Research papers are highly valued both in academia and the industry. Anybody who’s ever attempted to write a research paper probably knows that such projects can easily make you feel swamped and overpowered with too much work. It’s not just research papers, even writing blogs or articles can make you feel like that. Ultimately, it ends up taking a toll on your writing and your confidence. Just putting effort is never enough! You must analyze and find out ways to make the process smooth & easy. I have listed a few ways to create a perfect outline of your paper.
(1). Pick a topic:
You might not feel it, but choosing the right topic is the key to writing to godly research paper. It would be a lot easier for you to write on a topic that intrigues you instead of writing on a random topic which your instructor assigned you. You can always ask your instructor to change the title for you, as long as your suggested topic is relevant, no one ever denies it. I have tried this a couple of times at Lovely Professional University, and it works like a charm. Also, if it’s a topic you like, it would be a lot easier for you to do brainstorming. But for instance, if you don’t have the liberty to choose a title of your choice, it is always a good idea to step out of your comfort zone and learn some new concepts. If you feel lost, you can always seek help from your instructors or seniors.
(2). Brainstorming:
Instead of vaguely writing as soon as you get your hands on the topic, you should take your time to gather facts from different sources and try framing a crude/skeleton version of your paper in your mind. Such an approach towards writing will ensure you don’t have to start from scratch. The skeleton version of your research paper should include ideas or points you would want to emphasize, and later on, on top of it, you can add layers of concepts, theories, a conclusion as per your requirement.
Google Scholar, ScienceDirect, Elsevier, Sci-Hub, YouTube are some great sources where you begin with your brainstorming.
(3). Writing:
At, this stage you are done with all the brainstorming, and it’s time to wrap things up. Now instead of simply rephrasing theories or concepts and writing them in your paper, you should write about your learnings. For instance, you are writing an article on mutation, and you studied ten scholarly articles on the same from the web. Now, if you were to write the definition of mutation, your explanation should reflect your combined understanding of mutation from all the papers you studied, written in your own words. This way, you will ensure every time you write something, your work intellectually superior to the sources you referred to while learning. Such an approach should help you throughout the writing process, and at the end, you wrap things up with a short & concise conclusion (refer to your introductory paragraph to write a short & meaningful conclusion).
(4). Final touch-ups:
At this stage, you have a complete paper. Now, it’s time for proofreading. This stage is to ensure that your work stands up to its claims and also to eliminate errors. The best way to do this is to proofread your work twice or thrice and ask a third person to do the same for you. Later, you can analyze the pupil’s learning outcomes and get an unbiased perspective on your work. To wrap things up, you should run a grammar check (using Grammarly) and a plagiarism check (this step is non-negotiable) of your work.
This process might seem a bit tedious, but this approach simplifies and smoothens the entire process.
