DATA PROCESSING
Research Paper
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Timeline |
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Thursday September, 21 |
Report Topic Due at the end of Class |
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Friday, September 22 |
Research Techniques – Internet Searches |
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Monday, September 25 |
Research Techniques – Library Skills |
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Tuesday, September 26 |
Online research |
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Wednesday, September, 27 |
Library research |
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Thursday, September 28` |
Source List Due to be complete like a works cited page |
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Friday, September 29 |
Work Day |
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Monday, October 2 |
Work Day |
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Tuesday, October 3 |
Rough Draft Due with citations and works cited page |
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Wednesday, October 4 |
Work Day |
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Thursday, October 5 |
Work Day |
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Friday, October 6 |
Final Reports Due |
Guidelines:
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REPORT GUIDELINES |
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Length |
5-7 pages |
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Sources |
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Electronic |
2-4 approved sources |
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2-4 (books, magazines, newspapers, etc.) |
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Format MLA |
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Title Page Included on the first page of your report |
Title of report Your name Date Instructor Class & period |
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Body of Report |
Including citations of at least 4 sources and correct header |
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Works Cited Page |
A complete bibliographical listing of all sources used |
Step 1: Get Started
Don’t procrastinate! You have two weeks to complete this paper, use your time wisely and DO NOT wait until two days before your paper is due to start.
Step 2: Select a General Topic
Your topic can be any social problem or issue that interests you. Everyone must have a different topic. You should choose a topic that you can gather adequate information and statistics to complete your paper.
For example: Teenage Drug Use in America, Welfare, Use of Technology in Schools, School Dress Codes, etc. and many, many more.
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TOPIC CHECKLIST |
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Not too broad |
"Preparations for D-Day" not "Causes and Results of WWII" |
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Not too narrow |
"Impact of Foreign Car Imports" not "BMW Mag Wheels" |
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Interesting to readers |
"Ocean Tides-Alternative Fuel: not the obvious "Should We Seek Other Fuels" |
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Not too technical |
""Chemotherapy For Cancer" not "Carcinoma of the Pancreas" |
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Scholarly |
"A Comparative Analysis of Technology Today verses 10 Years Ago" |
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Interesting to you |
Opens a new, challenging area to you or brings new information to a topic you were already aware of |
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OK with Instructor |
Meets subject, length or other criteria |
Step 3: Search for Information
See that there is enough data on your topic. As your begin your search, use the Source Quality Checklist to help you screen potential material.
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SOURCE QUALITY CHECKLIST |
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Primary Sources |
First hand material such as documents, novels, news stories. EXCELLENT SOURCES |
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Secondary Sources |
Material written about primary sources, events, or ideas. Have to be Oked by instructor to be used. |
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Copyright Date |
Most recent unless historically significant |
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Author’s Reputation |
Well-known in field, prolific, university scholar |
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Scholarship |
Material footnoted, detailed, accurate. Not from sensational, "low-brow" books or magazines |
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Relevance |
Relates closely to topic |
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Objectivity |
Clear point of view. Recognizes ideas of others |
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Bibliography |
Extensive, scholarly sources |
MLA Style Rules
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MLA Style Guidelines |
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Margins |
1" top, bottom, and side margins |
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Line Spacing |
Double space throughout |
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Font |
Courier or Times – size 12 |
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Underlining |
Foreign words, titles of books, magazines, and newspapers are underlined |
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Indenting |
1/2" indent at the beginning of a new paragraph |
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Headers (1/2" from the top of the page) |
Beginning with the first page, papers should have a right justified heading with your last name followed by the page number |
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Title Page |
Your name Instructors name Class name and period Date **see Sample MLA first text page (TITLE PAGE) |
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Author-Page citations |
Citations are placed directly in the text. **see attached sheet titled CITING REFERENCES |
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Works Cited List |
A list of all references used in your paper that is printed at the end of your document **see Sample MLA works cited page |
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Tables |
Tables should be labeled at they are in the example given, however table format should follow what you have been taught in this class |
CITING REFERENCES
Citations within your document
BOOK-SINGLE AUTHOR
Insert the last name of the author and page number in the parenthesis.
This concept has been reported earlier (Jones 148).
OR
If the author’s name appears in the text, insert only the page number(s) in the parenthesis.
Jones reported this concept (148).
BOOK – MULTIPLE AUTHORS
Insert all authors’ last names and the page number(s) in the parenthesis.
An opposing idea has been explored (Brown, Smith, and Rogers 179-81).
OR
If the author’s name appears in the text, insert only the page number(s) in the parenthesis.
Brown, Smith, and Rogers explored an opposing idea (179-810).
Multi-Volume Work (encyclopedias, etc.)
Insert author’s name and volume number, followed by a colon, space and page number in parentheses.
