Introduction
The main purpose of Core Assessment is a personal self analysis where
you take the course material and apply it a new event you did or
experienced while enrolled in this course.
The Core Assessment Project should be communicated as a substantive, formal
paper. The paper is not a research paper, although it has a research element in
the backgrounder section due in Unit 2 along with references cited in the
backgrounder.
The Core Assessment has two assignments.
•
• Unit 3 Backgrounder
Unit 6 Core Assessment Paper Unit 3 Backgrounder
Please note that the backgrounder is due by the end of Week/Unit
3. However, if you want feedback, feel free to email it to me early for a response
from me. You can make a revision to increase your points. Remember, it is not
due until the end of Unit 3.
What is a backgrounder?
This is a term used in journalism and public relations, the course designer is a
former speech writer and is most familiar with this term. For your purposes,
consider the backgrounder as the literature review and tentative outline for your
core assessment assignment. Time goes by quickly, and you need to start
thinking that assignment, which is a paper you will write. It is much easier to
write a paper if you have had time to think about the topic and prepared a map
(outline) of what you want to say.
This assignment is called an assessment because you will be assessing your
intercultural skills as they were at the beginning of class and then tracking your
changes, and finally discuss the practices you see as useful for your future
endeavors. You will:
1. Pick an area about intercultural communication that would be most
beneficial for you to develop. Determine your purpose of study from this
choice. It may be useful to you in your future work, social/familial
associations, or even a way to prepare yourself for your next move (company
expatriate work or military transfer). You can look at the textbook outline to 2.
3. 4. 5. 6.
7. get an idea of what aspect of intercultural communication you want to
improve in.
Use one or more of the self-assessments in the textbook to analyze where
your skills are, and as a way of judging how you can improve those skills.
You will write a tentative introduction and part of your abstract from the
information you garner in steps 1 and 2. I say tentative because you will likely
revise these aspects of your paper a little as you find your sources. (FYI, an
abstract is a complete overview of your paper, in 50-100 words. Researchers
use abstracts to get the gist of a paper and see if there will be useful
information from reading the full paper.)
Create an outline, showing the 3-5 main points you will be covering. For
example, you may want to develop your awareness of nonverbal skills in
multi-cultural settings. There are so many nonverbal skills that you would
have to write a book. So pick three, such as eye contact, body positioning,
or proxemics.
Be sure to add critical thinking points to your outline. Critical thinking
is applying scholarly/reliable sources to your statements about the
communication skills you are discussing. This shows the reader that your
thoughts have a reliable foundation. You can also use these sources as a
launch-pad for self-analysis and apply them to your experiences.
Write a tentative conclusion.
Include your APA style reference list (class textbook and 4 additional
scholarly sources are required). Remember, an in-text citation includes the
page number: (Neuliep, 2015, p. 42 or Neuliep, 2017, p. 40) and needs to be
tied to a corresponding reference. You can conduct research
here: https://www.park.edu/library/ Also try Google Scholar. Notice the
scholarly sources toward the end your textbook to see the kind of high
quality sources you can use in your report. You will be graded on the quality
of the sources that are used in your paper. The below template shows all the pieces of this backgrounder assignment. For
the paper, due at the end of Unit 6, the below outline for the 3 main points of the
body will be written out and abstract, introduction, and conclusion may be
revised. 1. Title Page (page 1) 1. Abstract Draft (page 2) In about 50 words, summarize your report. This information is the kind of
content you might put in a summary at the end of a report, but in APA style, the
abstract goes at the beginning. In the abstract, you can say the following: The research question to be answered in this report is the following: How can I
use intercultural communication research principles to improve my
communication? The three main ideas I am going to discuss are ____________,
__________,and_________. In the conclusion, I evaluate my course learning and
ways that I plan to improve my intercultural communication in the future. III. Introduction Draft (page 3) Tell the reader why you are writing the report. State the purpose or objective of
your report and provide an overview of the subject content that you will explain. 1. Body (page 3-6 for final paper, but just outline for the backgrounder)
A. Main Idea One (e.g., Culture affects interpersonal communication.)
1. Scenario or Personal Example
2. Research Base (Explain and cite your textbook, supplemental research
readings, or other scholarly articles from Communication and Mass Media

Attachments:

• 1505976614-assessment.pdf