Dr. Robbins’ Handy Guides to Effective Paper Composition and Writing.

Making Good Outlines.

One of the most important, if not THE MOST IMPORTANT, rules of effective college-level writing is to ALWAYS MAKE MULTIPLE OUTLINES OF EVERY PAPER YOU WRITE AND WELL BEFORE, WAY IN ADVANCE OF WRITING THE PAPER. Think about it. Outlines are intended to organize your thoughts and make paper writing easier, not harder. ORGANIZATION, ORGANIZATION, ORGANIZATION must be your watchword to excel in all university writing assignments. Never, ever do a paper without having done at least TWO OUTLINES well before you start the actual writing of the essay. Most students are very poor writers because most students are very disorganized writers. Organize your thoughts carefully and you will easily do better than all of your classmates on your written assignments. Outlines are maps of where you must go in your writing. Leaving home without a map for a distant, previously unknown location is terribly foolish. Make a clear, reliable map before you leave on any writing expedition.

Shown here are sample outlines, rough and more detailed, for a standard essay topic in Western Civilization. I will always be giving you topic questions. All of these questions can be easily outlined in rough format and then revised in a second outline deploying the evidence from the target text under analysis you will use to answer the questions posed and justify your replies. PAY ATTENTION. THIS IS NOT ROCKET SCIENCE. ANYONE CAN FOLLOW THESE SIMPLE PLANS FOR ORGANIZING WRITING AND EXCELLING AT WRITTEN EXPRESSION. ALL STUDENTS WILL HAND IN TWO OUTLINES, ROUGH AND REVISED, WITH ALL REQUIRED WRITTEN ASSIGNMENTS!

The Sample Topic

Based upon your reading of the text (Gilgamesh), please identify what you believe to be the single most important skill or attribute elite Sumerian poets expected their leaders to possess. Why was this skill so critical? What aspects or elements of Sumerian civilization do you believe made this skill in leaders of absolute importance?

As will be shown on the next page, this topic can easily and must be divided into its component question parts for the first rough outline. The second revised outline, below, shows that room must be made right in the outline to include supporting pieces of information and quotations taken directly from the source text and written out verbatim—word for word with page numbers and titles of the source texts. OBSERVE:

Rough Outline 1

I Introduction. (All outlines, like all papers, must have a clear introduction. Best tactic

here is to answer all topic questions in single sentences of your own to

get started clearly.)

II Single Most Important Skill Elite Sumerian Poets Expected their Leaders to Possess.

III Why This Skill Was So Important.

IV Aspects of Sumerian Civilization Making This Skill in Kings of Absolute Importance.

V Conclusion. (All outlines and essays must have clear conclusions. Restate clearly
your main points.)

You are done. This is a fine rough outline that tracks exactly all topic questions.

Revised Detailed Outline 2

I. Introduction. (As above write out in detail your main answers to all topic questions. Be

clear and brief. Use language from the topic question itself to reply. This

is not plagiarism.) Example: “The single most important skill or attribute

Sumerians expected their leaders to possess was…..”

II. Key Definitions of all analytical terms/phrases employed in essay.

(If you coin words or special phrases of analysis in your own writing, make certain then

to define clearly and precisely what you mean by these terms. A good connecting

technique to knit together the various sections of your essay is to start each subsection of

your paper with a reiteration/restatement of the definitions of analytical terms used

extensively in that section.

III. Single most important skill was X. (Give no more than three reasons with verbatim text

Citations. If skill is one word or phrase, define terms carefully immediately after use here.)

Reason 1, with one verbatim text citation written out in your outline.

Reason 2, with another citation including page number and title of source.

Reason 3, with one more different full text citation.

IV. Why this skill was so important. (Give no more than three reasons.)

Reason 1, with text citation written out as a target toward which you will write.

Reason 2, with another verbatim citation.

Reason 3, with a new verbatim citation.

V. Aspects of Sumerian civilization making this skill vital. (Give no more than three

reasons.)

Reason 1, with citation to a supporting text.

Reason 2, with citation.

Reason 3, with citation.

VI. Conclusion. Restate clearly and cogently main points. Tie your argument to important aspects in the development of Western Civilization .

Finally, in the far left column of your outline, written in by hand if necessary, list exactly How Many Paragraphs you will use to complete each section. Count for only one paragraph for Intro. and Conclusion. Remember that a five-page paper has only ten paragraphs in it. Use an HMP column for all essays and get in the habit of conceptualizing and carefully planning all essays by length in paragraphs per section, not pages.

Also keep in mind that sometimes the iron law of three citations per section noted above will not be possible to follow. Some paper sections may need 4-5 citations, others perhaps as few as 1-2. Keep in mind that paper planning needs to be flexible to assure that you have ample room (in short essays overall) to handle adequate proof of your most important points or contentions. Get in the habit now of planning every writing exercise meticulously via multiple outlines. THE ONLY REALLY BAD WRITERS ARE MERELY DISORGANIZED WRITERS.

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