Economic policy should provide for maintenance of full employment (Johnson 2: 273).
Magazine OR Journal ARTICLES
Use the same techniques as for books.
Works Listed By Title
Insert title or abbreviation and page number(s) in parentheses.
The spectrum is visible when white light is sent through a prism ("Color and Light" 213).
Online Sources
If no page numbers are given, omit page numbers and use the appropriate sample from above.
Works Cited Page
BOOK – NO NAMED AUTOHR
Handbook of Pre-Columbian Art. New York: Johnson, 1988
BOOK – ONE AUTHOR
Gershman, Herbert S. The Surrealist Revolution in France. Ann Arbor; U of Michigan P, 1994.
BOOK-MULTIPLE AUTHORS
Raffer, Bernard C., Richard Friedman, and Robert A. Baron. New York in Crisis. New York: 1993.
MULTIVOLUME WORK – CITING ONE VOLUME ONLY
Smith, Richard K. A History of Religion in the United States. Vol. 3. Chicago: U of Chicago, 1993.
NEWSPAPER ARTICLE-SIGNED
May, Clifford. "Relitious Frictions Heat Up in Rwanda." New York Times 12 Aug.. 1994, late ed.: A1.
MAGAZINE ARTICLE-UNSIGNED
"Making of a Candidate for President." Time 20 Jul. 1984: 40-42.
MAGAZINE ARTICLE-SIGNED
Kuhn, Susan. "A New Stock Play in Saving and Loans." Fortune 15 May 1995: 67-72.
CD-ROM
Grolier Ineractive Inc. 1998 Grolier Multimedia Encyclopedia. CD-ROM. United States: Datapak Software, Inc., 1997.
ONLINE SOURCES
PROFESSIONAL OR PERSONAL SITE
Name of Site Creator (if given). Site Title(if there is one or the words HomePage not underlined). Institution or Organization (if associated with site). Access Date <Electronic Address>.
Chartered Institute of Marketing Page. 22 Jan. 1998 http://www.cim.co.uk/.
Online Research
Boolean Operators
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AND |
Use AND between two words. Only files containing both words will appear. |
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OR |
Use OR between two words. Only files containing at least one of the words will appear. |
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NOT |
Use NOT before a word. No files containing the word following NOT will appear. |
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ALL |
is the same as AND |
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ANY |
is the same as OR |
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NEAR |
Use NEAR between two words. Only files in which the two terms occur within 10 words of each other will appear. |
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FAR |
Use FAR between two words. Only files in which the two terms occur 25 words or more apart will appear. |
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Phrase Searching Operator |
Use " " marks to group words as phrases. Search engines will now look for the group of words instead of each individual word. |
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Truncation Operator |
Use and asterisk * after a root word to generate files with all variations of the word. human* will find humanist, humane, humanism |
Using Search Engines
All search engines will present a list of files based on the key words you use in the query.
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Common Search Engines |
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AltaVista |
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Infoseek |
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Lycos |
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Yahoo |
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Excite |
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Hotbot |
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Northern Light |
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A META-Search Engine searches several of the search engines mentioned above at the same time and displays files from all of the engines it has searched.
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META-Search Engines |
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Dogpile |
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MetaCrawler |
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Inference Find |
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Metafind |
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Search Libraries and Library References |
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Libweb |
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Internet Public Library |
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Internet Source Evaluation Checklist
Internet Address Domains:
.com commercial
.edu educational instutions
.gov government agencies
.mil military organizations
.net network resources
.org other organizations
Internet Source Evaluation Checklist
SITE: Is the site and edu, org, gov, or mil site? These are most reliable and maintained by colleges and universities, professional organizations, the military, and governmental agencies. Be cautious of com. Or commercial sites. They usually are heavily weighted with advertising. They may contain information for which payment has been made for publication.
AUTHOR Is the author will-known, expert, qualified? Is there an association with an established, recognized instution?
PUBLISHER Is the publisher an establishment such as university, professional organization, or well-known publisher? Be careful of publishers which only exhist on the Web.
LINKS Do hypertext links take you to educational or other solid sites which can lead to further realiable research and not to commercial sites?
REFERENCES Are quality sources cited which you can locate and check? Is there a bibliography which attests to scholarship and leads to quality sources?
CURRENCY Is information current with a recent publication date? Internet documents are frequently updated.
POINT OF VIEW Are fact rather than opinion presented? Is the authors point of view clear and supported by facts.
Grading Matrix
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Assignment |
Points |
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Preliminary Works Cited Page |
25 (handed in on time) |
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Rough Draft |
25 (handed in on time) |
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Report content, grammar, table (English Stuff) |
100 |
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Report Format MLA style |
50 |
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TOTAL POINTS POSSIBLE |
200 |