The Bedford Researcher Chapter 17 Summary

William Hoffmann
English 102
5/19/14

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 17 Summary

       Chapter 17 of the Bedford Researcher is all about revising and editing your document. What many writers should focus on while revising their documents is considering their writing situation, arguments and ideas, structure of your document, and the design and genre. If a writer has many of those considerations down than their revision will be strong. A writer should make sure that their paragraphs flow along with their evidence, while being structured in a way that is easy to read. A good strategy for revising would be to put yourself in your readers shoes and critique your paper then. You could challenge your assumptions, play the "so what" game or the devils advocate. Another way to get started revising is to make multiple drafts so you don over revise a particular section of your paper and highlight main sections of your paper.
      In addition, asking for feedback can be the biggest help possible for revision. Also focusing on accuracy, economy, and consistency will help in your revision.Make sure your grammar, spelling and punctuation are all correct because it is easy to overlook that. More strategies include: reading carefully and marking and searching your document. Much of these strategies are making sure you read through your grammar, evidence, and flow closely and carefully because if you do that along with receiving feedback your revision should be excellent.  

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 14 Summary

William Hoffmann
English 102
5/19/14

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 14 Summary

       Chapter 14 of the Bedford Researcher discusses how to draft your paper properly. There are many ways in approaching how to draft your document such as drafting based on your outline. Creating an outline gives a writer the foundation of their paper for then they can go off their outline to create the paper. Drafting effective papers is what a writer wants. Some ways to draft an effective paper include: Focusing on a central idea or follow an organizing pattern such as chronology, description, or cause/effect. Using details to capture your readers attention is a good idea along with integrating information from sources and creating transitions between paragraphs.

     The next step would be to draft your introduction. Framing the issue is key when starting this process. Selecting a strategy is also a good idea for your paper. Some strategies include: Stating the topic, establish the context, define the problem, or asking a question. Even with a good intro making sure your document is easy to follow will make less work for the reader Using headings and subheadings, providing a map, or using a menu will help organize your document. Conclusions are a writers last chance to convert the readers. Great strategies for conclusions include: Closing with quotations, closing with a story, closing with a question, or calling your readers to action are all ways in which to finally convert your readers to your points.

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 18 Summary

William Hofmann
English 102
5/12/14

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 18 Summary

       

       Chapter 18 consists mostly of understanding design principles with your paper. It is good for a writer to realize design principles fundamental components such as balance, emphasis, placement, repetition, and consistency. Many of those components make sure your paper includes the right use of elements such as determining if arguments are related, consistency for the entire paper, alignment of your paper, or the use of headers or footers. Many of these components if not designed correctly can throw your reader off. Even if your arguments, thesis, and body paragraphs are outstanding, if your design is out of line your reader may have a difficult time reading your document. 

      Organizing your document by providing headings or subheadings can really help your reader read your paper without trying to figure out what your talking about. In addition, helping your readers locate information and ideas is also a good idea because it provides less work for them and the less work for readers the better. This also correlates to helping your readers recognize the function of parts of your document which again will be helpful for future readers. Illustrations, line spacing, alignment, page layouts, and color and shading also really make your document look neat and well presentable that may attract readers. Design is important but if not used properly can make your paper look trashy even if your information is excellent.

The Bedford Reasearcher Chapter 15 Summary

William Hoffmann
English 102
5/12/14

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 15 Summary

       In chapter 15 of the Bedford Researcher, much of what was discussed was how to use your sources effectively and use them appropriately based on your writing situation. Once you have your sources it is good to establish purposes of the use of them. many include: introducing an argument, contrasting one, or provide evidence for your argument. There are many ways to present how you will describe the evidence you give, and based on your situation one may be better than the other. Many ways of presenting arguments include: aligning it with authority such as with a president or pope, define a concept, set a mood, provide an example, or qualify a point made. 

     There are many great ways to show an argument, however, a writer must format the actual quote or evidence properly in order for the argument to be valid. Providing attributions before, after or during a quote such as according to, suggested, or expressed can be not only effective but changes up the usual quotation format. Writers not only want to provide original attributions but also they want to quote strategically. Many such as partial quotations, complete quotations, and block quotations are great ways of quoting but again depends on the evidence to see which form of quotation would be the best. Quotations are not the only way of providing evidence, there is also paraphrasing, summarizing, and even summarizing in a group of sources. There are many ways of showing evidence but as long as you choose the right ones for your situation, you will have a nice paper.

