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Writing the Exploration

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  • Internal Assessment/
  • Writing the IA/
  • Writing the Exploration

The goal of the exploration is to explain to the reader what you did. This includes an explanation of your design, your sample, your controls, and your materials.

If you write this section in good detail, the reader should be able to understand exactly what you did and why.  If, however, you want to make it absolutely clear, you may include your procedure.  However, it is not required to write out your procedure in the exploration. 

How to write your exploration

 Teacher only box

One of the difficulties of working in groups for the internal assessment is that the exploration section of the internal assessment has very little leeway for creativity. In other words, there are specific answers that are being sought, and it is often difficult for students working in a group to put it into "their own words." If the text is the same, they will be penalized for academic dishonesty.

Prior to writing the exploration, the group should have completed their procedure. This will make up part of the exploration section.  All the rest, however, must be written in the student's own words.

To solve this problem, I give my students the handout. We go over the expectations for the activity in class, and then in the next class - using computers - they write their rough drafts of the exploration. This minimizes the chance of plagiarism and collusion; it also gives students a chance to show you what they know.

The assessment criteria

The following descriptors are for the top mark bands for the exploration section of the IA report.

3 - 4 marks
The research design is explained.
The sampling technique is explained.
The choice of participants is explained.
Controlled variables are explained.
The choice of materials is explained.

Key points for writing the exploration

1. Identify how many participants are in the sample. Be exact in the numbers - do not say “roughly 20 people” or "there were almost as many males as females."

2. Describe the population from which the sample was drawn. This means that they should describe the school or community from which the sample was drawn. In our case, it would be a private school located in the Czech Republic. The high school is made up of roughly 200 students. The population is primarily non-native English speaking. Students should not identify the school by name - as this is unethical.

3. Describe the sample in terms of gender, age, grade, or any other relevant variables. Once again, use exact numbers. Do not say “roughly half of the sample was male.” You should be able to describe your sample accurately. It is important here that the variables be relevant. For example - if they are doing a test of reflexes, then "left-handedness" may be an important variable to identify. Otherwise, it is not. It may be relevant to identify the number of native English speakers. It is not acceptable for you to ask participants to list any learning disabilities, as this information should not be given to teens in a school community. In addition, you should not include the names of the participants in their IA as this is unethical - violating the right to the confidentiality of data.

4. Identify the type of sampling that you did - and why you did it that way. Simply saying, “it was the best way” or “it was the most convenient for us” is not sufficient. It is very rare that a random sample is chosen. Most samples will be randomized opportunity samples - that is, they will be preexisting groups where the participants were randomly allocated to groups.

5. How were participants allocated to groups? “Randomly” is not enough. Explain the process used for allocation. You may allocate participants to conditions using a random numbers table or by flipping a coin. In rare cases, a matched-pairs design may be used to allocate participants to groups.

6. Use the word “participants” - NOT “subjects.”

Recommended structure of the Exploration

Paragraph 1:  Describe and explain the design and the sample of your experiment.

Paragraph 2:  Explain how you designed your materials.

Paragraph 3:  Explain what you did.  Briefly outline the procedure.  Be specific about which controls you used in your study.  So, for example, "in order to control for confounding variables, we recorded the list of words rather than read them out loud to each group.  This was important because....."

In addition, in paragraph 3 you should make reference to the ethical considerations that were made.  The only requirement is that you state that consent (and parent consent, if necessary) was obtained and that debriefing was carried out.  In both cases, you should refer to the appendices.