2 -3 pgs rough draft

Title of the Paper in Full (centered, using Uppercase and Lowercase)

Your Name

Walden University

Month Day, Year

Course

Place the Title of the Paper Here (Centered)

This document is set up with a title page, running head, 1-inch margins, page numbers, and double-spaced 12-point Times New Roman font with a single space between sentences. These are standard guidelines for all papers at Walden. Keep in mind that your course instructor might have additional preferences, so check for announcements from him or her in Week 1, before the first written assignment is due. In addition to formatting help, there are suggestions for your writing and a break-down of the AWE guidelines. If you read this essay carefully and save or print a copy for your use, it will be a great help as you create your assignments.

How to Use the Template

You can use this template as the foundation of every paper you write in your undergraduate courses. First, save a copy to your computer and label it Paper Template or something else that you will remember. Then, when you want to start writing a paper, open the file and immediately save it as that particular assignment (for instance, JShawWK2Application). This is now your paper and is no longer a template. After you have saved it, double-click on the running head on pages 1 and 2. This opens up the Header section of the document, allowing you to type a shortened form of your paper’s title in both spots. Then fill in the appropriate information on the title page, including the paper’s title, your name, and the date and course (not always required by your instructor, but not a bad idea if no preference has been expressed by your teacher).

You can delete the current body text by selecting the text with your cursor and then simply beginning to type your paper. You can also copy and paste into the template from another document. Select the area to be copied, hit CTRL C, and then open the template. Select the current body text and then CTRL V. At the bottom left of the text you have pasted, you will see a clipboard icon labeled Paste Options. Choose Merge Formatting to make the pasted text fit the template’s specifications.

The Academic Writing Expectations (AWE)

As an undergraduate, you have guidelines to assist you in developing writing skills. These are called the Academic Writing Expectations (AWE) , and they increase in complexity with each course level. If you are in a 1000-level course , work on sentence and paragraph skills, as well as integrating evidence from your course readings. Progressing to the 2000-3000-level courses requires that students also display essay skills and give credit for the information used through in-text citations. At the 4000 level , students should compile a reference list at the end of their papers, in addition to all the other skills mentioned. (Be sure to scroll down in this document for examples of common references.) Finally, students in undergraduate capstone courses should work on polishing their document, displaying appropriate academic voice, and using high-quality sources. Please click on the links within this paragraph to access more information about each AWE level; you can also download and print this overview of requirements .

Please keep in mind that even though you are held specifically to certain standards at each level of course, it is never a bad idea to try the other levels as you write in any course. In other words, the formatting of your in-text citations (Level 2000-300 requirement) or the formatting and type of references (Level 4000 requirement) might not be graded for accuracy in a 1000-level course. BUT, instructors will expect to see you trying to cite your sources and including them at the end of a paper in something that is like a References list. This is part of academic integrity and citing sources and you should be trying to do these even now. You just won’t likely be deducted points if they aren’t entirely done correctly. You should still be trying to do them as part of practicing your scholarly writing skills.

General Writing Suggestions and Writing Center Links

The Writing Center has an extensive database of help topics, webinars, blog posts, and even podcasts to help with your writing. There are even tutors who you can make an appointment with to help. For more information geared at undergraduates start here . There are also additional links through the following paragraphs to help you hone in on some very specific writing basics for any paper. Chances are that you’ve learned a lot of this already, but there is no better time to refresh and review these skills. Academic or scholarly writing is a bit different than the writing you may do in your professional or personal lives.

Most of your written assignments will take the form of essays with opening and closing paragraphs, a clear purpose that is accomplished in the course of the essay, and logically organized paragraphs that develop your ideas. Please note that the best introductory paragraphs identify a specific topic or problem, highlight what has been said or done concerning this topic, and offer a new and significant argument or perspective about the topic. As you construct your introductory paragraph, remember to engage the reader and to express the purpose you hope to fulfill in the paper. In addition, the introduction should offer thesis statement, which is usually the last sentence of your introductory paragraph. A strong thesis is like a roadmap for your readers, presenting the route you are planning to take in order to hit all of the highlights of your topic. For more help on how to create a focused thesis statement, make sure to check out http://academicguides.waldenu.edu/writingcenter/writingprocess/thesisstatements .

