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Creating Your Research Paper

Use this guide to help you create your research paper from start to finish

Getting started

The research process requires planning. We recommend following the research process below.

The Research Process: 
  1. Analyze the Assignment
  2. Select your Topic
  3. Gather Background Information
  4. Write your Thesis Statement
  5. Create an Outline
  6. Research your Topic and Locate Information Sources
  7. Cite your Sources 
  8. Read, revise, and format your paper 

Assignment Instructions Checklist

Look for and Identify the following information in your assignment instructions: 

  • Due Date: Check for the due date.
  • Benchmarks & Check-ins: Does the assignment have multiple due dates? These can also be called benchmarks or check-ins.
  • Deliverables: Check for the length of the assignment. How many pages, words, or minutes does the assignment require? 
  • Style Guidelines: Review the citation and formatting information, such as font size, spacing, and citation style. Do you need to cite your sources in MLA, APA, Chicago or another style? 
  • Required Sources: Note how many sources are required. What types of sources are required? Scholarly articles and books?
  • Assignment Prompts: Check for specific information that the instructor wants you to address in your assignment.
    • Highlight or underline the elements that are key to understanding your assignment. 
    • Summarize the assignment. If you cannot describe your assignment to someone else, re-read the assignment or ask your instructor for clarification.

Attribution: University of Northern Iowa Rod Library "Understand Your Assignment"

Questions about spelling, grammar, or organizing your paper? Here's help from Purdue's OWL

If you have questions about spelling, grammar, organization or style, these resources from the Online Writing Lab - OWL - at Purdue can help you find the answers.

Academic Writing

OWL resources found at this webpage cover many of the different types of writing assignments you may have in college.

Common Writing Assignments

Describes common writing assignments like annotated bibliographies and research papers.

Mechanics

Spelling exercises - Accept or except? Affect or effect?
Numbering exercises - When do you use a numeral, like 31, and when do you write out thirty one? Find out here
Sentence structure exercises - Test yourself subject and verb agreement, run on sentences and more
Sentence style exercises - Eliminating wordiness

Grammar

Need help with words that sound alike? When should you use their, there or they're? Who or whom? Its or it's? Click here for help with these and other tricky rules of grammar. Scroll down to find all the options on the left side column.

Grammar-related exercises can be found here.

Punctuation

These OWL resources will help you with punctuation, such as using commas, quotation marks, apostrophes, and hyphens.

General writing information FAQs