Informative Essay Assignment Instructions

Essay #1 (Informative Essay)

Your first major essay is a four-source informative essay. This means you will need to present information in a clear, unbiased way. Your voice should not be prevalent in this style of essay; it is not a personal narrative nor is it a persuasive paper. Rather, it is an informative report to an educated audience. This means you will use third person point of view in your body paragraphs.

Your subject: multitasking.  Your task: write an informative essay that narrows the scope of the subject and digs deeply into the narrowed topic you have selected.  You cannot possibly write an essay on multitasking because it is too broad of a subject; therefore, you must scan the 38 or so assembled sources. You will find these sources in the Essay #1 Sources module:  Essay #1 Sources (This is Where Levitin’s Article “Hit the Reset Button in Your Brain” Lives!)

The three narrowed topics for this essay are multitasking and driving; multitasking and the medical field, and multitasking and student learning. Once you decide which narrowed topic you will research, you must begin to read the sources that apply to your topic. After you read the sources, you need to decide what your essay will focus on since the topics all have even more narrowed areas of emphasis. Your paper must tackle one narrowed, specific topic in order to qualify for a passing grade. You cannot write a broad essay about multitasking and driving, multitasking and learning, and multitasking and the brain, for example. In my class, this is a failing essay because there is no narrowing of the focus.

For Essay #1, you must only use the articles assembled or you from CBC multitaskingsubscriber databases and from reputable online sites. These articles can be found in the module called Essay #1 Sources. Click on the title of the article to access the word file or the website where the article can be found. These articles come from various periodicals (this is what newspapers, magazines, and journals are called).  Of the articles posted, you must use at least four of them.  One must be an academic journal.  If you fail to use at least four sources,  at least one of which is an academic journal, your essay does not qualify for a grade and will receive a 0/100.  Also, you may not use any of the sources assigned during the practice sessions unless they are in addition to four other sources.

 For Essay #1, the following chapters from Lunsford are required reading: Chapters 1, 3, 4, 13, 17, 20, 21, and 22. You will be quizzed on this material.  The quiz schedule for these chapters is posted on the Canvas web page in the Quizzes module, so you will want to check to see which chapters to read first! Keep in mind that your quizzes open Friday and are available for 48 hours. More information about the quizzes is posted in the Quiz Module.

Your main goal is to write an essay that accurately and effectively incorporates sources. Every body paragraph must incorporate sources. Do not provide your opinion on the topic for this essay; instead, you must demonstrate the ability to narrow a subject to an appropriate topic, write clearly, organize paragraphs around one topic, paraphrase accurately, provide clear signal phrases, and cite accurately.  Your textbook and my posts will discuss these key skills, but you will need to actively practice and ask questions along the way. You must paraphrase at least once in this paper, and you may not use any block quotes. Failure to comply with these requirements means your essay will receive a score of 0/100.

Remember this is a college-level essay. Depth and quality should be your main concern, not word count.  However, I do have guidelines to help make sure your essay is, in fact, college-level. It must have at least four well-developed body paragraphs.   In this class, a well-developed body paragraph is at least ten sentences long (give or take, depending on the complexity of your writing) and it must focus on one narrow topic. Your first body paragraph for this essay must provide context by using sources to explain the concept of multitasking. Your essay must also have an effective introduction and conclusion. Keep in mind that these are minimum requirements.  Therefore, an essay eligible for a passing grade must have at least four or five focused body paragraphs in addition to an introduction and conclusion.

You must follow the 8th edition MLA style of documentation for this essay. This means using accurate in-text citations and including a works cited page. You must also submit copies of your sources, with the quoted, summarized, and paraphrased sections clearly marked.  You must indicate whether you paraphrased or directly quoted the passage. Failure to do this will result in a grade of 0–no exceptions. I have explained how to annotate and submit sources in the How to Submit Annotated Copies of Sources with Your Final Drafts

Do not use a title page but do write a thoughtful title for your essay. Double space your essay, use 12 point and use a standard font (such as Calibri or Times New Roman).

Fixed Due Dates for Essay #1 (All work must be submitted as a Word file by 11:59pm on the due date. You must check the Announcements to see if additional work has been assigned; I may require additional paraphrase practices, for example, and that work will be due even if you fail to read about it):

 Summary of Levitin’s article “Hit the Reset Button in Your Brain” (5 points)

Paraphrase of  paragraph of Levitin’s article; see assignment for which paragraph  (5 points)

: Ten source Annotated Bibliography (20 points)

Thesis/Body paragraph with sources integrated and cited in-text (10 points)

: Quiz #3 (10 points)

 Rough draft due (Your draft must be at least four body paragraphs long and include in-text citations and Works Cited page) (10 points)

Peer reviews due (5 points)

: Final draft is due (100 points)

Notice that the entire week of     is designed to allow you to finish your reading to prepare for the Annotated Bibliography and to allow you to begin to formulate your thesis and your body paragraph, both of which are due the week of

If, as you write this paper you feel as though you are merely repeating what other sources say, rest assured that you are doing it correctly.  This essay is assessing your grammatical, summarizing, paraphrasing, quoting, organizing and documenting skills.  It is forcing you to read deeply into a subject to better allow you to develop a credible academic writing voice.  It requires you to demonstrate the ability to narrow the scope of a broad subject in such a way as to allow you to manage an appropriately narrowed topic.Does Your Essay Meet the Requirements?

