Research question feature: feasibility

Name:

Date:

Class:

Quick Questions

Shade in the A or B circle for each question.

1. A student has two weeks to finish a project. Which research question is more feasible?

A How has travel to school changed across every Victorian school since 1950?

B How do Year 11 students at our school travel to school?

2. Which question is more feasible for a student with no access to hospital records?

A How many hours of sleep do students in my class get on school nights?

B Which hospital in Victoria has the longest emergency waiting times for each patient?

3. Which research question is more feasible for a student who has only used spreadsheet software?

A Is there a link between hours of study and test marks in our class?

B Can a machine learning model predict test marks for all VCE students in Australia?

4. True or false: A research question is feasible if it is interesting, even if the data cannot be collected.

A True

B False

5. Which of these checks feasibility?

A Can I collect or find this data before my deadline?

B Is the question worded in a very long, formal way?

Match the Pairs

Draw a line connecting each item on the left to its match on the right.

Left column		Right column
1feasible		ANot feasible because you have no access to the data needed to answer it.
2Feasibility check: time		BAsking whether the project can be finished before the deadline, given the hours available for collecting and analysing data
3A feasible question needs data you can actually get access to		CNot feasible because of time and access: surveying 10 000 people in 2 weeks is unrealistic.
4A feasible question can be answered with the skills and software you have, such as a spreadsheet		DHow did daily maximum temperature change over the past year at our local weather station? (open data available)
5How do all Australian teenagers spend their money? (survey of 10 000 people in 2 weeks)		EA research question that can be answered with the time, skills, software and data access you actually have available
6What are the private health records of patients at a local hospital? (no permission to use the data)		FWhich subject has the highest average mark in our class results? (analysed using AVERAGE in a spreadsheet)

Definitions

feasible

Fill in the Blanks

Complete each line of code by filling in the missing parts.

A ________ research question can be answered.

IF daysNeeded __ daysAvailable THEN feasible = TRUE ENDIF

IF hasDataAccess ___ hasTime THEN feasible = TRUE ENDIF

IF NOT hasDataAccess THEN feasible = _____ ENDIF

IF hasSkills AND ___________ THEN feasible = TRUE ENDIF

Spot the Error

Shade in the letter of the line that contains an error.

Question 1

A daysNeeded ← 10

B daysLeft ← "14"

C IF daysNeeded ≤ daysLeft THEN

D OUTPUT "Feasible"

E ENDIF

Question 2

A dataOwner ← "Council"

B IF NOT accessGranted THEN

C OUTPUT "Data can be used"

D ELSE

E OUTPUT "Not feasible"

Question 3

A needed ← "SQL"

B skills ← ["Excel", "SQL"]

C IF needed IN skills THEN

D feasible ← FALSE

E ENDIF

Question 4

A tool ← "Tableau"

B owned ← ["Excel", "Sheets"]

C IF tool = owned THEN

D OUTPUT "Feasible"

E ENDIF

Question 5

A hoursPerWeek ← 4

B weeks ← 6

C total ← hoursPerWeek + weeks

D OUTPUT total

Answer Key

Research question feature: feasibility

Section A: Quick Questions

B — How do Year 11 students at our school travel to school?

A — How many hours of sleep do students in my class get on school nights?

A — Is there a link between hours of study and test marks in our class?

B — False

A — Can I collect or find this data before my deadline?

Section B: Match the Pairs

feasible → A research question that can be answered with the time, skills, software and data access you actually have available

Feasibility check: time → Asking whether the project can be finished before the deadline, given the hours available for collecting and analysing data

A feasible question needs data you can actually get access to → How did daily maximum temperature change over the past year at our local weather station? (open data available)

A feasible question can be answered with the skills and software you have, such as a spreadsheet → Which subject has the highest average mark in our class results? (analysed using AVERAGE in a spreadsheet)

How do all Australian teenagers spend their money? (survey of 10 000 people in 2 weeks) → Not feasible because of time and access: surveying 10 000 people in 2 weeks is unrealistic.

What are the private health records of patients at a local hospital? (no permission to use the data) → Not feasible because you have no access to the data needed to answer it.

Section C: Definitions

feasible — A feasible research question can be answered with the time, skills, software and access to data that you actually have available.

Section D: Fill in the Blanks

A feasible research question can be answered.

IF daysNeeded <= daysAvailable THEN
  feasible = TRUE
ENDIF

IF hasDataAccess AND hasTime THEN
  feasible = TRUE
ENDIF

IF NOT hasDataAccess THEN
  feasible = FALSE
ENDIF

IF hasSkills AND hasSoftware THEN
  feasible = TRUE
ENDIF

Section E: Spot the Error

B — Time available is a number of days. Storing 14 as text ("14") makes the comparison with daysNeeded unreliable. It should be daysLeft ← 14.

B — The question is only feasible for data access when access is granted. IF NOT accessGranted reverses the test, so it should be IF accessGranted THEN.

D — The needed skill (SQL) is in the list of skills the student has, so the question is feasible on skills. It should be feasible ← TRUE.

C — owned is a list of software, so a single tool cannot equal it. To check whether the software is available, test membership with IF tool IN owned THEN.

C — Total time available is hours per week multiplied by the number of weeks (4 * 6 = 24 hours), not added. It should be total ← hoursPerWeek * weeks.