Successful Middle School Research Paper Tips
Dispel Myths Students Hold True about Researching and Writing Papers
Jan 13, 2009
Many students enjoy researching on the Internet. It is quick and very easy. The key is to help students to find reliable sources and to then write the information in their own words. When teaching middle school students, a teacher must first crush the believed myths about writing a research paper.
Help Students Find Reliable Sources
Myth number one – if it is on the Internet, it must be true. Many students believe what they read. It takes time to show them that Joe Doe from Idaho can put up a savvy website just as well as a magazine or university. They need to look at who is writing the content and who is sponsoring the website.
Some teachers ask that students only use websites from an approved list. In Ohio, there is a website called INFOhio. It charges schools a fee; however, its information is reputable. To get students started, it is great to have them use this website or begin searching from a list of sites. If they cannot find information, they can venture from the list or website, but they need to first check the author of the information before they use the source. Information that comes from reputable news magazines, journals, universities or encyclopedias are generally safe sources.
Copying and Pasting Information
Myth number two – if the source is cited, the information can be copied. Some students believe that as long as they told where the information came from that they can copy it directly from the Internet website and paste it into their research paper. Remind students that this is plagiarism, which means in many schools that they can receive a zero for the paper. Some schools even threaten to expel the student.
Use of Quotes, Paraphrasing and Summarizing
Myth number three – paraphrasing means that students look up all of the “hard words” and change them. Students think if they change a few words in their information that they have paraphrased the information.
In addition, a few students think they can “quote” the whole paper to avoid the job of paraphrasing or summarizing the information. Students need to be taught how to paraphrase their work. This needs to be modeled for most students.
The best way to do this is to put a chunk of information on the projector or board. Then talk to students about how to write it in their own words. First show them how to summarize the whole chunk of information in a few sentences. This is one appropriate method. Second, show them how to write the information in their own voice. Remind students that their research papers should not sound like a professor wrote the paper, but that a middle school student wrote the paper.
Teaching how to write a research paper is an arduous task. Not only do students need time to find the reliable sources, they have to learn how to take the information and write it into a research paper. It can be done; it just takes modeling and time.
 |
