The essay is an attempt to communicate information, opinion or feeling, which
usually presents an argument about a topic. Within the RCMP Academy, an essay
is an exercise that gives the student an opportunity to explore and clarify
thoughts about a subject. The skills required by, and learned through essay writing, include thinking,
organizing, researching and writing itself. These are skills that are required in
almost any career but are particularly necessary in law enforcement duties. In
particular, there will always be expository reports to write and arguments to
present.
While there are a variety of essay styles, three in particular are useful for
students of the Academy. The function of the expository essay is to
explain, or to acquaint your reader with a body of knowledge. By explaining a
topic to the reader, you are demonstrating your own knowledge. In the persuasive
essay, you must defend your side of an argument. You are no longer merely
showing, you are convincing. The persuasive essay must choose a side, make a
case for it, consider and refute alternative arguments, and prove to the
undecided reader that the opinion it presents is the best one.
The research
essay leads you into the works of others and asks you to compare their
thoughts with your own. Writing a research paper involves going to source
material and synthesizing what you learn from it with your own ideas. You must
find texts on the subject and use them to support the topic you have been given
to explore.
An essay needs the formality of a beginning, a middle and an end. Organizing
before you write gives your ideas a structure to cling to and allows you to
articulate, analyze, and clarify your thoughts. Organization is a continuous
process; it goes on simultaneously with other activities, such as narrowing your
topic, forming your thesis statement, and conducting your research. Formal
organization generally involves two components: determining a method of
organization for the essay, and drawing up an outline which applies your ideas
to that method. Some principles of organizations are:
Chronological order: paragraphs separate the process or series of events into
major states; Classification: paragraphs divide the material into major
categories and distinguish between them; Increasing importance: paragraphs are
arranged so that the most important point comes last, thus building the essay's
strength; Cause and effect: indicates causal relationships between things and
events; Comparison and contrast: involves lining up related ideas for a detailed
account of similarities and differences; in this kind of essay, it is important
to decide whether you will be concentrating on similarities or
differences.
Although one pattern should serve as the overall organized framework, your
argument can benefit from a combination of these strategies. For example, while
the paragraphs may be arranged in ascending order of importance, within the
paragraphs it is likely that you will incorporate comparisons, causes,
classification or chronology. These principles apply to both the greater
structure of the essay and each individual idea.
Common Problems of Writing Essays:
The above principles, direction and guidelines will assist in the preparation
of a good essay. Knowledge of the common problems of writing essays will also
assist in the avoidance of such problems. The most common problems are:
Thesis Statement: lacking a thesis; a thesis that is too general, or a
truism; or a thesis that is too narrow.
Organization: there is no sense of direction, no reason why one
paragraph follows another; there are few, or inadequate transitions; there are
too many generalizations, and too little support for them; and the introduction
or conclusion is weak, or one simply repeats the other.
Presentation: the essay is poorly set out, with inadequate space for
the instructor's comments and there are frequent typos or misspelled words.
Directions for presentation of a standard expository essay
Typing is always preferable and usually required. If you have to write,
use lined paper.
Use only one side of the paper.
Double-space, so your instructor can both read and criticize your work
effectively.
Leave margins of at least one inch on the top, bottom and sides of the
page.
Page numbers should be placed in the upper right hand corner. Make sure
that all pages are numbered. Title pages are not numbered. Page 1 is the
first page of the essay proper, and must be numbered.
Do not hand in loose pages; always bind them together, either with a
staple or a folder. If you use a folder, be sure that the whole of the
written text is clearly visible. Do not use folders that will substantially
increase the bulk of the pile your professor has to carry home.
A title page is not necessary for research papers but may be used if
desired. Alternatively, you may enter your name, instructor and course
number, and the date at the tope left margin of the first page
(double-spacing after your name and the course number). Enter the title two
spaces below the date and double-space it if it extends more than one line.
The information contained here was summarized from, and based
on, the UVic Writer's Guide of the Department of English, University of
Victoria. http://webuvic.ca/wguide
Additional Guides to Style and Grammar
Getting an A on an English Paper www.andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/EngPaper/index.html
Guide to Grammar and Style www.andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Writing/
Writing Better www.askoxford.com/betterwriting
Guide to Grammar and Writing ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/
Altavista search engine guide
http://www.altavista.com
How to Prepare a Bibliography
It is important to acknowledge the sources used when
writing an essay or preparing a presentation of any kind. (i.e. This
information utilizes a web-based resource APA Publication Manual Crib
Sheet by Russ Dewey of Georgia Southern University which is a
summary of rules from the APA Publication Manual; this resource is
located at http://www.wooster.edu/psychology/apa-crib.html).
Not to acknowledge or cite sources
constitutes plagiarism (which is form of theft) and is a basis for
expulsion from most post-secondary institutions. In addition, it is
dishonest and unethical behavior. Consequently, knowledge of how to cite
sources and to prepare bibliographical information is essential. This is
knowledge that will be increasingly important for report writing and
advanced research as cadets become more specialized in their knowledge
base and areas of specialization. The ability to cite both print and
electronic sources will be more and more essential.
The
initial orientation of the Resource Centre (see Orientation) refers
to copyright and informs the cadets that the Resource Centre has a Cancopy
license which provides permission to photocopy limited sections of books
and journals for research purposes. In addition, the video collection of
the Resource Centre frequently has copyright restrictions and permission
is usually sought for permission to use specific videos for public
broadcast purposes such as applies to an educational setting.
