This weeks assignment marks a significant leap forward in the formation of your final research paper. As you work to create the sentence outline, youll be creating the skeleton on which the meat of your paper will begin to hang in the next few weeks. The sentence outline requires you to give considerable thought to the ways you introduce and conclude your paper, the way you organize your main points in the body of the paper, the way you place supporting information from outside sources throughout, and, perhaps most importantly, the argument youre making about your topic.
The sentence outline is exactly what it sounds like. Its a formal outline with Roman numerals (I, II, III, IV
), letters, and Arabic numerals (1, 2, 3, 4
) used to organize a series of complete sentences into the general order of information that youll use in your essay. In
your assigned reading this week, youll see a sample of a handwritten sentence outline. While your completed submission will need to be typed and double-spaced, this is still an excellent example of what a completed sentence outline might look like. (Note the TIP box under the sample; as you are preparing to write a lengthy research paper, you will definitely need a longer sentence outline than the one provided here. For a final project as long as the one required in Week 8 of this course, your sentence outline should be at least 3 pages long.)
I said it last week, but it bears repeating now. The more effort that is invested in the sentence outline, the easier next weeks task of writing the rough draft becomes. Every sentence that you create for this weeks outline becomes a main point, subpoint, or paragraph topic sentence in next weeks draft