Portfolio #2 Due Dates

Due Thursday, April 25 -- Rough draft of entire essay for peer review.

Due Wednesday, May 1 -- Portfolio 2 (final draft of essay plus all materials that document your process).

References! References! References!

You have completed your bibliography and are writing your paper and need to refer to a source.  Should you refer to the author, the page title, the URL or something else?  The Purdue OWL provides a clear answer:

• Any source information that you provide in-text must correspond to the source information on the Works Cited page. More specifically, whatever signal word or phrase you provide to your readers in the text, must be the first thing that appears in the corresponding entry in the Works Cited List.

For example if your bibliography entry looks like this:  

Lundman, Susan. "How to Make Vegetarian Chili." eHow, www.ehow.com/how_10727_make-vegetarian-chili.html.*

You are required to state the last name of the author, "Lundman," in your reference, since the name of the author is what comes first in your bib. entry.  The last name of the author is then your "signal word."

If there is no author last name in your bibliography, then you will refer to the first thing provided in your correctly formatted MLA bib. entry.  In order of preference, these would typically be:

1. Author.
2. If no author:  use the title of the source. (Title of article or web page or abbreviated title)
3. If no title of source:  use the title of the "container" (Title of web site or abbreviated title.  Note this is NOT a URL)

Which brings us to another rule:

In-text citations for sources with no known author

When a source has no known author, use a shortened title of the work instead of an author name. Place the title in quotation marks if it's a short work (such as an article) or italicize it if it's a longer work (e.g. plays, books, television shows, entire Web sites).

We see so many global warming hotspots in North America likely because this region has "more readily accessible climatic data and more comprehensive programs to monitor and study environmental change" ("Impact of Global Warming").

In this example, since the reader does not know the author of the article, an abbreviated title of the article appears in the parenthetical citation which corresponds to the full name of the article which appears first at the left-hand margin of its respective entry in the Works Cited. Thus, the writer includes the title in quotation marks as the signal phrase in the parenthetical citation in order to lead the reader directly to the source on the Works Cited page. The Works Cited entry appears as follows:

"The Impact of Global Warming in North America." Global Warming: Early Signs. 1999. Web. 23 Mar. 2009.

For sources with multiple authors:

For a source with two authors, list the authors’ last names in the text or in the parenthetical citation:

Best and Marcus argue that one should read a text for what it says on its surface, rather than looking for some hidden meaning (9).

The authors claim that surface reading looks at what is “evident, perceptible, apprehensible in texts” (Best and Marcus 9).

For a source with three or more authors, list only the first author’s last name, and replace the additional names with et al.

According to Franck, et al, “Current agricultural policies in the U.S. are contributing to the poor health of Americans” (327).

The authors claim that one cause of obesity in the United States is government-funded farm subsidies (Franck, et al. 327).

For sources with no author available:

When a source has no known author, use a shortened title of the work instead of an author name. Place the title in quotation marks if it's a short work (such as an article) or italicize it if it's a longer work (e.g. plays, books, television shows, entire Web sites) and provide a page number.

Thursday, April 4 -- English 101

Upcoming:

• Bibliography final edits:  capitalization and italics.
• Portfolio 2 assignment sheet (handout).  Portfolio 2 is due Wednesday, May 1.
• Plagiarism and how to avoid it.
• Paraphrasing Practice (handout)
• Brainstorm ideas for note making
• Review of text, pp. 353 - 359 (thesis, focused research, note-taking)
• Discuss organizing the structure of the essay
• Work on completing Stakeholder Analysis 

Assignment for Monday, April 8

• Completed Stakeholder Analysis chart -- 15+ squares (

Assignment for Wednesday, April 10

• Create an informal outline of your essay (on Classroom)  [Sample Outline] 
• Continue note-taking phase of research.  Complete your first 5 note cards or record your first 5 "chunks" of information.  This, ideally, should be a mix of paraphrased information and quotes.
• Read “Summarizing, Paraphrasing, and Quoting Sources” pp. 399-403. Read “Integrating Source Material into your Writing” pp. 404-408. Read “Synthesizing Sources” pp. 408-413 .

Assignment for Thursday, April 11

• Begin writing your essay. Draft at least the introduction (define the issue, include necessary background information, indicate why it’s important to the audience, include your research question).  Sample essays are here.

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--Cartoon from Wikimedia Commons via Creative Commons.

Week of April 1 -- Annotated Bibliography & Research

General structure of a database citation in MLA 8:

Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of the source.” Title of the first container, First name Last name of any contributors, Version, Numbers, Publisher, Publication date, Name of Database, URL or DOI.

Common items are highlighted above.  Less common are items such as contributors and publisher.  These items should be included if available but often are not available.  

Use the following capitalization rule for your article (or website page) titles:  capitalize the first word of the article title and also capitalize any proper nouns.  All other words should be lower case.

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is something you have to work hard to avoid -- like getting wet when it is raining.  In other words, if you just go about your business as is your habit, you are likely to get wet, just as you are likely to unintentionally plagiarize unless you take safeguards:
1) acknowledge your sources -- bibliography
2) refer to sources as needed
3) use quotation marks for quotes.  If you don't want to put something in your own words, if in doubt, use a direct quote.
4) paraphrase information when taking notes

How to Paraphrase:

• change the words
• change the order of words
• change the structure of the author’s words
• collapse lists
  
  An excellent site on the intricacies of plagiarism and how to avoid it is Plagiarism.org

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1. Peer Review of Annotated Bibliography

• discuss citation formatting fine points
• discuss annotations

2. Revise Annotated Bibliographies as needed.
3. 1. Continue to search for articles:  Do you have a buddy, a foreign agent, a gemstone?

Paraphrasing -- An Essential Research Skill

Paraphrasing Slideshow
Paraphrasing Practice 
Paraphrasing Answer Key

Upcoming / during class on Thursday:  
Read text "Doing Focused Research," pp, 354-363.
Complete In-Progress Reflection on Classroom.
Review Portfolio #2 Assignment Sheet & Grading Criteria

Due Friday:
Final draft of Annotated Bibliography.

Due Monday:

Complete total of 15 boxes in Stakeholder Analysis chart
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In Process: During this phase of the research process, you should:

• move bookmarks to Diigo, Google doc., note cards, or notebook
• continue to read & annotate articles
• categorize and label articles
• continue to develop your annotated bibliography as needed.

Stakeholder cartoons

Monday, April 1

Annotated Bibliography Due Dates:
     --Peer review draft due at the start of class on Wednesday, April 3
     --Final draft due at the start of class on Friday, April 5

Sources Reflection -- A buddy, a gemstone, a secret agent?

In-Progress Reflection

1.  Briefly describe your research methods so far.  How are you keeping your information organized?

2.  You should have most of your articles by now.  What new or surprising or interesting things have you learned about your topic?

3.  Course reading and your instructor have suggested a a few different options for taking notes when researching.  What method will you/do you employ?