1/7/19 - Senior Papers, Databases, and Whatnot

Today in class Mr. Rivers went more in-depth with the review of not only what is required for our Senior Papers but also what our paper should have in it and what it should accomplish. The major parts of what was covered in class today are as follows:

Literature Review Structure:

• Introduce major speakers/topics/events
• Establish your credibility
• NAME DROP → Way to seem more established, more concrete
• Need to talk about the people that you researched
• Examine what the experts you researched are saying?
• What are they trying to prove? What are they researching?
• Is there any debate? → Shows that the topic is more complex
• This leads into the next step…
• Distill current state of conversation
• Show that there are different sides and thoughts on the issue
• What is relevant?
• Call for research
• How does CINEMA contribute to this conversation?
• Is research responding to [cinema choice] and/or is [cinema choice] responding to research?

What films/characters/plot-points/themes/metaphors/allegories/episodes/seasons will your paper focus on??

Now if that seems a little overwhelming, the basic key points that Rivers said your paper has to include/talk about are...

Literature Review~

• Establish Credibility
• Name drop!
• What are experts saying?
• Any debate?
• What are they trying to prove TODAY?
• Introduce the FILM

After this more detailed review of our Senior Papers, we were introduced to the databases we would be using to acquire all of the evidence outside of the movie(s) we have selected. On the Google Classroom, Rivers has included a link to all of the databases, a document of all of the passwords to each, and even more resources for us to use to find good evidence. In addition to this, River suggested that we create a folder in each of our Google Drives for all of our 'Senior Paper stuff'. The folder itself should have PDFs of all articles (evidence) we find, a 'Scratchpad' Doc, a Literature Review Drafting Doc, and a Synthesis Paper Drafting Doc. Although most of the lesson today pertains to the Senior Paper assignment, which will be concluded after the third marking period, the lessons learned from this experience can carry over into (mostly) every day life. Knowing how to write  scholarly articles is a very useful skill, especially if you are going into a field where research is a key element of being successful in that field, such as a Scientist, Professor, or Engineer. Especially in college, (which most people will attend in their lives), being able to write a expository, professional sounding/looking essay or paper is a skill that is almost required in order to graduate from college. In addition to being able to write a scholarly paper, the organizational skills that we went over in class today are extremely applicable to the real world. Again, most people will be going to college and being organized is a major issue for a lot of people in that transition from high school to college life, especially with being able to keep track of work. There are many other examples of how today's lesson apply to the real world however, these are the two examples that will be the most prevalent in our lives very soon.