Read all of these carefully and post questions or email me. Items 1-14 will help while you’re revising your draft; Item 15 is only required for your final draft.

1. Does the introduction end with a clear thesis that narrows down the topic of multitasking? Does your thesis emphasize the word “research” and does it clearly identify the narrowed topic of your essay?
2. Does the essay have at least 4 body paragraphs? Does every body paragraph include support from a source (or multiple sources)?
3. Is the first body paragraph a context paragraph that uses sources to explain the concept of multitasking?
   Do each of your body paragraphs have a clear topic sentence at or near the beginning?
4. Are your body paragraphs only about one narrowed topic? If you have to write two body paragraphs about one narrowed topic, that is great!  You want to be able to dig deeply into a topic to explain it thoroughly.
5. Do you effectively explain sources and transitions between elements within each paragraph?
6. Do you effectively transition between paragraphs?
7. Do you use the appropriate type and amount of sources (at least 4 sources including 1 academic journal article)? Remember, you can only use the sources posted in the Essay #1 Sources module.
8. Does the essay have at least one paraphrase? And, does it avoid using block quotations?
9. Do all quotations and paraphrases have effective signal phrases and citations? Be sure the author’s full name and credentials are used the first time a source is mentioned. Be sure source introductions clearly direct the reader to the appropriate Works Cited entry. (Check rules for indirect sources).
10. Does the Works Cited page match up with the sources used in the essay? If you leave out a source or if you include ones not cited in your essay, your essay will not earn a passing grade.
11. Does your tone stay informative?
12. Do you use third person point of view in your body paragraphs? (First and second person point of view may be okay in your introduction and conclusion, depending on what type you’re writing).
13. Does your essay meet college-level proofreading standards?
14. Did you submit highlighted, annotated copies of all of your sources with clearly labeled file titles along with the final draft?
    How to Submit Annotated Copies of Sources with Your Final Drafts

Annotated Bibliography Instructions and Example

Annotated Bibliography Instructions

Use ten sources. If you use twelve, you can earn five extra points. Remember, for Essay #1 you can only use the sources I’ve provided in the Essay #1 sources module:  Essay #1 Sources (This is Where Levitin’s Article “Hit the Reset Button in Your Brain” Lives!)

Organize sources by alphabetical order of author’s last name (if no author, cite by title of article).Use 8th edition  MLA format for the document and the works cited entries*.
For EACH of your ten sources you must do the following: give a works cited entry; provide a brief summary of the source; provide a brief analysis of the source discussing how you will (or will not) use it in your essay or how it did (or did not) help you understand the issue you’re researching.  Be sure your summary has enough information to show you read the article and picked out relevant points for your own essay.  The evaluation can be more informal—discuss how the information might fit into your essay.  If the information doesn’t fit, say so.
No partial credit is assigned. You must have ten entries.
Be sure you include your tentative thesis at the top of the page!

You will need entries for ten sources in your annotated bibliography. Here is a sample of an entry for one source (your entries should be double spaced):

Engel, Mary. “Low Reaction Rate in Gardasil Study.” Los Angeles Times, 4 Dec. 2008, p. A1.
This article examines a large study conducted by the Royal Children’s Hospital in Australia which found only 3 confirmed adverse allergic reactions to the HPV vaccine. This finding is echoed by the FDA which says there’s no evidence that Gardasil cased deaths or serious side effects in women.

* Use 8th edition MLA format for all works cited entries: How to do your works cited page (8th edition MLA)

PreviousNextAnnotated Bibliography and Works Cited Advice

A friendly reminder about EasyBib and other bibliography generating sites:

Don’t use them. Seriously.  They are not very accurate, and at this level of college composition, you need to use accurate MLA format.  Use the 8^th edition MLA handout I’ve posted, and create your own entries from scratch. It’s actually pretty easy once you get the hang of it. If, despite my advice, you do use a website to create your entries, make sure you double check and correct the entries.

For those of you who want additional help with grammar or MLA format, Purdue’s online writing lab (OWL) is a great website.  Just be aware that 8^th edition MLA format has a lot of optional information in the works cited entries, and for this class, I don’t want you to include most of the optional information.  So, it’ll probably be easier for you if you just use the handout I’ve posted, read through this entire post,  and then post your questions when you run into any tricky situations. For example, most of the sample entries on the 8th edition handout include page numbers.  However, many of your sources do not have page numbers on them.  So, if no page number is given on the source or listed along with the author, source, etc. at the top of the page, just leave page number off the entry.

