In the Topic Analysis section, you saw how your assessment question gives you the clues you need to start searching for information. 

But sometimes, it isn't quite that simple. People can get just as frustrated by finding too much information as they can by finding not enough. This is where the Question Formulation Technique can help. 

Your lecturer will give you the questions that you need to answer in your assignments, but this technique helps you to figure out what you need to learn, find, understand, or already know, in order to answer those questions.

Let's analyse the previous example:

“Evaluate how seasonal changes affect the foraging behaviour of King Penguins. Specifically include Macquarie Island in your evaluation"

Grab a piece of paper, or open a word processing document, and start thinking up questions, following these four important rules:

• Ask as many questions as you can.
• Do not stop to question, judge, or answer any question.
• Write down every question exactly as it comes to your mind.
• Change any statements into questions.

Producing questions example:

• What are seasonal changes?
• What is foraging behaviour?
• Where is Macquarie Island?
• What do I know about King Penguins?
• Where should I look for information?
• Is there anything about this in my text book?

Read through the questions you've come up with. Try rewriting your open questions as closed questions, and closed questions as open. See if you can make them better questions.

Improving questions example

• "What are seasonal changes?" could become "What are seasonal changes specific to Macquarie Island?"
• "What is foraging behaviour?" could become "What foraging behaviour is known of King Penguins?"

Choose the most important questions that you will need to answer. That will help you to answer the original question focus.

How this helps:

Now, if you are faced with an overwhelming number of books, journal articles, or websites, that might have something to do with Macquarie Island, foraging behaviour, or King Penguins, you can quickly decide whether they are going to be useful to you.

If they help you answer any of the questions you have identified as important - then it's probably a useful resource. If not, you can move on to the next one.

Alternatively, if you've had trouble finding information, this technique will probably throw up some more keywords that you can search on.