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How To - Research Paper II

The document provides tips for finding and evaluating sources for research papers. It recommends that sources be recent unless there is a valid reason for an older source. Sources should also be relevant to the topic and come from a variety of categories. When taking notes, summarize sources in your own words rather than quoting. An annotated bibliography should be compiled as research is done, with summaries, evaluations, and reflections on each source. Author credentials, trustworthiness, and reliability of sources should all be considered.

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cantor2000
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21 views

How To - Research Paper II

The document provides tips for finding and evaluating sources for research papers. It recommends that sources be recent unless there is a valid reason for an older source. Sources should also be relevant to the topic and come from a variety of categories. When taking notes, summarize sources in your own words rather than quoting. An annotated bibliography should be compiled as research is done, with summaries, evaluations, and reflections on each source. Author credentials, trustworthiness, and reliability of sources should all be considered.

Uploaded by

cantor2000
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PPT, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Researching

Tips
What to look for in sources
and how to find them

RECENTNESS
Sources should be RECENT, unless
the old age of the source is valid for
some reason. This can matter when
writing about an author like James
Joyce and using his autobiography,
The Portrait of an Artist as a Young
Man. This book cant be in a more
recent edition since Joyce was the
author and he is dead.

RELEVANCE
Sources need to be RELEVANT to the
topic. Dont let a source distract you
because of what it says, how it says
it, or how much material it might
have. Make sure that the source
relates directly to your topic and
helps you develop your thesis.

RELIABILITY
Sources should be RELIABLE. Check the
authors credentials to see what else he
or she has written. Bias is a huge
concern in writing. If you were writing
about gun control, an NRA article or a
Handgun control article would be biased
sources. For an informative essay on an
author, AVOID reviews of works written
by your author.

VARIETY
Your sources should be VARIED. They
should all come from different
categories listed on the research
paper handout. Dont use all Internet
or print sources. Journal articles,
written by professionals for
professionals, are the one exception
here.

BALANCE
Sources should be BALANCED in their
use in that one huge book and
several short articles lends itself to a
book report rather than a true
synthesis paper, which takes the
sources, lets them talk to each other,
and constructs a new work that is
better than the sum of the sources.

TAKE GOOD NOTES


Take bibliographic notes on who wrote the
source, who published it, where it was
published, when it was published, etc.
Take source notes on the content of the
article. Be sure to use your own words and
summarize or paraphrase more than quote.
Make copies of print sources and printouts
of electronic sources as you go. You will
need them when you turn in your paper.

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY
Build it as you go rather than wait until
the end when you have found FIVE
sources or more. (It is better to have
more than five in case some dont work
out.)
Use the abstract that accompanies many
scholarly articles as a guide for writing
your own summary of the content. (DO
NOT COPY AND PASTE THESE INTO YOUR
OWN ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY.)

ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY
(cont.)
Remember that you are writing three
parts to each annotation that follows a
source:
1. Summary of the main ideas in the
source;
2. Assessment of the credentials of the
author, the trustworthiness of the source
and its reliablity;
3. Reflection on how the source will be
used in your Research Paper.

Annotated Bibliography
(cont.)
The correct format for your Annotated
Bibliography is on the handout from
OWL. (IF you dont have one, ask for it
or go to their web site to get one.)
Remember you can use EasyBib.com
or sonofcitationmachine.net.
The annotations will be the major part
of the grade for this assignment;
however, the format matters as well.

REMEMBER
Dont blindly trust .com, .biz, .net and
even .org web sites.
Trust .edu and .gov web sites.
Look for authority, recentness, source and
intent (from RTL) before you use a source.
Use the librarys databases rather than a
blind Google search.
Ask the librarian or someone in the Writing
Center for help.

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