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| Paraphrasing Sentences. Paraphrasing is borrowing the ideas of someone else but using your own words and structure. The single most important thing in paraphrasing is to UNDERSTANDING THE ORIGINAL. You can’t possibly paraphrase if you don’t understand what you are writing. Plagiarizing something means copying facts, ideas, and/or words without giving credit to the person from whom you got the information.
“Education in the United States is financed by taxing everyone, even those people without children or those who children attend private school.” Even childless people or those with children in private schools contribute to education through taxes in the United States. “Computer systems contain internal memory units for storage of instructions and data; in addition, they may include external systems to increase the memory and provide flexibility.” Instructions and data are kept in the internal memory units of computer systems. External memory units may be added for extra storage. Remember you change the authors words (using synonyms) or sentence structure. You must keep the author’s essential point. How to incorporate the paraphrase into your paper. You need not mention the source in your text unless there is a reason – eg, Smith is well known and will add authority to your paper. You must always document your source with a note in the text, however. (Smith, 1999) If you do mention Smith in
your text, there are a number of ways to do this. 1. John Smith, in his book
XYZ says that “messages should be linked . . . (1999) Three dots are used to show omission of words in a sentence. “XXXXXXXXXX . . . XXXXXX” Omissions of complete sentences have 4 dots. “XXXXXXX. . . . XXXXXXXXXX” Examples of good paraphrasing: "The Antarctic is the vast source of cold on our planet, just as the sun is the source of our heat, and it exerts tremendous control on our climate," [Jacques] Cousteau told the camera. "The cold ocean water around Antarctica flows north to mix with warmer water from the tropics, and its upwellings help to cool both the surface water and our atmosphere. Yet the fragility of this regulating system is now threatened by human activity." From "Captain Cousteau," Audubon (May 1990):17. According to Jacques Cousteau, the activity of people in Antarctica is jeopardizing a delicate natural mechanism that controls the earth's climate. He fears that human activity could interfere with the balance between the sun, the source of the earth's heat, and the important source of cold from Antarctic waters that flow north and cool the oceans and atmosphere ("Captain Cousteau" 17). The twenties were the years when drinking was against the law, and the law was a bad joke because everyone knew of a local bar where liquor could be had. They were the years when organized crime ruled the cities, and the police seemed powerless to do anything against it. Classical music was forgotten while jazz spread throughout the land, and men like Bix Beiderbecke, Louis Armstrong, and Count Basie became the heroes of the young. The flapper was born in the twenties, and with her bobbed hair and short skirts, she symbolized, perhaps more than anyone or anything else, America's break with the past. From Kathleen Yancey, English 102 Supplemental Guide (1989): 25. Based on: |
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Here is a checklist for reports and articles that may help you get a better mark. It was written by Ajarn Michael especially for his writing students. Here is a table which gives you the major sections of a report and examples. Lecture notes for general to specific movement in a five paragraph essay can be found here. Example article with bibliography: "Language Fluency and Cultural Literacy." Term Project for a Business Report Writing Class. |