Paper Guide

Directions, Audience, Purpose

• For any assignment, make sure you follow whatever directions are given. This may include the paper format, source citations, and bibliography.
• Consider your intended audience. Determine what they probably already know about your topic and how to engage them to further their knowledge. This helps to determine your main purpose in writing.

Criteria for grading

In addition to particular assignment directions, writing instructors consider the following elements in evaluating an essay.

• Controlling idea or thesis
  This is the main point, the argument or thesis that controls and unifies your paper, sometimes stated directly near the beginning of your work.
• Support
  Supporting evidence must be substantive, specific, accurate, and relevant to your thesis.
• Organization
  Writers use one or a combination of methods for organizing essays. The structure for all methods is paragraphs. They may vary in length and number, but each one must serve a clear purpose in your paper. Transitions in your organization come naturally if you maintain the focus on your main point. These words connect paragraphs and sentences as repeated key words, synonyms, or references to time, space, or logic.
• Grammar and Punctuation
  If you know you need help, make an appointment with a tutor, 508 854-4287. Use online resources such as
  • Purdue OWL
  • 12 Common Errors: An Editing Checklist (University of Wisconsin)
• Vocabulary
  For help in choosing the right words see Revising Poetry.
  To be sure word usage is appropriate to your subject use a dictionary such as Merriam-Webster Online.
   

Drafting and Proofreading

• Read the essay out loud during your drafting process, or have someone read it to you.
• Proofread a printed copy and edit before you pass in the paper.

Citations and Bibliography

• Use citations to credit your source whenever you quote, paraphrase, summarize, present statistics, or use another person's interpretation.
• Follow the correct style guide for the particular discipline for any sources you use. 
  For humanities disciplines, the MLA (Modern Language Association) format for any in-text citation is the author's last name followed by the page number. Use the title of the work if the author is not named and just the page number if you identify the author in the text of your paper. The basic format is:  (Smith 21). See
  • MLA Formatting and Style Guide at the Purdue OWL for more directions and examples. 
  • For the four major style guides (MLA, APA, Chicago, and CSE) see
    Research and Documentation Online
• Additional information for Internet sources in a bibliography (titled Works Cited) includes the date you accessed the site and the URL.
• Follow the sample papers and examples of Works Cited entries in your textbook. 

Interpreting Literature

Think of your reader as someone who needs a new or deeper understanding of the story, poem, or play you're interpreting. Think of your paper as an argument to convince your reader to accept your interpretation. You will have to present evidence from the work to prove your analysis. Writers generally use present tense when referring to the ideas and characters in a literary work; if you refer to actions that happened before the main action of the story, past tense is acceptable. Be sure that the meaning is clear if you need to shift from one tense to another.

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