We have a lot of new books coming out this spring! And we would love to introduce them to you in this space! And we would really love for you to click on the Projects Contained, Tables of Contents, Samples, etc., to check them out and see if they are what your homeschool needs next year to get your kids writing—and writing well.

This book uses our simplified research method: Color-Coded Research and Outlining.

This week we bring to you one of our new high school books, MC 10 II: Four Research Reports. This book has been tested with dozens of students over the past three years—and has passed our inspection with flying colors. (Okay, it passed after three years of rewrites and edits and quite literally fifty hours-plus spent by yours truly on the quotation citation portions alone!)

Here is what you need to know:

Meaningful Composition 10-II: Four Research Reports

Our MC 8 II: Junior High Research Reports, as well as projects in other junior high first semester books, all point to and lead up to this challenging high school research reports book. This book brings all research and citation elements together in four incremental projects laid out in weekly lessons.

Report I: Five or Six Agriculture Products is a two to three source ten paragraph paper that includes bibliography cards, outlining cards, Works Cited, quotation inclusion, our “Overview Source Method” of research, our “Color-Coded Research” method of merging sources, and MLA source citation for quotes.

Report II: One Agriculture Product is a three to four source project of ten to twelve paragraphs that includes bibliography cards, outlining cards, Works Cited, Major Works and Minor Works instruction, “Overview Source Method” of research, our “Color-Coded Research” for merging sources; MLA parenthetical citation for quotation inclusion; our “Section-Paragraph-Sentence Approach to Note Taking” and beginning formal outlining.

Report III: A Biography of One Who Contributed to Society is a five to six source project of sixteen to twenty total paragraphs that includes all of the above elements from Reports I and II and adds Redundancy/Synonym Brainstorming; parenthetical citation for paraphrased material; advanced content-based speech tags for quotes; cover page development; and advanced Checklist Challenge tasks.

Finally, Report IV: Topic of Choice brings all of the previous skills and techniques introduced in the first three projects in a multi-week, lengthy paper that shows your student’s research and citation skills at their best. This project utilizes six to nine sources and twenty to twenty-four information-packed paragraphs. You and your student will be extremely proud of the final products he or she has at the end of this high school book.

Read the Table of Contents for this book here.

Get a look at the projects contained in this book here.

Check out the two-week samples here.

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In my curriculum books (Character Quality Language Arts, a complete Christian language arts program for grades two through twelve, and Meaningful Composition, composition books for grades two through twelve), I teach an approach to research called “The Overview Source Method.”

One of the language arts books I have written, Character Quality Language Arts Red Book–Level C (high school)

I happened upon this method years ago as I was teaching kids how to write research reports. I have always taught students to write using a paragraph-by-paragraph method. (I don’t like the 100 word report, etc., approach as writings {essays, reports, and even books}.) 

In the paragraph-by-paragraph method, the student decides ahead of time what each paragraph in an essay or report is going to be about. This early determination helps him in his research, choosing of quotations, sequencing, and more. To use this method in research writing, a student must work in this order: (1) Choose topic; (2) Research enough to write thesis statement (and write it); (3) Choose paragraph topics (from the source(s); (4) Research each paragraph’s topics/take notes.

Highlighters and colored pens are musts for research in the Overview Source Method and Color Coded Research approach

When a young student (third or fourth grade, for instance) writes a research report, he is usually just starting out with the myriad of skills that are involved in writing a research report, so he generally begins just using one source. That is fairly simple–his teacher helps him choose a good source, such as an encyclopedia entry or web site, a source that has a lot of headers, sub-headers, sidebars, etc. to help him determine his paragraph topics.

As students proceed through middle school, however, my expectations in research writing are heightened. I want the student to begin using multiple sources for one paper. I want him to learn how to merge a few sources (two at first) into one paper. This multi-source research can be especially challenging in the beginning.

One of the students in my classes to test my books–working on his Overview Source Method and Color-Coded Research

Thus, “The Overview Source Method” of research to the rescue!

In this method, the student chooses his first source, his “Overview Source.” This source will be the first source he consults in laying out his paragraph topics. It will be the first source that he uses to start taking notes beneath each paragraph topic. It will be the source that helps him determine what each paragraph of his report will contain. 

One of the beauties of the “Overview Source Method” is that once a student learns it in, say, sixth grade, he has a skill for life. He can continue to use this approach all through his high school years and even into college. 

Three sources that are “color-coded” and ready for note taking

Choose a source that has any or all of the following:

a. Headers and sub-headers that provide a sort of “outline” of the topic (Hint: At first, I tell my young students to find these great headers and choose three of them to be the paragraph topics (for three paragraphs) for his report!)

b. Glossary or other place where terms are defined

c. At least four times the number of paragraphs that the student is assigned to write. (If he chooses a six paragraph source for a four paragraph paper, he is back to using almost everything in that source, and he will not learn to choose the parts of information he wants to use in his paper.)

Once he chooses his Overview Source, he does any or all of the following:

1. Finds the headers that are above the material that he wants to use in his report. We start out telling students to choose one aspect or sub-topic of the topic per paragraph. (This also solves ALL paragraph break problems! No more running paragraphs together!)

2. Begin the Color-Coded Research (more on that later!) by highlighting each header in the Overview Source with a different color.

3. Using the color of the first header you chose for your first aspect (and first paragraph), highlight everything about that topic that you think you might want to take notes on for your paragraph in that first paragraph.

4. Using your other source(s), continue with that first color of highlighter. Find information about that color’s topic and highlight anything in the second source that you might want to use in your notes.

5. Continue doing Steps 3 and 4 for each aspect/paragraph.

I will write another post on the Color-Coded Research in more detail later. In the meantime, teach your students to use the Overview Source Method–that is, find one good, solid source that will help him to determine his paragraph topics. These are the initial baby steps to research that will build confidence in your student to write longer and more detailed research reports in the future.

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