Your textbook does have helpful information.  For example, if you want to know what to do if there are 2 authors, check page 472.  But your textbook doesn’t have everything.  If you want to know what to do if there are 3 or more authors, keep reading.  You give the full name of the author who is listed first, and then you use the abbreviation et al.  For example, in the article “Connected Yet Distracted: Multitasking Among College Students,” the following are listed as authors: Mokhtari, Kouider; Delello, Julie; Reichard, Carla.  Here’s how you’d write that in your work cited entry: Mokhtari, Kouider, et al.

Also, don’t forget to change all titles into MLA format.  They aren’t always in MLA format on the documents themselves.  And, keep in mind that some of the sources give you information you don’t need (like the publisher of a website or volume issue for a magazine).  Make sure you only include the proper, necessary information. Never use volume and issue for a magazine.  In MLA format, you only use that information for academic journal articles.

Context Paragraph(s)-2

When you write your essays for this class, each one will require you to write what I call a context paragraph. (Sometimes, two paragraphs are required to provide the correct background for the reader.)

A context paragraph provides the reader with the necessary information required to follow what comes next in the essay, which is usually a deeper dive into a specific topic. This deep dive would lose most readers if they did not have the proper background (context) information required to get the reader up to speed. For your first essay, the obvious topic for your context paragraph is a valid definition of what multitasking is; since it is not what most people assume it to be, you will need to explain what multitasking actually is, and then you will have to define it, using several sources.  Do not dig into your narrowed topic in this paragraph–that is, if you are writing your essay about multitasking and driving, do not write about driving in any way in this paragraph! Instead, focus on what multitasking really vs. what most people assume it to be.

For Essay #1, you can provide context with one well-developed paragraph. In future essays, you may need more than one paragraph.

The example paragraphs below come from a student who earned a 4.0 on both the paper and in the class; it comes from her third essay, and her thesis was “Research shows that while some experts claim social media does not cause depression in teens, other experts claim social media use does lead to depression in teens.”

What did she need to explain to her readers (her audience) so that they could follow along? She needed to define social media, and she needed to explain its allure to a specific age group, teens. Here is what she did, in two context paragraphs, one on each topic, both executed at a high level:

Social media has become a common form of communication.  Drew Hendricks, writer for Small Business Trends, explains that “social media is a network or application that allows anyone to post content, share ideas, or participate in social networking… and was first recognizable… in 1997” (4). Hendricks also reports that, “after the invention of blogging [in 1997], social media began to explode in popularity… in the early 2000s” (4). According to Esteban Ortiz-Opsina, writer for Our World in Data, “The first social media sight to reach a million monthly active users was Myspace – it achieved this milestone around 2004” (1). After Myspace was born, social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat slowly started taking over the internet. An article written in the Search Engine Journal, written by Kristi Kellogg, provides the total number of users amongst the most popular apps in 2020. Kellogg reports that Facebook has 2.45 billion monthly active users, twitter has 330 million active monthly users, Instagram has 1 billion active users, and snapchat has 360 million active monthly users (3-4, 6-7). These platforms hold billions of users.

Social media has become extremely popular amongst a specific age group. A study conducted by Paul Ranter, writer for Big Think reports, “about 92% of all teens go online daily, with 71% of them using Facebook and 52% getting on Instagram” (1). Social media became an addictive like platform because of the feeling it gives users. According to a study conducted by Harvard University, “self-disclosure on social networking sites lights up the same part of the brain that also ignites when taking an addictive substance” (qtd. in Hillard 3). The rise of social media has become addictive because of the capabilities it withholds. As social media has evolved over the years, “the rapid and vast adoption of these technologies is changing how we find partners, how we access information from the news, and how we organize to demand political change” (Ortiz-Ospina 1). Social media easily targets teens because of the longing to fit in and become accepted, whether that is in person or online. In an article written in Interesting Engineering, author Christopher McFadden explains how, “social media taps into these primal needs of human beings and it should come as no surprise that social media … [is] so popular among young people today” (6). Social media has made its way into the everyday lives of many teens.

If you took the time to read her paragraphs and this page, you now know how to write a quality context section of your essay. She focuses on one topic in each paragraph; she uses clear and effective signal phrases; she cites accurately; and she writes quite clearly.  You can do the same.

How to Write an Effective Body Paragraph

Always start with a narrow topic sentence. Do not start with a quotation or paraphrase.  Make sure that topic sentence supports your thesis.
Make sure the topic sentence is supported with specific, in-depth information from the research.  (Quote or paraphrase the research).

Make sure you have enough depth. Use more than one quote or paraphrase in your paragraph.

Make sure each quotation or paraphrase is clearly introduced and cited. (see Using Sources in Your Essays)

Make sure you discuss each quotation or paraphrase. Link the evidence to your topic sentence and the other sources you are citing in the paragraph.

Don’t end on a quotation or paraphrase. End the paragraph by making sure your cited evidence supports your topic sentence.  A concluding sentence can go a long way towards paragraph unity.
Use third person point of view in your body paragraphs and use and present tense signal verbs in your source introductions.
Example Body Paragraph with instructor comments.docx