How Do I Write a Research Paper?

Mrs. Abdul, Librarian

Topic Triangle

Helps you focus your topic

How many pages do you have to write? How many sources do you need?

Is there anything that needs to be in the paper?

Topic triangle sheet available in library

and online

Key Questions

What do you want to know about the topic?These questions need to have answers

Key questions serve two purposes(1)

When you’re looking at books and articles, pick ones that answer your questions

(2) The questions (and their answers) become paragraphs in your

research paper

Locating & Using Sources

Use online databases first

Use the library’s catalog

Find more sources than the assignment asks

View Video

View Video

Taking Notes

Do not write full sentences

Pretend like you’re texting or tweeting (notes should be that short)

Use a note-taking sheet to help organize the sources

Note-taking sheets are

available in the library

Thesis Statement

You have enough information to write a thesis statement now

A thesis statement is a sentence at the beginning of your paper that tells the reader what your paper is about– this could be to

disprove or prove something, question something, or a statement of belief.

Make an Outline

I. Write a sentence that you’ll use as an introductionA. Write out your thesis statement

II-XII. Use the questions as topic sentences for each paragraph

A-C. Write down 1-3 ideas/answers from the questions as the body

XIII. Write a sentence you’ll use as a conclusion A. Restate your thesis statement and the main points from your paper

Review Citations

Are you using APA or MLA citations?

Both require the last name of the author and page numbers if you’re directly quoting. If using APA, you’ll also

need the copyright date

Every article or book you’re using needs an author (or the title if there isn’t one), a copyright date, and page

numbers

In-text citation sheets are available

in the library

Write the Paper with citations

Always write more than the required number of pages then edit it down

What are you trying to prove, disprove, question?

Be sure every sentence, statistic, data furthers the point you’re trying to make

When a sentence comes from another source (quoting, paraphrasing or summarizing), you must add the citation (author’s last name then copyright or page number if necessary)

Create the Works Cited or References Page

For online database articles, the entire citation is at the bottom of the article– copy and paste it alphabetically

For books, websites, and other sources, use a citation generator to create the citation– copy and paste it alphabetically

Check to make sure the citations are alphabetical, you have the number of required sources, and that if there’s more than one

line, you indent anything after the second line

Review sheet available in the

library

Revise & Edit

Read the paper aloud

Ask someone else to read it– does it make sense? Do you prove your point?

Edit if you need to reduce word count/pages

Make sure information that is not yours is cited properly– ask the librarian for help with this

Reflect

What could you do differently?

What makes it easy or hard?

Did you need more time to get sources, did you need better sources?