For students to write a great essay, they have to understand the individual components. We will work step-by-step choosing topics, doing research, taking notes, and writing the essay. Students will be working on their essays in class, so they need to be able to access Google Docs during class. Each week, we will look at examples of the new concept, practice together through mentor writing, and then students will work on mastering the concept with their own essay. During the workshop portion of the class, students will get live, individual feedback on what they're working on. By the end of this class, students will have a polished final draft.

Concepts covered in this class:
- Choosing a topic
- Finding sources
- Taking notes
- Organizing notes
- MLA style and citations
- Creating the outline
- Crafting an introduction
- Writing the rough draft
- Revising
- Editing

Week 1: 
What is a research paper?
What makes a good source?
Tips for taking notes and organizing
Group activity - Practice taking notes on sources
WORKSHOP - Practice taking notes
HOMEWORK: Choose essay topic. Start looking for sources and taking notes.

Week 2:
How to cite sources
Importance of citing sources
Group activity - Practice citing sources
WORKSHOP - Create works cited page for essay; work on note taking
HOMEWORK: Finish taking notes

Week 3:
Ways to outline an essay
Look at an example outline
Important elements of an outline
WORKSHOP - Start working on writing the outline
HOMEWORK: Finish outline

Week 4:
Parts of an introduction
How to write a thesis statement
How to write an attention-getter
Look at examples of introduction paragraphs
WORKSHOP - Working on writing introduction and start rough draft
HOMEWORK: Write the rough draft of the essay; turn in before class

Week 5:
How to revise an essay (adding details, cutting unnecessary information, re-arranging, etc...)
Look at an example of essay revisions
WORKSHOP: Work on revising essay
HOMEWORK: Finish revisions and submit essay

Week 6:
Review punctuation and parts of speech
Common errors
WORKSHOP - Edit essays
HOMEWORK: Submit final draft of edited essay