Requirements
Use Times New Roman 12-point font.
Double-space your essay.
Submit a 1,400-word minimum or 4-6 page minimum essay, depending on the option you select (do not count the Works Cited page).
Your essay must have at least 4 “quotations” and in-text citations.
Your essay must have a Works Cited page with all your cited sources listed.
Based on the option you choose, you will see additional requirements below.
Research Paper Standards (“Rubric”)
You and your facilitator will apply the following standards to your Practice Research Papers and determine how well you have met each one (“exceeds standard,” “meets standard,” “approaches standard,” “not yet,” and “insufficient data”).
Introductory paragraph hook
There is a hook to captivate readers’ attention that relates to and prepares readers for the essay.
Introductory paragraph background
Following the hook, you identify or provide readers with necessary background information on the issue or topic under discussion to help them recognize what the issue is or means, why it may be relevant for discussion, and how it relates to or prepares readers for the problem or issue of the essay.
Introductory paragraph debate
Following the background information, you present readers with a problem, debate, or issue that is controversial. Readers will need to see how the problem, debate, or issue is not an easy one to solve; it’s a tricky situation and there are multiple sides to the argument because people with different opinions raise good points about it.
Introductory paragraph thesis statement
The introduction concludes with a one-sentence thesis statement that presents your solution to the problem, debate, or issue introduced in the background and debate. The thesis statement is what your essay is trying to prove to readers. It will make at least one concession (“although” or “even though” or “though” or “while”) and will align with your essay’s topic sentences and body paragraph evidence.
Topic sentence with concession
Each body paragraph begins with a topic sentence that introduces the reason or topic or focus of that paragraph as it relates to and supports your essay’s thesis statement. Since counterarguments exist for nearly everything, the topic sentence may include a concession (“although” or “even though” or “though” or “while”) that alerts readers to potential opposing views on their reason or topic or focus for that paragraph.
(Optional: often, it may be helpful to provide a clarifying sentence by repeating the topic sentence in a different and clearer or simpler way if necessary.)
Say with context
Following the topic sentence or topic sentences, you incorporate others’ words and ideas into your writing (evidence, sources, quotes, etc), and you ensure that your evidence, source, or quote includes context, which has two key elements:
You introduce where the quote is coming from by providing the author or source’s name and/or background information about the author or source.
You introduce the point of the quote–what’s generally going on in the quote.
Finally, you ensure that the evidence, source, or quote is distinguishable from the rest of the paragraph (use quotations and citations per MLA formatting conventions).
Mean with illustration
Following each and every Say with Context, you interpret and analyze your Say’s meaning to explain clearly how it relates to and supports your topic sentence reason as well as your thesis statement. Then, help readers “get” your meaning by comparing your evidence’s meaning to something else that’s relevant–paint a picture for readers; you’re basically coming up with your own examples that parallel the evidence you just gave.
Counterargument & rebuttal
Since everything’s an argument, you’ll need to anticipate counterarguments to your points, so wherever anticipated or potentially needed, follow your Mean with Illustration is followed by a concession or concessions to your argument or point. You need to show that your debatable issue, question, or problem is complicated by considering other perspectives and using concessions wherever necessary, appropriate, or anticipated. Always turn back to your argument, however, by refuting the opposing perspective or perspectives and supporting your argument or perspective. Sometimes counterarguments need more space, and devoting an entire body paragraph to a significant counterargumentative point is warranted. For example, perhaps there is a major concern that someone might raise about your argument, which really challenges your position, so you may need to devote a whole paragraph establishing that counterargument and, then, refuting it.
Matter
Once you’ve addressed potential counterarguments and returned to support your argument, it’s important readers see why your point or argument matters. Express what consequences and wider implications derive from the point of your body paragraph: if you’re right, then what do those consequences reveal about us and our world? What new pathways now stand before us? How does the point you just proved change you or change others? Who else is impacted by this knowledge or reality? In other words, once you’ve evaluated what those consequences reveal about us and our world, predict what your newfound knowledge means for our collective future; that is, how are we all implicated and impacted by that knowledge and, most importantly, so what?
Transitions
Once you’ve concluded your Matter and established the wider implications of your point, transition from your point to the next point under discussion in your essay. Ensure each paragraph ends by establishing the relationship between the paragraph that is ending and the paragraph that follows. For example, you could express how the paragraph that follows is similar in some way or perhaps more important in some way; you could identify how the paragraph that comes next is more controversial or more surprising, etc. In short, get readers to connect what they just read to where you’re going in the next paragraph.
Conclusion paragraph thesis restatement
The first sentence of your conclusion paragraph restates your thesis statement, not as something that needs to be proved but as something that has been proven.
Conclusion paragraph summary
Following your restated thesis statement (which needs to be one sentence long), summarize your argument and the main points that support it to help readers recognize the validity of your proven thesis statement.
Conclusion paragraph significance
Once you’ve summarized your argument’s main points to justify your thesis statement, express how your argument matters even more by connecting it to other relevant arguments; in short, show what consequences and wider implications derive from your essay’s main argument: if you’re right, what do those consequences reveal about us and our world? What new pathways now stand before us? How does the thesis you just proved change you or change others, perhaps in a profound way? Who else is impacted by this knowledge or reality? Predict what may happen in the future because of this knowledge and how that prediction may represent a much bigger argument or thesis we need to consider now going forward.
Sentence strength
his standard assesses how well you use sentence-combining techniques to express your ideas, avoiding run-on sentences and redundant writing in the process. Readers should be able to read your ideas without getting distracted by grammar mistakes and redundancy. Ideally, you accurately incorporate a mix of various sentence-combining techniques throughout your writing (FANBOYS, semicolons, and subordination).
MLA formatting
For non-research paper submissions, MLA formatting still applies: you’ll want to double-space your submission, left-align it, and use appropriate headers (your name, our course name, submission date), Times New Roman font, and page numbers. There’s more to MLA formatting than this, and we’ll get to that later in the semester.
