In order for the course work to be successfully completed, it is necessary to properly organize its preparation and writing and comply with all the basic requirements.
The main stages of work are:
* Choice of the theme.
At the beginning of the semester, each student must, with the help of a teacher or independently, choose a topic from the proposed list.
* Discussion of the list of literature and the logical structure of the work.
Each student can buy term papers online or write them under the guidance of a teacher. During the first consultation, the supervisor explains the tasks, and content requirements, recommends the main literature, and reveals the procedure for implementation and defense.
* Compilation of a preliminary list of references.
The main source of information can be modern scientific collections, textbooks, manuals, documents, encyclopedias, dictionaries, monographs, magazines and newspapers, statistical collections, reference books, and materials posted on the Internet (if permitted). The main task of the student at this stage is to choose from the bulk of the literature those books, newspapers, or magazines, which reveal the issues of his course work. A teacher-consultant can help with this.
* Work with literature.
When studying each literature source, it will be useful to keep a synopsis where you can capture the most important data. When working with monographs, you need to pay attention to the bibliographic list of each of them to use it in the future when choosing literature. And it is better to start the study of articles with magazines that have been published recently and end with the earliest editions, because the course work should reflect the connection with the present.
After researching the information, the student must make a list of literature that will be used and agree on it with the teacher.
* Drawing up a plan.
The plan is the basis of all work. It will provide a consistent presentation of the content, help to navigate the material of the topic, and fully disclose it. The plan should consist of an introduction, the main part, divided into 5-6 paragraphs, a conclusion, a list of references and appendices (if necessary). Each of these parts must correspond to the content of the work, be concise, clear and consistent. The finished work plan must be agreed with the teacher.
* Writing an introduction.
In this part you need to justify the relevance, scientific and practical significance of the topic, show the degree of elaboration of the topic (indicate which scientists and when participated in the study of this problem), indicate the object, subject, purpose and objectives of the course work.
* Writing the main part.
Each section should be devoted to solving the problems formulated in the introduction, and end with a summary. It is not necessary to literally rewrite material from literary sources. The student must retell in his own words which of the scientists and in what sources gives a definition of these concepts, compare different points of view, show the coincidences and differences of views, as well as the most likely conclusions in the thoughts of scientists. In order to avoid plagiarism, all theoretical statements, graphics and statistics must be accompanied by references to the source.
* Writing conclusions and bibliography.
Conclusions should be concise and consistent with the objectives. The list of references must include at least 20 names of information sources that the student has processed and used to write the course.
* Registration.
Course work is made out according to all requirements and standards. It must be neat, without errors, it must be handed in on time.
Typical mistakes when writing a term paper
Only those who do nothing are not mistaken. If you have started writing a term paper yourself, you need to know in advance what pitfalls may lie in wait for you on this difficult path. Consider the typical mistakes made by students (especially beginners) in the course.
1. Failure to structure the coursework. At first glance, this mistake is from the category of fiction, but unfortunately – it is not. Most often, students allow themselves to omit “inconvenient elements.” So, this is absolutely unacceptable.
2. The volume of structural elements of the course work is not sustained. This is a problem that can occur even among graduate students. The fact is that there are cases when the actual research is quite small or the student does not yet have the skills of qualitative analysis of the obtained materials, so he makes every effort to make the theoretical section as much as possible. Or on the contrary, there is no theoretical material in the network, it is lazy to go to the library, and the imagination is stormy, here we have asymmetry in the other direction. But in any case, you need to remember that the volume of each section must be maintained with an error of 5-7%, but with the volume of sub-items, you can play as you want. They cling to this very rarely.
3. When formulating problems, a description of insignificant elements or worse, a description of the tasks of writing a term paper, not the study itself.
4. Review the literary sources of the course work in the form of translation, rather than generalization or analysis.
5. Plagiarism. With this phenomenon began a real war, so if you use someone’s development, then be sure to refer to the source, otherwise, you cannot give up the job. Let your merits be few, but they will be yours.
6. Incorrect grammatical constructions or unsustainable stylistics of the text of the course work. Most often, the student forgets that he is not yet a professor and begins to make inferences of such an order, which cannot afford even academics. You can also observe manifestations of egocentrism – the emergence or intentional use of the pronoun “I”. This is unacceptable.
7. Unsuccessfully chosen ways to provide information in the work. Remember, no one likes a set of numbers that are clear only to you in a row or column. Think about how to demonstrate the results of your research so that at first glance it becomes clear where you came to such conclusions. It is advisable to use tables, graphs, schematic models, and mathematical apparatus for generalization.
8. Ignoring applications. For the volume of course work to be completed, the student usually sacrifices this structural element in favor of the volume of the work itself, but this is also a mistake and in the vast majority of cases you will be pointed to it. Although, there are cases when applications are not needed – this should also be remembered.
9. Incorrect design of the list of literature of the course work. This is very important, always make references to the literature in accordance with the current rules, otherwise, problems cannot be avoided. And the design requirements can always be found online.
10. Lost communication with the supervisor. This is a big problem, without his guidance and approval, even a brilliant job will be poorly evaluated. So do not allow yourself such independence.
Save this article so as not to repeat other people’s mistakes.
