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BIS 4402 Coursework Description, Autumn 2006

Deadline:8th of January 2007

The coursework is to write a roughly 3000 word hypertext essay on a research topic in Knowledge Management. Students will be expected to put into practice three techniques from the module: hypertext, learning communities, and mind mapping.
The topic can be anything in the area of Knowledge Management. It can be one of the topics of one of the week's discussions, a part of one of those topics, or a topic of your own interest. It does have to be in the area of Knowledge Management. If you are concerned that the topic is valid, please feel free to discuss it with the module leader.
You should describe the state of the field in the topic. You should provide a background, a description of the current state, a description of methods, and a description of current active research questions.
The essay needs to be written in some form of hypertext, and have a linear translation. Typically this will be HTML, but an XML document is also fine. It is entirely acceptable to use an HTML generator, though linking different pages can be difficult. A linear translation means that the whole essay needs to be able to printed in one long document that makes sense. So, the essay needs to come in two formats: (1) hypertext format, and (2) traditional linear book format.
As part of this work you need to develop a learning community . This learning community can be anything from people you have spoken with to a on-line community that you have started. You need to document this learning community and provide links (conceptual or hypertext) to the learning community in your essay. In the case of an on-line community, it is self documenting. Verbal conversations could be transcribed and put in an appendix to the essay.
You also need to provide a cognitive map or mind map of the area of the topic. A simple picture will do and it may be scanned from a hand drawing.
The essay should explore a topic that interests you. You should use three techniques developed in the module, hypertext, learning communities and mind maps. You should also use standard essay skills including critical thinking and good referencing.

Marking Scheme:


percent criterion
10 use of hypertext
10 use of links
10 cognitive map
10 use of references
10 development of learning community
10 reference to your learning community
10 background of topic
10 description of state of topic
10 description of open questions in topic
10 description of use of topic

Submission:


You can either submit the essay on a floppy disk or other media, or you can put it on the web and submit the URL; either way please submit a sheet of paper stating your name, ID, word count and whether I can publish the paper on the course web site. I would like to publish these essays on line so that other's can look at them. If you are willing to have this done, please say so on the submission sheet. If you would like it to be anonymous, that would also be ok. Your mark will not show on the web. Submit the essay to the student office, by the 8th of January 2007.