6. Research Paper Reflection

My initial reaction to hearing that we were writing a research paper was "Oh no this is going to take awhile." Research papers in my previous experience have taken a long time and I often lost enthusiasm for the topic quickly. However, being able to relate my topic, the Great Depression, to my own family was a great way to keep me interested! Researching in the library at first was really difficult, however, by the second day I had over a dozen sources. I wish that I would have taken more time on my annotated bibliography by adding in quotes that I wanted to use into the actual document. I think this would have helped me to stay more organized in the beginning.

After gathering all of my research, I made a general outline and I began to write. I had in mind a story that I had heard from my Grandma Rogers, but I did not have access to the story until much later in my research process. This made relating my topic to my family very difficult from the beginning. After the long struggle of trying to get everything written and after acquiring some family sources, I finally felt like I was getting somewhere with my paper.

I took a draft over to a friend to have them read through it. They were definitely not the best peer reviewer. They did not add any corrections. I also tried going to the writing center. There was not a line, but they were short on consultants. When I finally did get help I did not feel like it was really worth the time that I went in. Needless to say I was frustrated. I instead emailed it to my mom who then recruited my grandma on the great adventure of editing, revising, and revamping my paper.

After many many MANY drafts I finally felt semi-satisfied, but I was still not done. My mom facetimed me one last time, technology is truly a blessing, and we read aloud my paper fixing a few oddly worded places. I was finally able to save my draft as a FINAL!!! Yay! I printed it out and I felt so much relief just to have it done. As I looked over my draft, however, I found a couple other mistakes . . . I think it just goes to show that you truly can't go over a paper too many times!

I really did love being able to research and learn about my family through this project. If I had to do it over again the biggest change that I would have made would be to get my family story FIRST! Before I even started researching! It would have been easier to find a topic to go with the story rather than a story to go with my topic. I think that talking to Sister Steadman and my Mom was by far the most helpful in writing this paper! It was good to write, but now I am just happy that it is done.