/Outline

Outline Sophomore Research Paper

What is it?

• Serves as an organiza3onal plan for your paper • Ar3culates what you plan to say • Shows how you will get to where you want to go

Importance • Ar3cula3on in point form for a superior dra< • Chance to fix structural problems more easily • Direc3on and substance • Confidence • Ability to tackle smaller, more manageable chunks

How to construct yours • Take a deep breath.

• Read through your notes.

• Classify your findings / look for paGerns and trends.

• Do some more research where needed or see if two "weak" sec3ons might fit under one stronger heading.

• Re-­‐evaluate your thesis.

Starting the outline • MLA heading and headers • Title: Research Paper Outline – Major Grade • I. Introduc3on • A. Interest grabber • B. Thesis statement: Write it out as a complete sentence here.

• II. Topic heading 1 • III. Topic heading 2 • IV. Topic heading 3 (could have 2-­‐4 topics) • V. Conclusion

Organizing information • Using colored index cards, write down your (revised) topics from your preliminary outline.

This is your “star3ng outline.”

• Once you feel you have a good set of topics, take out your note cards and try to find a place for them in your “star3ng outline.” Insert them where they belong.

Forming a topic outline • Give topic names to all of the pieces of informa3on (do not just write the quote in the outline!) and document them with appropriate cita3ons in your outline.

• End with the Conclusion.

Citations • Use the first word of the Source Card cita3on (usually the author’s or editor’s last name) and the page number (if available).

• If the first word is an ar3cle name, put quotes around it.

• If it’s a book 3tle, italicize it.

• Simply put the page number -­‐ no p., nor pp., nor pg., nor pgs, nor # signs.

• If there is no page number, you do not put anything but the first word of the cita3on.

Works Cited • Using your source cards, list each entry alphabe3cally by the first important word (not a, an or the) of the entry.

• Use a hanging indent.

Important structural things • Every I has a II; every A a B; every 1 a 2.

• Go over parallelism. Change any inconsistent parts of speech on the outline.

• Go over capitaliza3on. Adjust capitaliza3on.