Assuming you are in charge of a school. All your classrooms are overcrowded; your students are spilling into portables; your teachers are underpaid, overworked, and unhappy about working conditions; parents are upset; and the mandated, standardized test scores of your students are plummeting at an exponential rate. In short, you have a problem that needs a solution. Using the eight characteristics of Research as paragraph headings, formulate a research plan that might help you find at least one solution to your problem.

1. Research originates with a question or problem

2. Research requires clear articulation of a goal

3. Research requires a specific plan for proceeding

4. Research usually divides the principal problem into more manageable subproblems

5. Research is guided by the specific research problem, question, or hypothesis

6. Research accepts certain critical assumptions

7. Research requires the collection and interpretation of data in an attempt to resolve the problem that initiated the research

8. Research is, by its nature, cyclical or more exactly, helical