Do you stress research papers? I'll share a little secret about myself, my first three page college research paper took me 6 solid, multiple hour, workdays to complete and I was almost late in turning it in. Do you want to know why? Because I had never done one before. So there I was, saddled with this assignment to do with no experience or help to work from. I didn't know about the many and vast online resources from which to glean information such as the Purdue Online Writing Lab, affectionately known as OWL, http://owl.english.purdue.edu/ or the Son of Citation Machine, affectionately known as "thank the good Lord in Heaven" as most first timers say upon discovering this little gem http://citationmachine.net/ . No I didn't know about these things and went out and bought a little book called
Research Papers for Dummies and
the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers and soaked up as much knowledge as 6 days would allow.
I was stressed, I felt like quitting and thought for just a moment that perhaps I wasn't college material, but I gave it my best shot. Before finishing my B.S. just a couple of years later I was banging out 10 page research papers within 24 hours if need be. Not that I recommend anyone ever doing that, I had become proficient enough that it was entirely feasible for me to do so if put under the gun. How? Practice, Grasshopper. That's right, remember all of that stuff Mr. Miyagi did in that movie (you know you loved it) the Karate Kid with all of that "wax on, wax off" stuff? Repetitive motion became second nature, muscle memory, executable almost without a second thought. Well being assigned the dreaded research paper (of doom no doubt) is not that much different.
If you're sweating writing research papers, you are not alone. There are literally thousands upon thousands of people, many of whom are distance learners, who feel as dissuaded by research papers as I do about Algebra. They hate them, avoid them and will make up almost any excuse not to do them, but fear not my little ninjas, research is all about practice, heck, even Al Gore has done it! Well, he claims to anyways.
Now I'm not here to push a product or do a book review so I'm not going to name any one book, but I will name a couple of guides that every student should consider getting to help them along the way. First, the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association and the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, which as far as I know are directly from the writing associations themselves, the "official" handbooks if you will. Just an FYI, most instructors that I have had insist upon writing in APA format. I have no idea why, but that has been my experience. One or two decided to make life hard and use MLA, so of course I recommend learning both methods. That being said here is my "Cajun's Guide to Surviving Research Papers" (APA style).
- 1.) Don't panic! Just like Douglas Adams' famous Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy says on its intergalacticly famous cover, "Don't Panic!" Panicking doesn't help anyways; it only wastes time while you could be getting to work.
- 2.) Understand your limitations and fears. Do you hate writing or is it the strange looking citations at the end of the paper that scare you? Identify your weaknesses and fears and use this information to focus upon these shortcomings when writing your paper.
- 3.) Pick a topic that you are interested in if one is not assigned to you and begin to search the stuff you already know. Okay I know that more often than not you will be assigned a paper, but here's the bright side. Instructors often cannot help but give you clues on where to start your research. For example, look at that piece of paper you were given on the first day of class crumpled up way down in the bottom of your bag. That's right, the syllabus, now stretch it back out flat and look for something that says "additional sources" or "recommended readings". Secondly you can often look in the back of your textbook for citations of the quoted sources, look them up, they count. Lastly don't use Wikipedia as a source, EVER, but do look up the sources cited on the page and follow them up, if credible, use them.
- 4.) For God's sake make an outline. I know it sounds obvious but I have seen so many people flounder and freewheel for days until they finally break down and do it like it should be done. Often after their assignment has been rejected by the instructor. Need more advice on this? Consult some of the above mentioned sources or see mine below.
- 5.) Follow the outline as called for within that particular research scheme. For example, APA calls for an abstract, so be sure and include this before the introduction of your paper. I often write mine after the paper is done just in case my research takes me into a different direction.
- 6.) Write your introduction, look for a strong and clear thesis statement that basically summarizes the point you are trying to make. This should ideally be the first sentence of your paper but at the very least should be in the first paragraph. I recommend you Google "develop a strong thesis statement" and research the art of the thesis statement a bit before blurting out something on paper you may regret.
- 7.) In the body of the paper follow a logical and easy to remember format. I like the following:
- I. Cover page
- II. Abstract
- III. Introduction
- IV. Body and supporting data
- V. Body and supporting data
- VI. Rebuttal and countering points of view and the answers to them
- VII. Body and supporting data
- VIII. Summary and closing arguments
- IX. References
- 8.) By the way, I use roughly the same format on every single paper, remember, practice makes perfect and I'm too lazy to get zany with it.
- 9.) Keep a journal of all of your sources and where you found them. Trust me, just because you "think" you won't need it later, you may be surprised to find out how handy a last minute source can be at 2AM the night before a paper is due.
- 10.) Have fun, after about 10 of these things a research paper will become second nature.
If you ever find yourself getting short of breath, lightheaded or panicky when assigned your first or next paper, just mutter under your breath "wax on, wax off". Mr. Miyagi would be proud.
Hope this helps.