FAQS

Terms to understand:

• Paraphrasing: Putting information into your own words.  
• Student voice: When a reader can tell you wrote it. I.e. Your voice versus the author’s voice. 

Paraphrasing and using your voice while writing takes practice to get really good at it. The more you do it, the faster you get better at it.

Here’s how it works:

Your brain takes in information, processes it, understands it, and applies it to other things. It then becomes your knowledge that is based on the author’s information.  When you use that knowledge in your assignments, you should use your voice (your own words and phrasing) because it’s coming from your brain, but the original information is still from the author, so you need to cite it. 

EXAMPLE:

How to get started?

• When reading text, look away from the material and summarize each paragraph in your own words.
• Tell someone else what the article/text means. This forces your brain to understand it.
• Begin with a full sentence outline using your own words What does a "good" outline look like? What does a full-sentence outline look like? How do I create one?  
• Learn how to effectively integrate resources into your writing: QUOTE, PARAPHRASE and SUMMARIZE properly in APA
• Use Grammarly during the writing process. It will help with grammar and can also help identify writing that is from another source (plagiarism). 

Writing using your own voice effectively: Include your own ideas and analysis

Part of writing academically is to add your own thoughts, ideas, interpretations, and analysis to the conversation. Because you will have researched your topic in order to have some level of expertise on it, you should have also developed your own analysis of the topic being discussed.

• Know the parts of a paragraph
  • Have a strong topic sentence for each paragraph to ensure a clear purpose.
  • Avoid ending a paragraph with a direct quote or a paraphrase of what someone else has said. The evidence you use is for your supporting sentences, but the end of your paragraph is where you should add your own ideas or analysis.
• Know the difference between the fours voices of academic writing: own voice, external voice, indirect voice, and direct voice.
• Identify ways to add voice to your writing:
  • Add more explanation
  • Clarify your writing
  • Develop a concept
  • Present an argument
  • Restate the relevance