Working Outline Instructions
ENGL 111 English Composition Statewide Online Course
Working Outline Assignment
Overview
Your assignment is to draft a working outline to prepare for your first draft of Writing Project 4, the Argument Paper.
Creating a working outline helps you accomplish several things, especially when working with longer and more complex projects involving many sources: it helps you organize a mass of information, lay out a logical plan for your argument, decide what to use and not use from your available materials, and discover where you need to do more research to fill in gaps. Working outlines are flexible and allow you to change and move things around as your ideas develop. Since this is a WORKING outline, you are free to make changes to it even after you have turned in a version of it for a grade. Working outlines are works in progress.
Your working outline will include an introduction and thesis, your main supporting points (including refuting counter-arguments), your major source material and evidence, and some concluding ideas.
Again, remember, all of this can change—and almost certainly will change—as you continue to collect information, consider different thesis statements, draft your first draft, etc. The working outline is just the first stage in shaping your Argument Paper. The final form will likely be quite different, but you can only get there by starting here!
Before beginning your outline, assemble and review the following materials:
The Outline Links assigned in Session 12
Your Annotated Bibliography and the final draft of your Synthesis Paper
The assignment instructions for Writing Project 4 (which you can find in the Resources area, in the Writing Projects folder)
Chapter 13 in the textbook
Expected length: Your outline should be at least 250-500 words (though it could be longer).
Format for the Working Outline
Construct your working outline for Writing Project 4 using the following elements:
1. The working title of your
Working Outline Assignment
Overview
Your assignment is to draft a working outline to prepare for your first draft of Writing Project 4, the Argument Paper.
Creating a working outline helps you accomplish several things, especially when working with longer and more complex projects involving many sources: it helps you organize a mass of information, lay out a logical plan for your argument, decide what to use and not use from your available materials, and discover where you need to do more research to fill in gaps. Working outlines are flexible and allow you to change and move things around as your ideas develop. Since this is a WORKING outline, you are free to make changes to it even after you have turned in a version of it for a grade. Working outlines are works in progress.
Your working outline will include an introduction and thesis, your main supporting points (including refuting counter-arguments), your major source material and evidence, and some concluding ideas.
Again, remember, all of this can change—and almost certainly will change—as you continue to collect information, consider different thesis statements, draft your first draft, etc. The working outline is just the first stage in shaping your Argument Paper. The final form will likely be quite different, but you can only get there by starting here!
Before beginning your outline, assemble and review the following materials:
The Outline Links assigned in Session 12
Your Annotated Bibliography and the final draft of your Synthesis Paper
The assignment instructions for Writing Project 4 (which you can find in the Resources area, in the Writing Projects folder)
Chapter 13 in the textbook
Expected length: Your outline should be at least 250-500 words (though it could be longer).
Format for the Working Outline
Construct your working outline for Writing Project 4 using the following elements:
1. The working title of your
References: list, and the material that will be paraphrased, quoted, or summarized. Brief explanations, descriptions, and discussions about how your cited information relates to a particular supporting claim. It is important to note NOW what you are going to say in your discussion about each source you use to establish the relevance to the claim you have it under, to establish the authority and reliability of each source, and to connect the information to something that you calculate is important to your intended readers. Any important counterarguments to this claim that you are aware of and that should be addressed. Include any source material that will help you to fairly and rationally explain the counterargument and any source material that will help you to reasonably and logically refute the counterargument. 6. A concluding rationale, in which you specify what it is your intended audience ought to do with your argument information, and make a case that these readers can, in fact, accomplish what you are asking them to do—that they are the right ones to take up this decision or action. As you work on the outline, you will likely start to move parts around and rearrange the order of your points to make more sense. If you do so, adjust your thesis statement and your essay map as appropriate. Submitting the Working Outline Save your file in RTF format, and submit your file as an attachment via the View/Complete Assignment link in Session 12.