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1. Aspects of the Research Paper

2. Thesis Statement Your thesis statement is a sentence (or two) that lets the reader know the general idea of your research. For instance, if you were researching nursing as a career, your thesis statement would look something like this: A registered nurse is an admirable career that allows one to impact the lives of others, while working alongside of other medical professionals. Your thesis statement should state something meaningful about your chosen career. Your goal is to make your audience want to read more about your research on a career. The thesis statement goes at the end of the introductory paragraph.
3. Topic Sentences A topic sentence is a sentence that expresses the main idea of the paragraph in which it occurs. The topic sentence provides a focusfor the reader or listener. It tells what the paragraph is about. There should be a topic sentence at the beginning of every new body paragraph. Example: Topic sentence: Cooking requires a number of different skills. We know the topic is “cooking” and that the writer is going to discuss the many “different skills” required of a chef.
4. Transitions Transition words and phrases help establish clear connections between ideas. Transitions make your paragraphs flow together smoothly, so that they are easier to read. Example: Body paragraph 3 focuses on qualifications of workers in the career of your choice. You could transition from paragraph 3 to paragraph 4, which focuses on education, like this: It is important for a chef to be willing to work well with others in a supportive, team-oriented environment. However, many other skills are necessary to be successful. These skills can be learned in college courses offered at many universities and community colleges.(transition sentences) A college education is necessary to be successful as a chef.
5. Paraphrasing Paraphrasing is a restatement of the author’s information in your own words and in your own style. Use paraphrasing as a basic note-taking strategy. If you are able to paraphrase your notes, you can easily transfer them into the body of your paper. Let’s paraphrase the following paragraph: “Who should teach children about personal finances? Ideally, it would be the child’s parent or guardian. However, many adults do not have the knowledge necessary to teach such concepts. This is evident by the staggering amount of credit card debt in the United States and the astounding number of adults who claim they cannot balance their own checkbook. Many argue that schools must step in and teach personal finance. Adding this requirement to the compulsory curriculum would require that more teachers be hired, which many school districts cannot afford, and would increase the credit requirement for graduation.” Parents and guardians are often considered the best candidates for teaching children about personal finances. However, it has been argued that schools should step in to help avoid an increase in national credit card debt. In order for this idea to be successful, school s would have to hire teachers qualified to teach personal finance. Unfortunately, school districts across the United States cannot afford to increase faculty numbers.
6. Plagiarism Plagiarism is taking someone else’s ideas or writing and using it as your own. This includes: Copying a classmate’s work Copying words directly from someone else (such as an internet resource) Letting someone else write your paper for you Plagiarism will not be tolerated. In order to avoid plagiarism, you must do the following: Write everything in your own words Document all research and information with the use of internal citations (giving credit to an author throughout your paper) Include a Works Cited page at the end of your research paper Plagiarism will result in a grade of zero
7. Direct Quotes When you use direct quotes, you put a writer’s exact words in your paper. Each time you quote, you must cite (give credit to the author) the quotation using the last name of the person you are quoting in parenthesis. Example: “Colonel John M. Matheson, a commander at the time of the attacks, reported to the committee that he was told to spray the herbicide” (Jay 30). - In the example, I took the exact words written by a man with the last name of Jay. These words were found on page 30 of a book I read by Mr. Jay.
8. Citations and Reliable Sources In-text citations, also called parenthetical citations, are used throughout a paper to give credit to an author whom you have paraphrased or quoted. In-text citations include the author’s last name and the number of the page where you found the information. Find a textbook in your desk (share with your partner if you don’t have one). Turn to page 723. Undaunted Courage is a nonfiction work of literature by Stephen Ambrose based on the journals of explorers Lewis and Clark. In the space provided in your notes, paraphrase the first page (page 725) in several sentences. Then, find an important sentence or two and quote Stephen Ambrose. You should use quotation marks and include the in-text citation using the author’s last name and the number of the page where you found the quote. It should look like this: (Ambrose 725).
9. Works Cited and Source Cards (See Handouts) Your “Works Cited” page is a list of the sources you used to research your topic We are using what is called the Modern Language Association format (or MLA) Source cards list the information from each website or book in order to create your Works Cited page Follow the format on the hand out. We will practice writing the Works Cited page as a class toward the end of the research paper.
10. In-Text Citations At the end (or close to the end) of every paragraph, you will include an in-text citation Your in-text citation will be the author’s last name and the page number (if coming from a book). OR if you are using a website, the title of the website. In-text citations are ALWAYS in parenthesis The period for the sentence you have written comes AFTER the parenthesis
11. Note Cards Your notecards are going to be how you organize the information you want to use in your research paper. You will list facts on each notecard, 3 notecards per paragraph. In the top right corner, you will list the paragraph in which the information belongs and the source (website or book) from which you obtained the facts.