Chapter 1

In this first chapter I really got a grasp of the basic concepts of writing a research paper. At this point with the amount of research papers I have written I don't really think too much of what is involved in actually writing it I just do it. The nice thing about this chapter is actually breaks down the different parts of the paper and its process. After selecting a topic you must take a position based on your beliefs or thoughts and begin the research process to back that up. Topic selection is very important because you don’t want to just choose any old topic. You want to select a topic that has meaning to you that you may not know everything about, this is the purpose of the research. Personally in the past I’ve really overlooked a lot of these ways to construct your paper and just began drafting and researching all at once. This resulted in a few subpar papers. Having solid sources you’re a citing is very important because you want all of your information to be as credible as possible. I found the project timeline to be the most interesting part of the chapter because it breaks down every phase of the paper and allows you to set your own deadlines for each.

Chapter 2

The second chapter covers ways to explore into your chosen topic. There are many more ways to research your topic than just the conventional internet research. Simply discussing your topics with peers and recording their thoughts and observations can give you a different perspective. Conducting field interviews or surveys are also great ways to accomplish this. Finding an issue or many issues with your topic can also provide the different views that others have on it and help you really decide your approach on the subject. Research through plain old books, newspapers, and magazines are also great ways. These contains tons of information that most people don’t know even exists. Evaluating the creditability of a source is important because you don’t want just junk information or clearly incorrect statements in your paper. Interesting information is key in pulling the reader into your paper, if you’ve got just boring filler facts and information readers quickly become disengaged. I found in previous papers that the research process will test just how loyal and interested in the topic you are. If you’re falling asleep reading an article on the topic then it’s probably not the right one and you need to chose something else.