So you’re a college kid who just doesn’t understand why they would need something like outside sources? Well, I’m here to tell you that having the proper sources is the best way to give your paper credibility. Essentially making what you turn in/write more trustworthy and knowledgeable. Furthermore, a source is pretty much a media you derived more information from. The point of having a good source is to allow the reader to go back and check for themselves where these claims came from.

 

Now I know what you might be asking yourself now “what is a primary and secondary source?” well primary sources are first-hand. It is information extracted directly from where it came from. An example would be Laws, quotes, eye witness statements, and other original documents. A secondary source would be things in the nature of scholarly articles and findings posted in academic journals. Essential they are interpretations of the primary source. 

Another great source would be a popular source. It’s pretty self-explanatory, but a popular source is a source of news or information distributed by a business, general news, and entertainment magazines and publishers. Examples of these sources are pretty easy to find on google. They include but are not limited to The TIMES, New York Post, Washington Post, CNN, Thrasher, etc…I’m sure you get the idea.

Scholarly Sources are sources written by experts. People who dedicate their lives to a particular field and maintain said field by continuously updating their findings. If a course is considered “scholarly” it must have been peer-reviewed. This just means a lot of work went into making sure the author wasn’t wrong. Using EBSCO databases that allow you to choose “peer-reviewed journals can help you find scholarly sources, but also google scholar and your school library are great places to start these sources are very important because they are the most credible sources on the market and that’s just what you want if you would like to put a smile on your professors face and satisfy the works cite requirements. 

The only way to responsible use these outside sources responsibly would be to use tactics such as quoting and not claiming any of the information you have found as yours unless it is a claim the was derived from the content but not taken directly from the content. Also citing your sources is very important to preventing plagiarism. So you should definitely create works cited page or bibliography. Most important of all use the MLA format, teachers go nuts for it for some reason.

All in all, I know sources can feel like an unnecessary hassle but they are actually really useful and quite important. so just use the sources and hey, use Purdue owl to get that work cited page immaculate. 

 

Purdue owl: https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/mla_style/mla_formatting_and_style_guide/mla_formatting_and_style_guide.html

 

infographics websites:

https://libguides.middlesex.mass.edu/c.php?g=364221&p=2623148

https://libguides.spokanefalls.edu/c.php?g=288859&p=4306985