Summary Exercise

This writing assignment involves writing the Summary Exercise. This assignment is required, but not graded.

PLEASE CHOSE FROM ANY OF THE BELOW TOPICS

TOPIC  #1: Investigate and Interview

You have already chosen a topic and created a working thesis statement for your research paper topic. Find a non-profit organization (e.g., one that provides literacy instruction, a support group for cancer patients, a shelter that provides refuge for battered women) in your city that is connected to your topic. For example, if you are researching services for blind people, you might interview someone at the National Federation of the Blind.

Explain your assignment and request an interview with a staff member who is considered an expert in the field.

Create 10 to 20 questions related to your thesis statement to ask the interviewee.

For the writing assignment:1

• Create an introduction that includes the interviewee’s background. What is his/ her name? What is his/her position? How long has your interviewee worked at this

organization, and what is his/her role there? These are just some of the questions

that you can ask to help you build your introductory paragraph.

• Summarize the interviewee’s responses in approximately three cohesive body

paragraphs.

• Finish with a concluding paragraph that explains how this interview helped you better

understand your chosen research paper topic.

TOPIC #2: Getting What you Need from Periodicals

Locate credible sources for your chosen topic of the research paper project. Find at least five relevant sources from periodicals.2 From the sources that you find, choose one to summarize. The source you choose should be a credible periodical and not merely a random website. Also keep in mind that your chosen source should be research-based and nonfiction. For example, you should not summarize a short story for this assignment. Choose a source such as a journal article, an essay in an anthology, a magazine article, or a newspaper

article.