Outlines

Outlines are helpful tools for:

• Organizing your ideas
• Determining the most logical order to present your ideas
• Grouping ideas together and demonstrating relationships between them
• Showing an overview of what you will be writing about
• Preparing for the process of writing

Creating an outline can be a useful step in the research and writing process.

Step 1: Setting Up

To start, you will need to determine:

1. What is the purpose of my paper?
   • Example: Create a research-backed plan for how I will approach discipline in my classroom as a future teacher.
2. Who is my audience?
   • Example: My professor and classmates for my COM 1010 class.
3. What is my thesis statement (or research question I am trying to answer)?
   • Example: How will climate change affect the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem?

Step 2: Brainstorming

List all of the ideas that you plan to include in your paper.

Step 3: Organizing

Group related ideas together, then arrange them from general to specific.

Step 4: Structuring

Create headings and subheadings as labels for each set of ideas.