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 16 Summary

William Hoffmann
English 102
5/5/14

The Bedford Researcher chapter 16 summary

       Chapter 16 of the Bedford Researcher explains how you can write in style. Removing unnecessary phrases or just omitting phrases in general is also discussed. Sometimes adding modifiers such as really or very fine, is not the best thing to do along with adding unnecessary introductory phrases. Stock phrases such "as a matter of fact" can be minimized to "in fact" which cuts down on the "fluff" of papers. Sometimes writing a shorter amount is better because it gets the reader to the point faster. 

       In addition, adding a passive or active voice (depending on your situation) along with a constant point of view help your reader read your paper with less work. Also the formality and specialized language is key towards putting in a good sense of your writing to your reader. However, even if you have all of that down, variety will make the final difference to your paper. Word variety makes your paper interesting and less monotone which will bore your reader. Varying your sentence structure will also help your paper receive acknowledgement. If you have good variety of words, a balanced sentence structure and transitions such as transitional phrases and paragraphs that flow well, your paper will be on the right track.

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 12 summary

William Hoffmann
English 102
1/29/14

 

 

The Bedfored Researcher Chapter 12 summary

 

 

 

 

       In Chapter 12 the Bedford Researcher discussed how to develop your argument. Developing your thesis statement is crucial to developing the body of your paper. For developing a thesis it is important to include reasons, evidence to support your reasons, and decide how to appeal to your readers. Many ways have been developed to appeal to your readers such as, appealing to authority, appealing to emotion, appealing to principals, and values, appealing to character, and appealing to emotion. However, a writer must be careful how they want to appeal to their reader, because depending on their argument and situation one appeal may be more appropriate to use than another. Deduction and Induction are good logic appeals as well when developing an argument. Deduction has moral and ethical appeals while Induction is more based on probability

       Integrity is another very important key step in developing your arguments. Making sure you have good integrity to your arguments and analysis is important if you want to convince your readers. Some key fallacies  to avoid when developing the body of your paper are: A red herring, irrelevent history, or jumping on a bandwagon. If writing or reading it is a good idea to avoid using or recognizing the following fallacies: Stacking the deck, questionable analogies, either/or arguments, and circular reasoning.

The bedford researcher chapter 11 summary

William Hoffmann
English 102
4/21/14

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 11 Summary

       This Chapter focuses on developing your thesis statement for you research paper. After researching and developing a position statement, then it is time to take your position statement and turn it into (while using your notes and sources) a thesis statement. Developing a thesis statement does not just come naturally usually. before writing one you should review your notes and identify the important information along with review and elaborate on ideas to help narrow your position into a thesis. Your role and purpose is also an important aspect to consider. Your thesis may change or be different that what you expected because of the role you are playing or the purpose of the research position you are in. In addition, reflecting on your readers needs may play an impact on the development of your research project.

       Depending on your issue, alternative thesis statements may be something to consider. Asking readers to learn something new, asking readers to change their beliefs or attitude and,  asking readers to take action are all options for writing a thesis. Also depending on the type of document you are about to write you might consider the following: an argumentative academic essay, informative newspaper article, or opinion column can determine how your thesis might turn out. Above all make sure your thesis statement is clear and focused and not too broad. A good thesis is one that many people could argue about.

    

The bedford researcher chapter 10 summary

William Hoffmann
English 102
4/21/14

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 10 summary

       Sources from the internet, books, articles, or newspapers are all good ways of receiving information about your topic, but another source includes field research. Field research can help provide better information that you would not have found before and could help you reshape your research question in a better way. Planning an interview with someone that knows a lot about your topic may be a considerable choice. If that is the road you take, planning for the interview, deciding who you will interview, and deciding what to ask will help you get the best results out of it. Consider your research question before the interview rephrase if needed or ask something that requires more than a yes or no. There are many ways in which an interview can take place such as over the phone, written like email or mail, or face to face.

       The interview only happens once with that particular person so taking notes or maybe recording the interview somehow is probably a good idea since you will probably refer back to it. After an interview it is good to analyze it to help further your research project. Interviews are not the only means of field research, observation is another great way as well. The key things to do in an observation is to know what to look for so you can record your results. Surveying is another great way of receiving field information. Another that some may overlook is public events or broadcast media such as the T.V or radio. Field research can be one of the most useful ways of gathering information for your research project.   

