SENIOR PAPER Writing Issues

SPACING ERRORS

SPACING Make sure your essay is properly spaced! There should not be any extra spaces in between paragraphs. Your entire paper should be TNR font and size 12. Your entire paper should be DOUBLE SPACED

Titles Your title has to reflect your essay Lord of the Flies Does this work as a title? Why or why not? What is a good title? The End of Civilization: Savagery in Lord of the Flies

Italicized or Quotations? Italicize – DO NOT UNDERLINE Book titles (Catcher in the Rye), magazine titles (Rolling Stone), Newspapers (The Courier Express), album titles (20/20 Experience) Quotations –Article titles (“The Newest Tech Toy”), dialogue (“Yes, ma’am, I am here.”) NOTHING IS UNDERLINED IN YOUR PAPER

Subject/Verb Agreement 1. When the subject of a sentence is composed of two or more nouns or pronouns connected by and, use a plural verb. She and her friends are at the fair. 2. When two or more singular nouns or pronouns are connected by or or nor, use a singular verb. The book or the pen is in the drawer.

Pronoun-Antecedent Agreement Basic Principle: A pronoun usually refers to something earlier in the text (its antecedent) and must agree in number — singular/plural — with the thing to which it refers. EXAMPLES: Students must see their counselor before the end of the semester. Or, one could say A student must see his or her counselor....

Transitions Transitions between sections—Particularly in longer works, it may be necessary to include transitional paragraphs that summarize for the reader the information just covered and specify the relevance of this information to the discussion in the following section. Transitions between paragraphs—If you have done a good job of arranging paragraphs so that the content of one leads logically to the next, the transition will highlight a relationship that already exists by summarizing the previous paragraph and suggesting something of the content of the paragraph that follows. A transition between paragraphs can be a word or two (however, for example, similarly), a phrase, or a sentence. Transitions can be at the end of the first paragraph, at the beginning of the second paragraph, or in both places. Transitions within paragraphs—As with transitions between sections and paragraphs, transitions within paragraphs act as cues by helping readers to anticipate what is coming before they read it. Within paragraphs, transitions tend to be single words or short phrases. *See Handout!

Proving your point When I write “prove this”or “proof” I want you to actually go to your book or sources and pull a fact/quote out to put in your paper. You need to back up a claim. Look at your paper…where did I write this?

Analysis What does it mean to analyze? You are arguing a point…your thesis statement. You will defend your argument with specific examples from your text…and other outside sources. Go back after reading your analysis…did you actually argue your thesis statement? Do they match? Your thesis must match your argument.

Works Cited Page It is the last page of your paper. It is double spaced just like the rest of your paper. The title of your page is Works Cited Every line past the first of each citation is indented FIVE spaces…no tab! Alphabetize your works cited page. Make sure you have spaces between a period and another word.

Introductions An Introduction Serves Two Purposes It gives readers an idea of what the rest of the writing will say. It provides a reason for readers to keep reading. What does a GOOD, SOLID introduction include? Open with a quote/statistic (hook your reader) Give background information on your topic/author Move into the thesis (last sentence). A solid intro is at least 4-5 sentences.

Passive Voice Verbs or either ACTIVE or PASSIVE Active – the subject and verb relationship is straightforward: the subject is a be-er or a do-er and the verb moves the sentence along Mrs. A. gave her students the assignment for homework. Passive - the subject of the sentence is neither a do-er or be-er The students were given the homework assignment by Mrs. A. The passive voice is generally acceptable in science classes (lab reports) when the process becomes more important than the subject performing it.

Basic Issues SPELL CHECK Proof read No personal pronouns or contractions unless in a quotation! Please capitalize all proper nouns Write in present tense when describing events from the novel or quoting an author (Shakespeare writes, …) Do not throw a comma randomly in between words…that is called a comma splice! Semi-colons are used to separate two sentences that are related. The sky looked very ominous this evening; I believe we are going to get a big thunderstorm.