The term paper writing process as with any research process often requires a lot of hard work on the part of students. However, the out-come is very satisfying if one has put in a substantial amount of work. A term paper is primarily a record of intelligent reading from several sources on a particular subject. The task of writing such is not as formidable as it often is to students. All it requires
is a definite and systematic procedure.
Steps in term paper writing.
The following steps must be taken in writing a good term paper.
Step 1: Selection of Term Paper Topic
The topic for the term paper should be carefully chosen for clarity and accuracy. It should be an informative summary of the paper. Lengthy titles often contain waste words, and shorter words may not be specific and informative enough. Therefore, a title should be specific so as to accurately convey the term paper’s message. It is often necessary to start a term paper with more than one title and ask your coordinator to help in choosing which one better describes one’s paper. Lecturer’s approval must be sought before embarking on a full-scale research. Most good papers are built around questions. Your paper is an attempt to write a well-organized answer to whatever question that is decided upon, using facts for the purpose of proving (or at least supporting) one’s contention. Select a subject that can easily be managed. Subjects too technical, learned or too
Information Search for Online Resources
Online Public Access Catalogue (OPAC) is available in the library which readers can use to access materials online. Electronic resources are tremendous on the web but students are encouraged to use these resources with caution, as not all materials available online are reliable. To make a useful search, attention should be paid to the domain names of site e.g. .edu (educational institution).gov (government), or .org (non-profit organization). These sites represent institutions and tend to be more reliable. For general or background information check useful URLS (Uniform Resource Locators) such as general information online, almanacs or encyclopaedias online such as Britannica or Encarta. Use search engines such as google, googlescholar, yahoo etc and other search tools as a starting point. Consult other online resources such as:
Online reference materials (including databases eg . elibrary)
Index to periodicals and Newspapers (eg) magportal.com, online newspapers.com etc.
Online surveys dictionary and encyclopaedia all-in-one resource that you can install on your computer free of charge eg.
answers.com
Encyclopedias eg. wikipaedia free encyclopedia, encarta, Britannica Canadian encyclopedia
Magazines and journals eg time, discover, National geographic, macleans newsweek etc.
Newspapers (Foreign) New York Times, USA Today, Vancouver Newspapers (Nigeria) Nigeria webmaster.com.
You read all the national daily’s in this website. Read, evaluate and bookmark your favourite Internet sites. It is important to jot down full bibliographic information of author, title, place of publication, publisher, date of publication, page numbers, URLS, creation or modification dates on webpages and date of access. These can be entered in one’s laptop or desktop for later retrieval. If printing from the Internet is possible, set up the browser to print the URL and date of access for every page. Remember that an article without bibliographic information cannot be cited.
Introduction .
This section should provide sufficient background information to enable the reader/lecturer understand the article.
The thesis, the purpose of the term paper and the major pornts covered in the paper should be elucidated. Ensure your introduction does not suffer from a lack of continuous flow of information and ideas. Otherwise, your term paper may be seen as lacking in originality and clear thinking.
Body.
This is where arguments are presented to support the thesis statement. Begin with a strong argument, use a stronger one and end with the strongest argument for the final point.
Conclusion
Restate or reword your thesis. Summarize your arguments and explain why you have come to this particular conclusion. The next step is to organize notes already taken down.
Organize all the information gathered according to the outline. At this point it is necessary to critically analyze research data. Check for accuracy and verify that information is up-to-date, factual and correct. Opposing views should be noted if they support one's thesis. This stage is crucial as this is the time to critically analyze, synthesize, sort and digest the information you have gathered and hopefully learn something more about the title of the term paper. Make sure at this stage that all information noted are properly documented. Document all ideas borrowed or quotes used very accurately
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