Planning Academic Writing

i just want to write a general response on how to do assignments without restricting myself to the questions asked above. In essays, you are asked to come up with a thesis (articulated in the form of a thesis statement) or research question and then write on it. How then, do you come up with a thesis? The process is different for literature essays and linguistic essays.

For literature essays, you probably will be doing comparative work between two pieces of writing. This is a fantastic opportunity for you to show independent thinking. With the works that you have studied for a literature module, there will definitely be elements in them where you can comment upon their similarities and differences (i.e. characters, themes, setting, plot points, major events, symbols, motifs, etc.) Pointing out their similarities/differences is not enough. You need to give your own views on these similarities/differences. How does this enrich our understanding of the compared elements?

For linguistics essays, think about the purpose behind each section. Why do we need an Introduction, Literature Review, Methodology, etc.? But being able to fill out these sections, however, doesn’t guarantee originality. To show originality, you need to be able to say “these ideas in my essay are mine” I thought about them, I came up with them, and I did not copy them from existing literature. How do you do that? Read around the chosen topic and then responding to them. Sustain the argument from the Intro to the Conclusion. One point leads to the other. Every single sentence needs to be relevant, otherwise, delete them.

Lastly, love what you do. I try to think about why I’m doing a certain thing, what I can learn from it. If I don’t know my purpose of doing it, then perhaps I should’ve chosen another profession or discipline. I think this mentality can be narrowed down to you asking yourself why you are looking at your topic. When you show genuine interest, genuine ideas come.

THE KEY COMPONENTS OF BODY PARAGRAPHS

Just as the central component of an introductory paragraph of an essay is the thesis statement, the central components of body paragraphs are their contributing arguments and supporting evidence.

The body section of an essay outlines contributing arguments (or supporting arguments) that are designed to inform or persuade the reader to come around to the writer's point of view (as described in the writer's thesis statement). These arguments should be backed up by evidence, which comes from the work of others. Together, the contributing arguments and their associated pieces of evidence form most of the essay.

In an essay of 1000-2000 words, there will generally be space to provide details about three contributing arguments. 

EXAMPLE

Consider the thesis statement, "This essay will argue that government surveillance is harmful to citizens". The contributing arguments could be represented on a concept map as follows:

Once these contributing arguments have been determined, the writer would then seek out evidence from other sources to support those arguments.

HOW TO ENHANCE ARGUMENTS WITH SUPPORTING EVIDENCE

For each argument that you make in your writing, you will be required to support your point with evidence. This means referring to the work of others who have conducted study in that area.

Using evidence helps you to show the reader that your arguments are based on the work of those who have actually investigated the topic, not just on thoughts that have come from your own head.

In finding and presenting evidence, it may be helpful to think of yourself like a detective or lawyer who is gathering evidence to build a case. Every piece of evidence you find can help you justify your arguments.

This evidence that you collect should come from a number of different sources to indicate that you have read widely about your topic. You should ensure that:

• Your evidence is appropriate to the paper you are writing.
• The selected evidence is relevant to your argument or your claims.
• You have made it clear to your reader how the evidence supports your contributing argument.
• You have an appropriate amount of evidence.
• Your evidence is correctly cited.

EXAMPLE

The table below shows examples of arguments or statements that are unsupported compared to those that are supported by evidence.

Arguments not supported with evidence ✗	Arguments supported by evidence ✔
Providing students with help in their academic writing would enhance their skills in this area.	A review by Jeffries et al. (2018) demonstrated that providing students with help in their academic writing enhanced their skills in this area.
Teaching strategies that accommodate diversity would increase students' confidence in meeting university behaviour expectations.	Freeman and Li (2019) suggest that teaching strategies that accommodate student diversity will increase students' confidence in meeting university behaviour expectations.

EFFECTIVE CONCLUSIONS

The concluding paragraph of an essay is, in a way, a mirroring of the introduction: Where the introductory paragraph looks forward, outlining the body of the essay, the conclusion looks back, reviewing what has been covered in the body paragraphs and pulling all of the key points together.

It is important to finish your essay with a strong conclusion. A good conclusion has the ability to leave your reader with an overall positive impression of the essay, while a weak conclusion can give the reader the impression that you are not entirely sure about what you are saying.

