During the process of writing the EE a supervisor should be available to support the student along their personal learning pathway as they write their extended essay.  The emphasis is "they" and "their" in "they write their extended essay", so much of the supervisors role is in guiding the student to the next steps of the process, setting deadlines with the student helping the student to overcome problems which present themselves.

This page contains suggestions of the sorts of questions a supervisor might be asking to guide the student through the EE process that will help the student, without doing the work for them. I am indebted to John McMurtry for his original list of questions for supervisors which I have updated here for the 2018 Extended essay criteria.

1. Having a good general picture of the whole process at the start.

To support an Extended essay student the supervisor will first want to be familiar with the EE Assessment Criteria and the subject specific guidance provided in the Extended essay website (first exams 2018).  These two documents provide information for reference and are useful in knowing the hurdles in the different steps

2. Helping students to choose the best subject area for them.

The choice of subject is the first step and requires as much elimination as selection at this stage.

The following questions may help a student to decide whether of not to do a Biology extended essay.

Questions you may wish to ask students:

a. Of your 6 IB subjects as HL and SL what subjects do you like best?

b. Which subjects are you best at or most curious about?

c. What would you like to study in the future?

d. Identify a reason for each subject as to why or why not you would write the Extended essay in the subject.

e. Try to identify at least one topic area for each subject. In which subjects do you find ideas more easily?

f. Examine your topic ideas with your supervisor. Which of these are most suitable for an Extended essay?

g. Can you put your top three subjects in priority order; 1st, 2nd and 3rd best choices for the Extended essay?

3. Guiding a good topic choice

This is a critical first step, as the subject and its treatment must be biological for a Biology Extended essay.  Guidance from the IB documents warns against topics which overlap with other subjects, e.g. Chemistry or Psychology, because the final essay will only be assessed from the perspective of one subject.

It is well worth taking the time to consider the options of biology topics carefully, weighing the pros and cons for each topic.

Students should be made aware of the IB Guidelines for the use of animals which covers treatment of animals in experiments and also on the requirement for consent if human subjects are used in any experiments. A further suggestion for physical activity in experiments is to ask participants to complete a PAR-Q (physical activity readiness questionnaire)

Questions to ask students:

a. What interests you in this topic?

b. Is your geographical locality able to provide for research in this topic area?

i. If you want to work on Ecology of a coral reef and you live far from the ocean, this may not be a wise choice.

ii. If you want to study the effect of winter sports on the local environment, do you live near a winter sport area?

c. Are your school facilities able to provide for research in this topic area?

i. If you want to study endonucleases, does your school have all the equipment for your analysis?

ii. Is the school or are you able to obtain these materials?

d. What additional theory material might you need to learn to approach this topic?

e. Where and in what format do you plan to keep your research notes as you investigate the topic?
(This might be in an MS Office document, or a note taking app like Onenote, a folder in a shared Google drive, or a dedicated school platform.)

e. Does the topic have an element of unknown cause, or conflicting theories to explain it?
(This would help the analytical approach.)

4. Settling students on a 'preliminary' Research Question

The RQ sets the pathway for the entire essay and its importance cannot be underestimated. 
The research question can be altered if other more appropriate questions present themselves in the process of researching the topic.

Questions to ask students:

a. In your chosen topic what is the most interesting issue?

b. How can you ask a question about this issue that is not answered by yes or no?

c. How can you formulate a question that contains the independent and dependent variables?

d. How can you formulate a question which includes the range and units of the independent variable?

e. Are there any calculations which you will need to do to get one of the variables?
(This is common if a rate of reaction is one of the variables, as the dependent variable may be the movement of a bubble, or a colorimeter measurement from which a rate will be calculated.)

f. What is the analysis which you will do when answering the research question?

The best questions will resemble an excellent research question for the Internal Assessment.
However, the Extended Essay requires a more thorough literature search than the IA. The analysis should be more in the form of an argument, than the simple conclusion of the IA.  There is more information on this page: Extended Essay titles 

5. Planning the process of academic research.

Once the preliminary research question is settled the student will try to find information about the theoretical hypotheses and methodological approaches which are to be included in the essay.  Students will need guidance in how to find information, how to keep a record of their findings and how to use citation and references.

Using online sources is most likely to be the starting point for most students, but supervisors should point the student towards school libraries, university library facilities and local experts to broaden the scope of research and provide a variety of sources. Wikipedia is sometime the first point of call for students, using the references provided in the articles can give useful leads for more suitable sources for research.

Managing time with such a long and complex task will often require support from the supervisor. It is quite common to agree several deadlines with a student for each stage of their work.

Questions to ask students:

a. What background theory material will you need to read?

b. Are there two or three points of view to present, different possible outcomes, or research hypotheses?

c. Where can you find the scientific research to justify your arguments, ideas and practical methods?

d. What is the bigger picture in which your essay is set, Why is the research question worth answering?

e. What timescale are we talking here? Can we plan some deadlines in your writing process?

f. What information do you need to present to put your EE into the context of the bigger picture?

g. Where are you going to store your research, evaluations of sources and personal reflections? (Researcher's Reflection Space.)

6. Guiding students to give the essay structure presenting a reasoned argument.

Claim and counter claim

A good argument will always have two (or more) perspectives and these need to be presented in the Extended essay. If there are a whole plethora of different possibilities it will be wise to focus on a few so that the essay doesn't become too complex and lose focus. Focus is really important, every part of the essay must have some relevance to the research question.

