for michael smith only

University of Phoenix Material

Topic Selection and Generating Ideas

Complete Part 1 and Part 2 below, which will help you complete the Expository Essay due in Week 5. Your response to each part should be at least 175 words.

Part 1: Topic Selection

• Read the list of broad topics, narrowed ideas, and research questions provided in the Topics List in this assignment.

• Choose a broad topic, narrowed idea, and question for your Expository Essay due in Week 5.

• Explain why you have selected this broad topic, narrowed idea, and research question.

• What interests you academically or personally about your selections?

• Before you submit this assignment, pay attention to your sentence structure working to avoid run-on sentences and fragments in your reply. For help avoiding run-on sententces the Grammar Tutorials located in this week’s learning activites and in the materials for this assignment.

My broad topic of choice is violence. From the narrowed ideas listed, I have picked identity theft, and I have chosen to go with the question “What are three ways that people can protect themselves from identity theft?” My choice for this topic has been inspired by the increased cases of identity theft in the current world. By studying identity theft, I have the chance to look at a number of cases and understand what led to their identities being stolen, and what consequences they faced. I am aware that I face the risk of being a victim of this crime, and this worries me a lot. I cannot help imagining the suffering I would go through if someone stole my identity. Besides losing my money and probably having a bad credit score as a result of transactions I did not make, I am worried that the thief may be part of a serious crime and use my name, hence getting me into trouble with the authorities. That would affect my reputation, which is a difficult problem to fix. Additionally, even if I got my identity back, I know I would be traumatized for a long time. I own a number of documents that may be of interest to identity thieves, which means that I need to be extra careful with the way I handle my private information. Further, the research question is of great significance, since by studying it, I will understand the steps I can take to be safe from this crime. With a good understanding of what needs to be done for one to be protected from identity theft, I can be sure of safety.

Part 2: Generating Ideas

• Read the Tips for Generating ideas presented in Ch. 1 of Pathways, (p. 3): freewriting, brainstorming, or branching.

• Select one of the tips to generate ideas for the topic you have selected for your essay. You only need to select one of the three tips presented in the reading.

• Write a paragraph describing how the process of generating ideas for the selected topic has helped you focus your final paper.

For my idea generation, I chose the brainstorming method. This method entails coming up with many ideas and critically looking at each of them in order to select the most appropriate ones for the problem. My choice of brainstorming is because of the process involved. In my opinion, brainstorming was the best solution for the problem I studied since it would give me the opportunity to think of many solutions to the problem and test how effective each of them would be. In order to come up with the most appropriate ideas for the problem, a large number of solutions are provided, from which a choice has to be made. Hence, in order to find the best solution to the identity theft problem, I listed a number of ways in which people can deal with this crime. I had a total of ten ways of solving the problem. From these ten options, I had to pick out the best three. This involved critical thinking and an analysis of the implications of each solution. I researched on the effectiveness of each solution by looking at previous cases of identity theft and how they were dealt with. I also looked at the limitations of each solution by putting myself in the identity thief’s shoes and finding loopholes in each of them. This helped me decide on the least helpful solutions, which I eliminated. I was left with six of them, which meant that I still needed to eliminate three more. I looked at the problems with the six solutions, and created ways to adjust them in order to make them more effective. This enabled me to form three stronger solutions out of the six.