Writing a Research Paper
When the instructor gave us a research assignment, I was nervous since I had not done it before. We were supposed to come up with our own topics and do a research on them. Open topics, while promising great freedom, are daunting because they don't provide any direction. I didn't have any idea of a topic to write about so I faced my friends and classmates who brainstormed me with hundreds of suggestions. Some seemed to be good while others were confusing. Considering the limit length of the essay, thousand words, I require a topic that was neither shallow nor so broad to be fully exploited within the limit.As I was struggling to go through my friends' ideas, a thought came into my mind, I had read from the newspapers the previous week that a certain religious group in my country had attacked and killed twenty people. Considering other cases of suicides associated with religious groups, I thought it would be good idea to research on how such groups develop and operate. I gave my research the title "Extreme Religious Groups". I knew that in a research paper I was supposed to present the results of my investigations on the topic, in a unique way, based on my own thoughts and the facts I would have gather
During my research I visited, North Ridge campus, Cypress Creek Campus and Round Rock Public libraries. Out of the three libraries Cypress Creek library is the smallest one and it didn't have a wide collection, however due its small size I was able to get more personalized assistance especially while I was searching on the Internet. The remaining two had a vast correction of articles and books. After doing my research and taking notes I read through all my points and I had to decide what my main points would be, and what evidence I would use to support them. I had to go back and read my thesis once again. I then analyzed the points and chose the ones which seemed to have more weight and I finally made an outlined and wrote my first draft. ed from various sources. After I chosen the topic, I had to decide whether I wanted my essay to be an argumentative or an informative paper. I chose the later since my main aim was to inform my readers how such groups develop, operate, and recruit their members. After I had found a center of interest, I needed to narrow the topic's scope to make it more manageable and specific and I did this by revising my thesis. Before writing my final draft I had to make a presentation in class. I explained my thesis and the supporting points to the class, and gave them a chance to either ask questions or make suggestions. I realized that talking to others about my paper helped get an idea of how my readers would respond towards the topic and I also gathered some more interesting points to add
Some common words found in the essay are:
Extreme Religious, Cypress Creek, Research Paper, Searching Internet, Rock Public, searching internet, reference books, North Ridge, books magazines, research paper, idea topic, final draft, cypress creek, citing sources, develop operate, wrote final,
Approximate Word count = 1031
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)
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