All too often in Biology lessons we use experiments to help us to describe the natural world, we rarely test an incorrect idea. Often students take the same approach in the EE but this will limit the analysis in their essay.  The claim and counter claims approach of arguments used in TOK may help the student to present a more coherent and substantiated argument. The degree to which the hypothesis are supported or rejected is very important.

Questions to ask students:

a. Given your research question, what claim and counter arguments can you propose?

b. How much evidence do you have in support of each?

c. What tools are there to use when establishing the quality or reliability of sources you have cited in your research?

Appropriate detail

It the student imagines the reader to be a knowledgeable adult with no specialist understanding of the topic it will help them to unravel the issues in the essay and the evidence supporting them at an appropriate level. The Extended essay is a piece of formal writing.

Students need guidance and encouragement to include written explanations how each piece of evidence supports their argument.  It is a challenge to review the quality of sources whilst using them to support and illustrate an argument. Sometimes this includes explaining where there is little evidence to support an idea.

Questions to ask students:

a. Would an adult be able to follow your argument?

b. Are there any areas which need a little more explanation?

Clear structure

Sub-headings can be used to help the reader to understand the argument (and will also help the student to keep on track). The structure should follow conventions in the structure of biological research articles. It may be useful to look at a few of these and dissect the structure. (e.g. Samples of Extended essays in the teacher support material on myIB, or this description of a research paper from California State University)

Once the main body of the essay is complete, it is possible to finalise the introduction (which tells the reader what to expect) and the conclusion (which says what has been achieved, including notes of any limitations and any questions that have not been resolved).

Supervisors must ensure that the student knows how to properly cite the evidence and provide accurate references for the words, ideas, graphics and data used from other sources. The IB does not prescribe any specific citation method but students must use a system consistently and correctly.

Questions to ask students:

a. Do you have a range or resource types?

b. Is it clear to a reader unfamiliar with your essay where to find different types of information, analysis.

7. Helping students to incorporate data collection and analysis from experiments.

Where students have carried out practical data collection in a experiment as part of the Extended essay this is an important source which can either support an argument or raise questions about the argument's validity.  Students may have to learn new techniques to collect their data. The design of the experiment will demonstrate knowledge and understanding of the methodology and the analysis of the results will show evidence of evaluation and analysis.

If the student understands how the data will be used in a statistical analysis of the results before they begin the investigation is more likely to be well designed and to collect sufficient data.

Questions to ask students:

a. What are the most important variables that you will need to control?

b. What techniques or procedures will you employ to collect your data?

c. How will the data from your experiment provide evidence for your argument?

d. What connections are there between your experiment and the other sources you have used?

e. How can you ensure that you will have sufficient and relevant data?

8. Supporting the student's statistical analysis

This area is most likely where the students will need the most assistance. Students can usually do basic stats, such as  calculation of the mean, standard deviation but as the Extended Essay should be in much more depth than regular practical work, additional statistical analysis may be appropriate. Analytical tools such as Students-t-test, ANOVA, Pearson correlations, Rank testing, Chi-squared test will need support to be learned. Most statistical tests involve the calculation of a single values, which is compared to a  critical value to establish whether there is a significant difference.

Students will likely need guidance in choosing the most appropriate test and some help in the evaluation the results of the statistical tests.

Questions to ask students:

a. What is your null hypothesis? Your alternative hypothesis?

b. Which statistical test might be used to analyse the data?

c. In what ways can you evaluate the findings in your results analysis?

9. Highlighting knowledge, understanding & appropriate biological conventions

The examiner assesses knowledge and understanding as well as the use of language. Supervisors should ensure the student pays attention to these elements. The selection of a range of appropriate sources of information and the way in which they are used to support the argument will indicate the depth of knowledge and understanding.  Conventions in Biology such as using scientific names (in italics) for organisms, appropriate equipment names and biological processes is critical, as is the layout of data in graphs and tables, and other formatting.

As many IB students do not write an extended essay in their first language, grammar and syntax are not prioritised in this criterion however; the reader must be able to follow the thread of logic and thinking of the student.

Questions to ask students:

a. What do you think the range of supporting evidence in your introduction says about your understanding of the study.

b. Are there any places where the scientific conventions in tables and graphs could be improved?
(E.g. consistent decimal points in data, uncertainties shown for measured data, titles with correct units.)

10. Ensuring a well formulated conclusion

The conclusion refers back to the research question thus closing the study. The student should provide a clear statement about the findings and how these relate to the research question. Additional and unanswered questions may be addressed in this section. These questions may arise from the research process as well as those that the student could not address due to limitations in time or facilities.

Questions to ask students:

a. To what extent does the research from your practical work and your literature search support the hypotheses?

b. Are there any unanswered aspects of your research question?

c. Have you considered the implications of your findings on the broader question?

11. Prompting students to review their introduction

The introduction should be written so that the essay is set into some context within the subject area and provide a justification for such research. In Biology, this would mean providing some preliminary literature review along with establishing the background knowledge needed to comprehend the research question and set the stage for the investigation.

It is possible that the introduction will need redrafting once the conclusions have been written to ensure that all aspects of the arguments have been introduced.

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It is appropriate at this stage to ensure students know why and how to properly reference material taken from another source.