significance?

Then, in another half page, briefly explain how your topic relates to public policy and/or administration.  Appropriate use of the APA format and style is required and expected for this assignment.
Support your Application Assignment with specific references to all resources used in its preparation. You are asked to provide a reference list for all resources, including those in the Learning Resources for this course.

Submit your Assignment by Day 7.