In a concluding paragraph, you should:

• refer back to your thesis statement, making your stance clear, and
• concisely summarise your main points for the reader.

It is important not to introduce any new information in a conclusion. If there is something that is important and worth mentioning, it should go in the body paragraphs where it can be developed more fully.

It is also important not to be too confident in your conclusions, expressing more certainty than would be reasonable. You should use unemotional, balanced language and come to conclusions with caution. This can be easily achieved by using words and phrases in your conclusion like 'may', 'is likely to' and 'suggests', rather than words that show too much certainty, like 'is going to', 'proven' or 'definitely'.

EXAMPLE

The concluding paragraph below is taken from an essay that you will see again in this course. Notice, however, that although you have not read the rest of this essay, you can still get a clear idea of the writer's thesis statement, stance and main contributing arguments just from reading the conclusion:

In conclusion, the Australian government should consider more comprehensive approaches to combat the spread of the Zika virus, through education, research, and mosquito control programmes. The government should invest more resources into educational campaigns and advertisements to keep the population informed about the risks and the prevention of the virus. Also, more reliable and sensitive diagnostic methods and treatments are critical to prevent further cases. Increasing funding in the research area is also a necessary strategy in order to develop a cure or vaccine. Finally, the government should consider the introduction of new mosquito control programs such as larvicides as an alternative to reduce or more effectively contain the incidence of the virus in Australia.

In this course, we have applied many of the concepts

of academic writing to argumentative essays

because, as mentioned in an earlier video,

this is the most common form of

written assignment given at university.

However, many of these ideas - planning, brainstorming,

locating and evaluating information,

summarising and so on -

are useful in other styles of writing as well.

In this video, we are going to take a quick look

at some of the most common genres of writing

that are used at university.

The next most-common form of written assignment,

and the one that is most often seen in the sciences,

is the experimental report.

In an experimental report, you have the opportunity

to show familiarity with methods for collecting

and reporting on data.

The primary difference from an academic essay

is that the main focus

is often about reporting on data

that you have collected yourself, rather than

than an essay which uses evidence

from secondary sources.

Experimental reports are typically structured

with an introduction, where you provide

background and references; a method,

where you describe how

the investigation was conducted;

a results section, where you report on

what you found; and a discussion,

where you talk about the significance

of your results, and discuss any limitations

that may be present in your investigation.

Experimental reports are often written

in the third person, without using words

like "I" or "we" or "my group".

and they are often written in the past tense,

describing what happened

during the investigation.

Another form of assessment that occurs

very frequently across almost all areas of study

is the critique.

The purpose of a critique is to show your

understanding of something. It could be

as diverse as a business plan, a play,

an academic paper, a book, a product,

a piece of legislation or a lesson plan.

Usually, you would be required to describe or

explain the object of study in some detail.

Then, provide some sort of evaluation,

in which you take a stance that shows your

opinion about the thing that you are examining.

The final genre we are going to consider

in this video, is the case study. These are

most often seen in professional disciplines

like business, health or engineering.

A case study looks at a single exemplar, often

one that is quite complex or multifaceted.

You then need to demonstrate an understanding

of professional practice by analysing

the case in detail, and make recommendations

or suggestions for future action.

Remember to clearly list out the points in mind pragmatically and succinctly. 

Try to Make a complete mind-map before starting out on writing. (making connections to all ideas worth exploring)

https://coggle.it/ 

https://www.mindmeister.com/

You can use it individually, or as part of a group.

It can be added-to easily over time as you do more reading,

and it can also be a helpful way of grouping papers

and other sources into categories.

Overall, a mind map is a flexible tool that can be very

useful in helping you to mentally prepare to write your

assignment.

• Draw and annotate a concept map that depicts the key components of an argumentative essay
• Identify which types of information are appropriate for use in an academic assignment
• Utilise search engine strategies to locate potentially useful sources of information to use in an assignment
• Evaluate information sources of various kinds to determine their quality

The first tip is to try searching by phrases,

rather than individual words.

Adding double quotation marks around a set of words

will return exact matches for that phrase.