The
following examples use the American Psychological Association (APA)
Publication Manual guide to bibliographical citation. This style of
citation is one of the most authoritative and widely-used guides. It is
the standard guide that is used at the Academy and cadets are advised to
become familiar with it. These examples contain information about author,
publication date, title, edition, place of publication and publisher.
These are the basic elements of a citation.
The following
examples are intended to provide references for different types of
citations that will be used in essays and papers. Wherever there are
italics below, you should actually underline when preparing your paper.
Italics are used here because many browsers use underlines to indicate
links. References should be indented 5 to 7 spaces on the first line, just
like other paragraphs. In examples below, the 5 white spaces are
represented by 5 underscores (_____) because most browsers ignore white
space.
[Top]
Books
_____Strunk, W., Jr., &
White, E.B. (1979).
_____American Psychiatric Association. (1990) Diagnostic
and statistical manual of mental disorders (3rd ed.). Washington, DC:
Author.
(note: "Author" is used as above when
author and publisher are identical.)
_____Freud, S. (1961).
The edo and the id. In J. Strachey (Ed. and Trans.), The standard edition
of the complete psychological works of Sigmund Freud (Vol. 19, pp. 3-66).
London: Hogarth Press. (Original work published 1923)
In
text this would be cited as (Freud, 1923/1961).
Group or
institutional authors
_____University of Pittsburgh. (1993). The titles goes
here. Journal of Something, 8, 5-9.
Journal article
____Spitch, M.L., Verzy,
H.N., & Wilkie, D.M. (1993). Subjective shortening: A model of pigeons'
memory for event duration. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Animal
Behavior Processes, 9, 14-30.
Letter to the editor
_____O'Neill,
G.W. (1992, January). In support of DSM-III [Letter to the editor]. APA
Monitor, 4-5.
Magazine article
_____Gardner,
H. (1991, December). Do babies sing a universal song? Psychology Today,
70-76.
Newsletter article
_____Brown, L.S.
(1993, Spring). My research with orangs. The Psychology Department
Newsletter, 3, 2.
The date is given as it appears on the
publication. For anonymous newspaper articles, see the previous section titled
"Anonymous or unknown authors."
Pamphlet
_____Just
Say No Foundation. (1992). Saving our youth. (9th ed.) [Brochure].
Washington, DC: Author.
Source: APA Publication Manual Crib
Sheet http://www.wooster.edu/psychology/apa-crib.html
[Top]
Additional
Resources
On-line Guide to APA Format
http://www.webster.commnet.edu/apa/apa_index.htm
Citing a Web Site
To
direct readers to an entire Web site (but not a specific document on the
site) it's sufficient to give the address of the site in the text. For
example,
Yahoo! is an excellent search engine for seeking Saskatchewan material http://www.yahoo.ca
Citing
Specific Documents on a Web Site
Web documents share many
of the same elements found in a print document (e.g., authors, titles, dates).
Therefore, the citation for a Web document often follows a format similar to
that for print, with some information omitted and some added. Here are
some examples of how to cite documents posted on the web using the APA format:
An
article from the journal American Psychologist:
Jacobson, J.W.,
Mullick, J.A., & Schwartz, A.A. (1995). A history of
facilitated communication: Science, pseudoscience, and antiscience:
Science working group on facilitated communication. American Psychologist,
50, 750 -765. Retrieved January 25, 1996, from the World Wide Web: http://www.apa.org/journals/jacobson.html
An
article from the APA Monitor (article in a magazine, no author identified):
From
'character' to 'personality': The lack of a generally accepted, unifying
theory hasn't curbed research into the study of personality. (1999, December).
APA Monitor, 30 (11). Retrieved August 22, 2000, from the World Wide Web: http://www.apa.org/monitor/dec99/ss9.html
All
references begin with the same information that would be provided for a
printed source (or as much of that information as is available). If no
publication date is available for a document, use "n.d." (stands for
"no date") in its place. The Web information is then placed in a
retrieval statement at the end of the reference. It is important to give the
date of retrieval because documents on the Web may change in content, move, or
be removed from a site altogether.
Source: Electronic
Reference Formats Recommended by the American Psychological Association http://www.apa.org/journals/webref.html
Guide
to Making a Group Presentation
While each group presentation
will differ in terms of group dynamics and subject matter, the correct
approach to a group presentation is to adopt a Project Management approach.
This involves 6 basic steps:
Break the project down into measurable tasks. Determine the inter-task dependencies.
Assign lengths to each task.
Assign resources (i.e., staff and equipment to each task.
Refine the plan.
Communicate, revise and update the project status
regularly.
Perform a post-implementation review.
Source: Seven Steps for Highly Effective Project
Management. Nancy Blumenstalk Mingus. Project Management. Ed. Paul C.
Tinnirello. (Auerbach: Boca Raton, 1999). Best Practices Series. p.3-10
Preparing
for a Multiple Choice Exam
The multiple choice exam requires more than the simple
recognition of true statements. Fine distinctions are required between
correct and nearly-correct statements. Thinking for synthesis, analysis
and application is required for success. Preparation is essential to learn
about the thinking required to answer multiple choice questions and to
read the questions carefully.
A guide for preparing for
multiple choice exams is located at http://www.coun.uvic.ca/learn/program/hndouts/multicho.html
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