Incorrect punctuation. Review the rules for placement of
commas, quotation marks, periods, and other punctuation.
Make sure you follow those rules throughout your paper.
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Incorrect sentence structure. Look for dangling participles,
split infinitives, sentences that end in prepositions, and other
various grammar no-no’s.
How to Study
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Step 12: Have Someone Else Proofread Reprint your paper, making all those corrections you marked during
the last step. Format the paper according to the teacher’s instructions.
Incorporate your final footnotes and bibliography.
Give your paper a title, one that’s as short and sweet as possible but
tells readers what they can expect to learn from your paper.
Find someone who is a good proofreader—a parent, relative, friend—
and ask him or her to proofread your paper before you put together
the final draft.
Steps 13–15: The Final Draft Incorporate any changes or errors your proofreader may have caught.
Print the final draft. Proof it again—very carefully.
Here are a couple of tricks of the trade: 1) Read your paper aloud.
Go ahead—shout it from the rooftops! It’s amazing how easily you’ll
discover misplaced words, poor grammar, even a misspelling or two.
2) Read your paper backwards. This forces you to focus on each
individual word and is a sensational way to pick up misspellings.
Last step? Put your paper in a new manuscript binder or folder. Then,
turn it in—on time, of course!
Oral Reports There are some key differences between writing a report and pre-
senting it orally, especially if you don’t want to make the mistake of
just reading your report in front of the class.
Chapter 7
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How to Write Terrific Papers
167
If you’ve been assigned to give a talk for a class, it will probably fall
into one of the following categories:
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