At some point in your undergraduate program, APA formatting will be introduced more formally and you will begin to use it more often. At some point it will be required as it is the standard across many colleges. Undergraduates at Walden are asked to being with scholarly writing habits and then will transition to the APA style as they progress. This template generally follows APA formatting, but the exceptions are significant. A number of features appropriate for a long manuscript or for a dissertation are not necessary for relatively brief assignments. For example, you do not need to provide an abstract or Table of Contents for every assignment unless your instructor indicates otherwise. Also, note that the sixth edition of the APA manual allows for first person singular, meaning that you may refer to yourself, the singular author of the essay, using the pronouns I, me, and my. However, you may not use the first person plural (we, us, our) unless you are referring to yourself and a group of authors who are writing the assignment.

Throughout your paper, consider the way a paragraph looks on the page. The indentation and length of a paragraph convey a message to the reader, suggesting a brief or extensively developed unity of an idea. Two naturally emphatic places in any paragraph are the opening sentence and the closing sentence. The opening sentence of a paragraph is often called the topic sentence, which should provide a mini-roadmap for what you plan on discussing in the paragraph. For a more comprehensive explanation of how to write effective topic sentences, make sure to review the Writing Center’s information on topic sentences . Take advantage of the positions of both the opening and closing sentences in a paragraph; use them for emphasis and for guiding your reader.

Specifically, the opening sentence, or topic sentence, of any paragraph provides a natural opportunity to direct the reader from one idea to another. The sentence may function as a combination topic and transition device, suggesting to the reader where this particular section is headed. You may also use single words or phrases to connect your ideas to one another. Think of transitional expressions such as the following as glue or signposts: also, in addition, moreover, therefore, similarly, in contrast, although, or however. For a list of commonly used transition words and phrases, make sure to review the Writing Center’s resource on transitions and check out the Writing Center’s blog post on effective transition use . As the author, you have the responsibility to demonstrate for the reader the relationship between one idea and another so that the reader never has to guess at the logical organization of your ideas. Notice that I am writing about organization, and this sentence becomes a bridge to the next paragraph.

Another way that you might wish to indicate organization to your reader is the use of headings. However, in many of your assignments, no headings are required. If your paper exceeds five pages, or if you think that headings will help to convey the organization and clarity of a particularly complex paper, then consult the Writing Center’s headings information for the correct formatting of the various levels of headings. Remember that headings alone will not accomplish what your writing should accomplish. In other words, your heading may announce “Conclusion,” but if a number of paragraphs introducing new ideas follow that heading, it is rather like a false advertisement and will confuse the reader.

At Walden, your writing is expected to reflect standard edited English. In other words, it should appear as grammatically correct, formal, written English intended for silent reading. Scholarly readers do not usually speak in (or listen to) standard edited English; in their oral dialect, they naturally use contractions, slang, repetition, and all kinds of interpersonal oral signals to one another. In a rather formal writing context, however, none of those elements of speech are particularly useful or appropriate. In particular, APA style does not allow for the use of contractions (e.g., write it is instead of it’s) or informal slang (i.e., use office assistant instead of office boy and students or learners instead of kids). The writing that you are submitting for a grade is more formal than you may be accustomed to. Take the time to read your writing aloud or consult a grammar source regarding some stylistic elements you might have forgotten over the years; to avoid contractions, bullets, and the use of bold type; and to be sure that your sentences are clear to your reader. Write in your authentic voice but in your most intelligent and interesting voice as well. Imagine what questions your reader might ask you, and then provide your reader with well-developed, detailed, specific ideas rather than vague generalizations.

One essential way to develop your ideas is to ground them in the course materials you have been reading or in additional evidence-based sources that you discover in the course of your studies. When you refer to the author of a required reading or to a statement by an expert on a video, you are offering a context for your idea that stems from the published research by experts in your field. For example, if you are writing about how Beach (1999) approached organizational change and you allude to his explanation of institutionalizing change in his book Leadership and the Art of Change, you are demonstrating your scholarship, which is an expected behavior of an exemplary Walden student. Conversely, if your thinking remains vague and general and you do not ground your ideas in references, your ideas are likely to be underdeveloped and taken as your opinion. Let your readers know that you have read (or viewed) and learned from the writings of theorists and scholars by either paraphrasing their ideas or quoting their language and following either the quote or a paraphrase with an in-text citation. For example, you can directly quote a source using the format illustrated by the following sentence (note that you use past tense to report research): Knowles (1998), an authority on adult learning theory, described students as “motivated to learn to the extent that they perceive that learning will help them perform tasks or deal with problems that they confront in their life situations” (p. 67). The reader may be so intrigued with this allusion to Knowles’s idea that he or she may wish to follow up by consulting the same reference. If you want to quote material that is 40 or more words in length, you would create a block quote, such as this quotation from the sixth edition of the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (2010), which states:

