Ep #13 Research Papers Part 1
As a homeschool parent teaching your high school student to write, what would you say is your top concern? If you said anything related to writing a research paper, then I have some good news for you.
First, you are not alone: research writing makes the “Top Ten” list of concerns that homeschool parents have about writing (this is based on a list compiled by ChatGPT).
And second, this week’s episode was created with you in mind as I’m answering all your questions, or at least a lot of them, about how to teach a research paper.
In this episode, I discuss
· Why learning to write a research paper is so important
· How to choose a topic and construct a working thesis statement
· Why you need credible sources and where to find them (NEWS FLASH: Wikipedia is NOT a credible source!)
If you’re like, wait a second, I also need to know how to teach notetaking and citing sources, so where’s that information? No worries, I’ll be talking about those topics and so much more over the next two weeks. The topic of research papers was too BIG and IMPORTANT to cram into one episode (or even two!)
To go along with this three-part series, I have created a free resource for you that you might want to download ahead of time. It is a roadmap to the research process, and you can use it to jot down notes as well as your own ideas as you listen to this episode.
I won’t pretend that research writing is easy, but I can assure that following my step-by-step process will make it a lot less overwhelming.
Links:
Research Paper Checklist
List of current events topics
“Five Must-Have Google Search Tips for Students”
Find It Virginia Explora Libraries Database