Ashley Carr
November 16, 2007
The process of choosing a topic for my research was a long process, but hopefully it led to a well-written paper. Prior to knowing exactly what my topic was, I thought to myself, what in the world is something that I am interested in spending the rest of the semester learning more about. To me, this was the hardest part because unlike my peers, who have had people and experiences that have inspired them to choose the topic that they chose, I have not really experienced anything of that nature. Therefore, this was just a process of me choosing what I thought was interesting in this field and researching information on that topic.
There are many topics in the field of Communication Disorders that I find very interesting, but I had to choose a topic that would not be too broad or maybe even too narrow to search information. Picking a topic to research is always difficult because one either ends up finding out it will be too hard to narrow down the thousands of documents that have been found or even that it will be too hard to type a lengthy and interesting paper from just the few sources that were found. When beginning a research paper, the process from beginning to ending with a thorough paper is always trial and error. One may pick a topic the first time and write an informative paper from it, or one can choose a topic and find out that the topic has to change because the information that was first found would be too difficult to write a paper.
This process for me actually was one of the easier ones compared to research papers in the past. I actually chose a topic that worked, and I was able to find just the right amount of information on it to write a thorough paper. I chose dyslexia because I have always been fascinated with how the brain works to form language. Language is one of the most important assets individuals are blessed with. It is how individuals communicate each and every day. Without language, one would never be able to express his or her feelings and/or express his or her wants and needs. I felt that if I had to pair a topic with the term literacy, dyslexia would be perfect because the main problem that dyslexics face are literacy problems.
After narrowing my research topic to dyslexia, I watched a television show called The George Lopez Show. Coincidentally, the show was about the son finding out he was dyslexic. It showed his difficulty with reading homework assignments and even how his grades were failing because he could not read like other typical children in his class. In the end, the father had to explain that he himself was diagnosed with dyselxia when he was a child and that he understood the problems that his son was facing. I realized that this show was just actors performing, but the characteristics of the child in the show were exactly like those of a dyslexic child. I found this disorder to be extremely fascinating and felt that I would continue with the topic because it would be very interesting to learn more about this disorder that affects so many people in today’s society.