The bedford researcher chapter 7 summary

William Hoffmann
English 102
4/21/14

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 7 Summary

        A writer should avoid plagiarism at all costs when writing a research paper, however sometimes plagiarism is unintentional. Many of the basic ways to prevent plagiarism is to surround sentences/phrases in quotation marks or include a paraphrase that differs in sentence structure from the original passage. Citing sources is a type of research ethic. Having a good research ethic can lead up to minimal or no problems is a research paper. Good ethics include acknowledging a source by citing it properly and accurately represent the information. However, sometimes you wont need to cite a source because it is just common knowledge, knowledge in which most people know about. You can assume information is common knowledge if many sites do not cite it. 

       Plagiarism often occurs because the writer did not take good notes. Taking good notes includes: surrounding quotations with quotation marks, avoiding making summaries, including publication information, and double-checking. Also identifying everything you get from a source is a good idea otherwise someone like an instructor might get suspicious. There are many reasons why plagiarism happens such as students saying: I ran out of time, its easier to copy, I'm no good at writing, I didn't think I would get caught, or I hate this course. Regardless of what the issue is, citing your sources not only gives you a better grade but also saves you time from going back and finding those sources again.

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 6 Summary

William Hoffmann
4/16/14
English 102

Chapter 6 Summary

       Chapter six discusses the importance of taking notes on your sources. The text talks about how to save sources on a computer for future access such as copying and pasting, downloading, or sending e-mails to yourself. Saving your work on a computer allows access to them later and saves time in drafting an annotated bibliography. However, smartphones work as well by searching for information on the web and noting your sources using one of many note taking apps. In addition, taking notes can be a little more tricky than some may think. There are ways of taking notes to avoid plagiarism such as using quotation marks, parenthesis, brackets, or the "sic". Taking notes about your sources is important because it not only helps you find out if it works for your paper but it saves you time in looking for that source if needed for a later time.

     If passages are taken out of a website, paraphrasing or summarizing them for analysis can help avoid plagiarism which is why it is important to sometimes not take full passages out of sources. Taking a lot of notes can sometimes get messy and disorganized, but documenting your sources in files or labeling them can help you keep track of which source is which. Also classifying sources can help. Some ways of classifying sources include: tagging and labeling, grouping, listing, and visualizing. Taking notes and documenting sources will help make a great annotated bibliography.  

The Bedford Researcher chapter 3 summary

William Hoffmann
English102
4/15/14

 

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 3 Summary

 

 

 

       Chapter three specifies the importance of developing a research question and proposal. Looking back on your writing situation can be helpful in terms of how you are understanding your writing situation and what you can do next to learn more about it. To learn more about your topic (if you don't know a lot about it already) would be to look at potential research questions that can be developed by key words such as goals, history, information, and assumptions. Those key phrases can generate thinking processes which include evaluation, cause/effect analysis, or problem/solutions. Depending on your topic certain stater words may help generate a persons research question. For example, if a person is conducting analysis they may start off their question with words like what, when, why, and how, compared to others that are interested in exploring goals or outcomes might use the words would or could. The word should may be used if the research question is leaning more towards determining the appropriate course of action on the issue.

       In addition, the next step of the research paper is narrowing and refining your research question to conduct preliminary searches on your issue. Using conditional words such as although, because, given that, and in light of can help narrow the direction of your research question onto a more appropriate track depending on the research question.Also conducting preliminary searches will help you receive information on your topic. Locating a vast amount of searches when gathering information may mean that someone needs to rephrase their question into a more specific one. On the other hand, if your search ends up in almost no results perhaps broadening your question a little may provide more search results. After searching for information on your topic, creating a research proposal helps you stay on track with your paper. The research proposal includes identifying the topic and issue, provides a review of literature, explaining how you will collect information, and making an annotated bibliography. A timeline may also be helpful for keeping record of how many days, weeks, or months you have been working on the project for a writing document. Lastly developing and identifying appropriate search tools and research methods will help a person in the long run. Search tools include: Online, print sources, and field research such as interviews or observartions all are great methods for research for your topic.



