You should use this review checklist to check your GEN145 persuasive paper before you submit it. This checklist has 4 sections. These sections look at;
1. The structure (organisation) of your paper
2. The way you use sources
3. Your language
4. The final formatting of your paper
Structure
This section of the checklist deals with the way you organise the parts of your paper.
Introduction
The topic and its relevance; Does your introduction start by making the topic of your paper clear? Does your background information in the introduction show why this topic is relevant (why the audience needs to read about it)?
A definition; If there are terms the reader may not know (because they are specialist or perhaps because they are commonly misunderstood) have you provided a definition of these terms?
A “hook”; Have you included a surprising piece of information (a statistic, a fact, an expert opinion, a personal story) related to the topic which might grab the readers’ attention?
The thesis; Does your thesis include a clear position (this is what you are trying to persuade the reader to agree with)? Does your thesis list the areas you will explore to support your thesis?
Supporting Paragraphs
Topic sentence(s); Does each supporting paragraph start with one (or possibly more) sentences which clearly show the topic of the whole paragraph? Are you sure that this topic includes all of the points you are making in the paragraph?
P. Introducing the point; Do you have a sentence to clearly introduce each new point? Does this sentence have a transition to show you are moving to a new point? (eg. Secondly, Another environmental issue relates to water use…, Perhaps the most serious social problem related to tourism is….)
I. Providing information to support your point; Do you include information from sources to support your point (statistics, facts, expert opinion, examples)? If possible, does this information come from more than one source?
E. Explaining your point; If your point needs some explanation from you to finish it, have you included this? If the reader needs a summary sentence to explain what the information shows, have you included this? If the reader needs some explanation to help them see the connection between your information and your position, have you included this?
Conclusion
Topic and relevance; Have you started with a short sentence to remind the reader of the topic and (possibly) why it is relevant? Have you written this using language different from the sentences and phrases you used in the introduction?
Position; Have you clearly reminded the reader of the position you are taking? (paraphrase the position you stated in your introduction)
Support; Have you summarised very briefly the main areas you have examined to support your position?
Final statement; Have you included a final suggestion, recommendation or prediction?
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Using Sources
This section of the checklist deals with the way you use sources in your paper.
Using sources in-text
Quotation; Have you shown any direct quotes clearly by putting them in quotation marks? Have you used no more than 2 direct quotes in your paper? Have you cited direct quotes correctly (by including the page or paragraph number along with the other parts of the in-text citation)?
Paraphrase; When you paraphrase information from sources, have you changed
o the order of the ideas?
o the grammar used ?
o the vocabulary used?
Have you cited the ideas you have paraphrased in-text using correct APA in-text citation format?
Your references list
Does your references list contain all the sources which you cited in-text?
Does it contain any sources which you did not cite in-text? (if so – remove these or cite them in-text)
Is your references list correctly formatted according to APA rules so that the reader can very quickly find a source which you cited in-text in your references list?
Have you alphabetised your references list (arranged it in alphabetical order)?
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Your Language
Each writer has her/his own strengths and weaknesses in writing. Here are some of the problems which come up in undergraduate student writing. Check your paper to be sure these problems do not appear in your work.
Your paper does not include inappropriately informal language eg;
o We need to protect kids
o There are lots of / a lot of reasons to review how we travel…
o When consumers buy stuff online, the company…
Your paper does not include any punctuation errors (capital letters, full stops etc)
All subjects and verbs agree in your paper e.g.
o Research shows that the majority of…
o Wu and Johnston (2005) argue that ….
o Sanchez (1999) points out that….
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Your Formatting
Your entire paper should be formatted according to APA guidelines. You can see an example at this link;
https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/apa_style/apa_formatting_and_style_guide/apa_sample_paper.html
This short Youtube video gives some guidelines on how to format the paper in Word; https://youtu.be/_ODakMMqvIs
Some important things to remember
Your cover page should contain these details;
o The title of the paper
o Your full name
o Your ID
o Your section
o Your affiliation (you are affiliated to Zayed University)
o the word count of your paper (count only from the start of the introduction to the end of the conclusion)
The title of the paper should reflect its content. One way to do this is to use the following format; Topic: Position. Here are some examples which first give the topic and then the writer’s position;
o Palm Oil: The Need for a Ban
o Social Media: Supervising Our Young to Protect Them
o Meat: The Food of The Past
APA papers need clear headers and footers containing specific information (check the links above)
APA papers use specific fonts and line spacing
o Times New Roman (size 12)
o An indent at the start of each paragraph
o All lines are double-spaced. There are not additional spaced between paragraphs