Research Paper
In this research paper, my research question is “Which social systems/institutions need to be repaired/strengthened to improve America’s culture”, and I chose sex education in America. I chose to write about this topic after watching Michael Moore’s movie “Where to Invade Next.” The summary to this can be found in this blog post. One of the countries he visited was France, where France teaches kids effective sex education instead of abstinence-only programs and their pregnancy rate is only half of what America’s is. This really peaked my interest and got me thinking that if America taught what France taught their students about sex education, we could possibly lower our pregnancy rates and possibly even more.
I looked up articles that would hopefully prove my point that abstinence only programs are not as effective as they say they are, and there were surprisingly many articles and authors that agreed with this statement.
Writing my paper was kind of difficult. I wanted to use several articles for several different reasons why America should teach all students’ effective sex education, so I was not really sure how to format the paper. Then I realized I could make each paragraph about the one reason, and put the information from the different sources into those paragraphs, even if it meant I had to mention the articles several times.
Once I wrote the paper, I revised it. At first I just fixed grammatical errors. Then I had to go back and add more details to make all of the points relate to the major point; that sex education should be taught in America. Once I related everything, I went back and added credentials about all the authors that I mentioned in my paper. After I was done this, bam. Draft #1 was complete.
Blog posts that relate to this research paper are the Annotated Bibliography, Where to Invade Next? An Argument, and the Summary of Where to Invade Next.
This assignment sheet also helped me figure out my research question which provided a focus for my paper.
I then completed a blog post that reflects on writing my essay. This blog post can be found here.
After completing all of this, we learned in class ways to revise our essay. One day we learned how to write a TSP thesis statement, structure our paper, and how to build an argument. Those notes can be found on this blog post. The following class, we learned about MLA citation and more associated with this type of citation, which can be found in this blog post.
After learning all of this information, I revised my essay again and created Draft #2.
I printed draft #2 and handed in the hard copy to my Professor, Sabatino Mangini. He critiqued my essay to try and improve my writing skills. I fixed my second draft by adding his suggested critiques, and I completed draft #3 of my essay.
Here are the drafts to my research paper:
I looked up articles that would hopefully prove my point that abstinence only programs are not as effective as they say they are, and there were surprisingly many articles and authors that agreed with this statement.
Writing my paper was kind of difficult. I wanted to use several articles for several different reasons why America should teach all students’ effective sex education, so I was not really sure how to format the paper. Then I realized I could make each paragraph about the one reason, and put the information from the different sources into those paragraphs, even if it meant I had to mention the articles several times.
Once I wrote the paper, I revised it. At first I just fixed grammatical errors. Then I had to go back and add more details to make all of the points relate to the major point; that sex education should be taught in America. Once I related everything, I went back and added credentials about all the authors that I mentioned in my paper. After I was done this, bam. Draft #1 was complete.
Blog posts that relate to this research paper are the Annotated Bibliography, Where to Invade Next? An Argument, and the Summary of Where to Invade Next.
This assignment sheet also helped me figure out my research question which provided a focus for my paper.
I then completed a blog post that reflects on writing my essay. This blog post can be found here.
After completing all of this, we learned in class ways to revise our essay. One day we learned how to write a TSP thesis statement, structure our paper, and how to build an argument. Those notes can be found on this blog post. The following class, we learned about MLA citation and more associated with this type of citation, which can be found in this blog post.
After learning all of this information, I revised my essay again and created Draft #2.
I printed draft #2 and handed in the hard copy to my Professor, Sabatino Mangini. He critiqued my essay to try and improve my writing skills. I fixed my second draft by adding his suggested critiques, and I completed draft #3 of my essay.
Here are the drafts to my research paper:
- Sex Education in America, Draft #3
- Sex Education in America, Draft #2
- Sex Education in America, Draft #1