Conducting research can be rather a challenging process. Basically, the main challenge you will face is the amount of unknown information, ideas of various authors that you will have to integrate in your paper later.
Making research paper notecards is one of the effective ways to organize all that info and take advantage of it. Thus, let us talk about research paper notecards and give general guidelines on how to make them properly.
What a research paper notecard is all about
To put it into simple words, a research paper notecard is a piece of paper that contains some idea you want to include in your paper and all information about the source from which the idea comes. In other words, a research paper notecard is not only a means of arranging unknown info, but also a great way to avoid plagiarism.
What research paper notecard format should be used?
Research paper notecard format, in other words, can be defined as the right way to organize everything on your cards. This is what research paper notecard format is all about:
- In the upper left-hand corner, you write a general idea of your card, e.g. “Robert Frost’s poetry”.
- In the upper right-hand corner, you give all publishing information about the source.
- In the middle of the research paper notecard, you write an idea, which you want to cover in your paper.
- Mind that this idea should come in the form of a paraphrase of the author’s words or a quote.
- Finally, in the bottom right-hand corner, write the number of page, where the idea is taken from.
We should say that it is just one of the possible research paper notecard formats. Some students, for instance, put all publishing info on the back side of a card.
Here, you can also read about research paper references and a research paper outline.