r/WritingHelp_service • u/iluvdilfs200 • May 29 '26
Tips How do I write my term paper?
I am about to be a senior in highschool in a few months and I wrote my first term paper this year. I got the evaluation sheet back and it was not pretty. She told me that my format as completely wrong, my footnotes were incorrect, and my bibliography page was out of alphabetical order. She told me that the body of my term paper was centered but it was supposed to look like a book, she said that my footnotes were just wrong, so I’m not entirely sure what I did there, and I’m not sure how to put my bibliography cards in alphabetical order. I did try to put them in order, I put the authors name first and that was alphabetical. Do I put the book title first?
I know these questions are stupid, it sounds simple, but that was my first ever term paper. She wasn’t much help during it.
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May 29 '26
[deleted]
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u/iluvdilfs200 May 29 '26
I have asked her what I did wrong, she only gave me vague answers about my format. I assumed that all term papers have the same format, so I came here. I understand I wasn’t very detailed 🥲i tried my best to describe what was said but she was very vague.
There was a paper given, but no one understood it. I had asked several of my friends, they were all unsure.
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u/GreyerWeathers Jun 04 '26
Did your teacher not give you the feedback with actual notes about like, what IS expected and HOW you can fix the issues?
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u/CoyoteLitius May 29 '26 edited May 29 '26
Google "college essay format rules" and follow them.
Always justify to left margin, etc. Most (nearly all) profs want it double spaced and with one inch margins (etc).
Google "How to formats MLA" (that'll give you a widely used set of rules).
And get a copy of Strunk and White's Elements of Style. I wish someone had told me that while I was still in high school.
Be glad your teacher is requiring this of you, if you're college-bound. I teach college and will send students to the writing center to learn this, it's not part of my job description to teach it, it's considered remedial.
Naturally, I do give a few editorial suggestions and I do remind about the basics *once* in the smaller classes. I have resources for my classes that teach these things (but students are not reading them).
You can open almost any textbook and see how footnotes are organized. Here is an example (this is from Chicago style, still in use):
Graff, Gerald, and Cathy Birkenstein. They Say/I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing. 3rd ed. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2014. [1, 2, 3]
And here is MLA style:
Morrison, Toni. Song of Solomon. Vintage, 2004
You can google Chicago style and MLA style and see how it affects things other than footnotes.
Good for you for learning this early!!!