Readers will better understand your ideas if you aim for continuity in words, concepts, and thematic development from the opening sentence to the conclusion. Continuity can be achieved in several ways. For instance, punctuation marks contribute to continuity by showing relationships between ideas. They cue the reader to the pauses, inflections, subordination, and pacing normally heard in speech. (p. 65)

Note that the block quotation as shown above is double-spaced. When you end your quotation, make sure the next paragraph transitions from that information, so your reader can follow you. You might also want to include other theorists’ ideas to substantiate the above information. Note that if you are citing a course video, you should not directly quote from it because a video does not have page numbers. However, you can easily paraphrase the information and cite the publisher of the video in a parenthetical citation, like this: (Laureate Education, Inc., 2009). Also remember to include complete reference information for the cited source in the reference list, for your reader to further investigate if he or she chooses.

Additionally, you may choose to cite a fellow student’s discussion post or other shared course work to substantiate your own perspective. Citing other students is a way to use all resources available to you, and it demonstrates your willingness to give credit to your online colleagues. For example, in a critical analysis of a source, you might remark that a fellow student named Alex Jones identified an author’s study as “interesting but lacking in practical application to the classroom” (Jones, 2012) to indicate how your views harmonized with those of other classmates. Information on how to cite discussion posts and other more unique references in APA are found at the Writing Center’s citations web page .

Now, glance back over this essay to note that it is a well-developed piece of writing and not merely a five-paragraph, perfunctory essay. Notice the transitional expressions that allow your mind to move smoothly from one idea to the next. Not all paragraphs are the same length, suggesting that the author is able to develop ideas in various ways. Try to determine what single topic unifies each paragraph. Ask yourself, “What question does this paragraph attempt to answer?” Sometimes it is helpful to write out one to two words that highlight the main idea beside each paragraph. After you have done this for each paragraph, then you should review each sentence of the paragraph to make sure it reflects this main idea. All of your sentences should not look or sound alike, either; some are brief and direct, while others are more complex and flowing. For tips on varying sentence structure, see this Writing Center resource . With practice and time, you can create an assignment that not only looks professional but also conveys your ideas powerfully. For sample paragraphs of each type, try this page .

Some program tools can assist you in creating documents with a professional appearance. Make sure you have your MS Word Spell Check and Grammar Check options turned on. The MS Word Troubleshooting site can be a helpful resource. When a green squiggle line (indicating potential grammatical error) or a red squiggle line (indicating potential spelling error) appears, right click on the line, and you will get a message about the possible error. If you would like a more complete review of grammar usage, Grammarly, an automated grammar checker offered free to Walden students, is another program to explore. To access Grammarly, simply click the green button that appears on the Writing Center website. However, remember that these grammar tools are not as wise as the judgment of the author who has consulted a grammar or usage dictionary.

Finally, just before submitting your work to your instructor, ask yourself, “Have I fully addressed the complete assignment ?” Then in your concluding paragraph, end your essay, rather like the last gesture of tying the ribbon on a present. Some writers close an essay with a concise summary of key ideas, as in the following sentence: “In this essay, I have examined the key requirements for the written assignments undergraduate students write in the Walden bachelor’s program.” Others like to offer an idea that takes the reader beyond the implications of this particular treatment of the topic. For more information on writing an effective conclusion, make sure to check out the Writing Center’s resource on conclusions . However you choose to close your essay, do close the door firmly, thereby giving the reader a satisfying sense of completion.

Conclusion

We hope you find this template helpful as you progress in your bachelor’s studies. If you have questions about the template or about writing expectations, contact the Walden Writing Center at [email protected] .

References

Benn, T., & McLaughlin, R. (2014). Nursing for the new millennium (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Stockhouse.

Jefferson, C. J. (2013). Abnormal psychology and personality. In H. Smith (Ed.), Introduction to the psychology of personality (pp. 45-80). Atlanta, GA: Southern Publishing.

Nason, D., Williams, F., & O’Brien, M. (2014). A study of recidivism in violent offenders. American Journal of Criminal Justice, 2, 100-120. doi:10.1/32455x/239

U.S. Small Business Administration. (n.d.). Forecasting for growth. Retrieved from https://www.sba.gov/content/forecasting-growth

The title page and every page of your document must have a running header. The header is usually one to two words of the title, and it is left aligned. The page number is right aligned.

It should be 1/2” from the top of the page.

*Also, note that the subsequent page running headers are a bit different from the first page.

Click this bubble to delete it.