For example, searching for World Trade Organisation

will return all results that contain any combination of those words.

However, typing "World Trade Organisation" in quotes

will only return results that contain that exact name.

Next, you can include an asterisk in your search to

instruct the search engine to include any text

in the space where the asterisk is. For example,

searching for the term instruct* will return results for

instruct, instruction, instructions, instructor, etc.

- basically, all words starting with those letters.

This is particularly useful when there are many variations

of the word that you are looking for.

Another helpful operator is the word "OR",

which can help you to combine separate searches,

rather than doing several individual ones.

For example, you may search for "retirement" AND "generation X" OR

"baby boomers". In some search engines like Google Scholar, you

do need to put the "or" in capital letters,

or the search will not work!

Lastly, if you find that you are doing a search and getting

too many irrelevant results, you can exclude words from the

results by adding a minus sign in front of the word.

For example, the search term, "smartphone sales -Apple"

will search for "smartphone sales", but will leave out

any matches that contain the word "Apple".

You can also combine these search tips, for instance by

using quotes and a minus sign, or the word "OR" and an *,

in the same search.

Note that not all databases use the same operators, but most do.

Feel free to experiment and see what works

with the database that you are using.

Using some of these strategies when searching

databases can help you to save time

in locating scholarly sources of information

for your assignment.

• Utilise search engine strategies such as symbols (e.g., " ", *, -) and operators (e.g., AND, OR, NOT) to locate potentially useful sources of information to use in an assignment
• Evaluate information sources of various kinds using the CARS checklist (credibility, accuracy, reasonableness, support) to determine their quality.

Essay plan - exemplar 

The document below is an example of a good quality essay plan that would receive a high grade. In this plan, the student has clearly outlined the key components of their essay, ensuring that each contributing argument is supported by evidence from more than one source. Each argument is clearly related to the thesis statement, and the conclusion follows logically from the arguments presented. The presentation of the plan is clear and concise, and free of spelling and grammatical errors. 

The approval of private lodging services in Japan 

Introduction 

Background: 

In 2017, the Japanese government established the new law related to private lodging services like Airbnb. It regulates the owners of those services to work no more than 180 business days per year, while allowing the local governments to make further restrictions beyond the national regulations.

Thesis statement: 

This essay argues that the Japanese central government and the local governments should approve private lodging services without any restrictions. 

Thesis map: 

• Urgent need for private lodging services because of the shortage of hotel rooms in urban areas 

• Private lodging services may contribute to the progress of the tourism industry in rural areas 

• Low possibility of negative influence on the hotel industry 

Body Paragraph 1

Contributing Argument 1: 

The complete acceptance of the private lodging services by the national government can resolve the serious problem of hotel room shortage in Japan. 

• Tourism is a growing industry, and Japan is a popular destination among foreign tourists (Henderson, 2017). 

• Japan aims to double tourist visits in 2020, when the Tokyo Olympics will be held (Fujikawa, 2016). 

• Despite the increase of incoming tourists, the number of the hotel rooms is not enough in the urban areas, so more accommodation venues are needed urgently (Miyajima & Hirayoshi, 2018). 

Body Paragraph 2 

Contributing Argument 2: 

The rural areas in Japan have struggled to combat low revenues, and the tourism industry could be a key solution. 

• The use of Airbnb in rural areas has become popular all over the world in recent years (USA Today, 2017). 

• Through private lodging services, foreign tourists can experience more of Japanese culture and customs (Bae et al., 2017). 

• Women in rural areas have the desire to make an income by hosting the customers through private lodging services (Asia News Monitor, 2018). 

Body Paragraph 3 

Contributing Argument 3: The private lodging services do not have a big impact on the hotel industry. 

• “Every 1% increase in Airbnb profit connects to just 0.05% decrease in hotel revenue” (Zervas, Proserpio & Byers, 2015). 

• According to another study, Airbnb did not affect hotel revenues at all (Haywood et al., 2017).

Conclusion 

The Japanese government and the local government should approve private lodging services without restriction, because: 

• The shortage of hotel rooms in urban areas needs to be addressed urgently. 

• Regional tourism has been boosted by private lodging services. 

• In reality, there is very little impact on the hotel industry. 

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