The Bedford Researcher chapter 4 summary

William Hoffmann
English 102
4/9/14

The Bedford Researcher Chapter 4 Summary

       Chapter four of the Bedford Researcher explains the needed components to write a research paper. Reading with an attitude helps a writer ask the questions needed for determining sources while gathering information on their chosen topic and issue. Knowing what a writers limitations are, their own opportunities, what a readers needs and interests are, will help the writer write the relevant type of documents and the design and context in which it will be read. In addition, while researching via the library or an online browser marking sources, taking notes on them, or annotating your sources can help you refer back to them later on or help reshape your argument on the issue and topic. While looking for sources it is also important to identify the type of source you are reading along with if it is a primary source or a secondary source. Primary sources include poems, novels, essays, and journals. Secondary sources include an analysis or interpretations of primary sources by another person which can be helpful but needs to be limited to ensure that your own paper is original with your own ideas/thoughts.

       After your primary and secondary sources are found consider the use of them to make it most appealing to the reader. Depending on your topic using appeals such as authority, emotion, values and beliefs, character, and logic will help the writer develop their paper based on their audience. After gathering evidence from wherever, it is important to refer back to the research log to stay on track and to make sure you are following all of the required components for the paper. Finding appropriate sources is critical for a research paper and sometimes rereading a source can help better understand it. Asking questions such as what is the main point, or who is it written for along with skimming, reading actively, or rereading helps perfect a writers research.

Chapter 2 The Bedford Researcher summary

William Hoffmann
English 102
4/9/14

Chapter 2 The Bedford Researcher

          Chapter two of the Bedford Researcher explains much of how to search for information about your topic via the internet, libraries, and even people who have personal or professional knowledge of your intended topic. Like how most projects are started, creating a plan to explore a topic is needed near the beginning stages of a research paper. Including a list of people whom you can discuss your topic with, a list of questions, and a list of resources to search are key to the formation of your paper. While researching finding preliminary sources along with reviewing sources can help you explore your topic in greater detail. The Bedford Researcher also explains that finding more than one type of source is important for various topics. Searching a library's online catalog, the physical shelves of books at the library themselves are great sources besides browsers from the internet. Articles and scholarly journals or magazines are also great sources to use but may vary depending on your topic.

        Some sources on the internet or in articles and books may or may not have exactly what you are looking for in your topic which is why skimming helps a person quickly receive information without reading the whole text. Checking the table of context, the index, glossary, works cited, or reading the first and last sentences of a paragraph can help determine what the text is about. Lastly,Focusing on an issue is key towards writing a research paper. Finding concepts that are repeated, broad themes on the topic, and finding arguments against your topic help refine and phrase it to help make a decision on an issue. After an issue is found for a topic finding out whether its purpose will satisfy the writer and the reader. In addition finding out if an issue is compatible with a persons limitations and opportunities will also help determine if an issue is the right one for the writer.

Bedford Researcher chapter 1 summary

William Hoffmann
4/8/14
English 102

 

 

Chapter 1

 

 

       In The Bedford Reasearcher the first chapter lists all the requirements and ways to start writing a research paper. It states that you have to find confidence to write a research paper along with taking ownership of your project along with understanding the research writing process and how to work with sources. While working with a source it is important to keep up with managing them by keeping record of them with  notebook, a folder, or on a phone. However, the Bedford Researcher also states that after finding the confidence enough to write a research paper a person must develop a position for their topic an undergo a genre and design. The writer must make a genre or type of essay that will attract as many readers as possible. In addition, writing a research paper will also make the writer need to manage their time accordingly so they do not for example spend too much time gathering information and not spend enough time working with it. Creating a project timeline will also help manage a persons time better in respect with due dates. Some of this timeline activities include exploring your topic, take a position, take notes, and revise drafts, all to help you complete the assignment in time.
      The text goes on explaining that you should find a sense of who your readers or audience are. This will help someone develop thoughts about how their paper should influence a reader. In this case the way you write should not be monotone, it should have some emotion, conviction, and personal interest. If your paper does not have those components along with values or beliefs many readers  simply will not be interested in your paper. To ensure that your document is ready for reading finding the right genre and contexts can help. Some contexts that many documents have include social context, cultural ans historical contexts, disciplinary contexts, and physical contexts. The Bedford Researcher lastly explains all the types of ways to genrate ideas for topic choices such as brainstorming, freewriting, looping, and clustering.