Project: civil war research paper and presentation objectives compose a research paper to examine the civil war. create a multimedia presentation of your research. revise for active sentences. when you hear the word publishing, you probably think of newspapers, novels, and magazines. you’d be partially right. those things are all produced by publishers who take authors’ works and make them available for the masses to read. you may not be distributing your writing world-wide, but you still publish writing in a technical sense. once you find the information that you need, document it in a readable way, and distribute it for others to read, you publish your writing. for your purposes, you’ll be publishing your informative research writing to your instructor. your teacher will read it, score it, and provide feedback. before you write today, you will choose a topic related to the american civil war. the novel, little women by louisa may alcott, is set just after that major event. you may select any element of the civil war you choose. consider the tensions of the war from slavery to states' rights. consider the impact on the country, local economies, and families. you want to make sure that your topic is narrow enough to give your paper focus, but not so narrow that you have difficulty finding enough information. you may need to adjust your topic sentence a couple of times. as you select sources to support your writing, ensure that you are selecting credible sources. credible sources are authored by experts in the field, primary sources, or a prestigious organization. your writing will cite the sources as you use them in text, as well as include a list of works cited as the last page of your paper. once the research is complete, you're ready to begin the writing process. your goal is to organize your notes into a clear presentation of the topic. you may elect to present in a chronological format and move through the civil war through time. you may elect to begin at a dramatic point and then backtrack to fill in how events led to that point. as you begin writing, you will need to consider your audience. your audience will affect the style you write in. this essay will have a formal voice to present for your teacher. finally, as you finish your essay, focus on revision. you will revise first to make any adjustments to ideas, then adjust the conventions of grammar and spelling. for this project, pay particular attention to three key areas of revision: using active verbs, writing a strong introduction and conclusion, and proofreading specifically for spelling that you practiced throughout the unit. your introduction will have a thesis. a thesis is a clear sentence that introduces the topic and the impact, often called the so what. your topic is the civil war, but what about it? each of the facts that you find support this sentence. a strong conclusion will apply the knowledge that you found. it is more than a re-statement of the thesis. it explains why your research matters. an active sentence has a clear relationship between the subject and the verb. if you look at the passive sentence below, it almost looks like the gettysburg address is the subject, but who gave the address? abraham lincoln, and he is the subject of the sentence. by using active sentences, your writing will be much clearer. active: abraham lincoln delivered the gettysburg address. passive: the gettysburg address was delivered by abraham lincoln. after you construct your research paper, you will create a presentation using media. you may select how you will incorporate this. you may use images, video (your own or clips of found video), slideshow presentation. you may have ideas beyond this list, and feel free to be creative. your images should support and enhance your presentation. you do not want to make your audience read your paper. instead, a visual presentation breaks down the key ideas for an audience, and makes it engaging. always practice and review a presentation to make sure it's audience ready. consider the following as you build your presentation: does your presentation display your research in an interesting way? have you gathered appropriate images, video, audio, and other means of communicating your information? have you created a compelling presentation blending text with various media? have you found credible sources for any media you selected from online sources? do you give credit for any media you selected from online sources? have you proofread any text visible in your presentation? have you recorded audio and/or video of you presenting your information clearly? directions write an informative paper of at least five hundred words on a topic from the civil war era of american history of your choosing. conduct research and cite the credible sources in text and in a works cited at the end of the paper.