Will Harris from Las Vegas' blog

This is a special blog post for my lovely daughter Ellie, she is in 3rd grade and is writing a research paper.

<Ellie>  ”Do I have to read this WHOLE THING???”

<Daddy> “Nope, all you really need is the summary, this is all pretty easy!  However, if you read the whole thing it will make more sense and you will write a better paper.”

SUMMARY - 

“What am i trying to prove? What are three things that prove what I want to prove? How can I show the reader that my proof proves what I want to prove?”

That is all you really need to answer, for yourself.  Answer those questions in your mind, and write the results into your word processor on the computer, and you’ll have a pretty good paper.  If you want a little more guidance, check out the extended version below :
I am writing a paper, how do I start? :

1. First you must answer the question : What am I trying to say? – this will be the subject (in writing it is called a thesis) of your paper, or your hypothesis, just like the scientific method.
You ALWAYS start your paper with explaining what you are trying to say, in this case we might say “Nevada is a nice place to live.” This should be a simple statement that you believe to be true. It should answer the requirements of the assignment as much as possible. If the teacher asks you to write a paper on ice cream being delicious, don’t write your paper about potato chips! Think deeply about the subject, and decide how you can best answer the question. For all of these examples, we will be using the assignment “What is it like to live in Nevada?”

Once you have decided on the subject of your paper, and the statement you’ll make to answer the subject in the best way, you will write it out in a sentence. For your grade level (grades 1-5) the majority of your papers will be answerable in one sentence.

You may think, “Only one sentence? Sure, I can do that, I’ll just write one sentence!” But, it won’t be that easy. Readers are not often foolish, and teachers are almost never foolish, especially when grading papers, so you need to convince your reader that your sentence is true. You’re going to use something called sourced evidence.

2. Next, we figure out : How can I prove that what I am saying is true? – this part of your paper will support your thesis using sources, probably from the Internet or a library.

You will want to think of three main arguments that support your thesis. These can all be fairly broad. In our example of Nevada being a nice place to live, we might go out and read some things on the Internet about Nevada. You can read the Wikipedia page, the Las Vegas Convention Authority, some books about Nevada, or anything you’d like. A big part of writing a paper is knowing what you are talking about. How can you convince anyone that Nevada is a nice place to live unless you know it to be true? If you haven’t done any research on your thesis, do it now. If you have already learned about your thesis, you might come up with some claims like the below :

* Nevada is a nice place to live because there are a lot of things to do.
* Nevada is a nice place to live because it does not cost a lot to live here (the cost of living is low.)
* Nevada is a nice place to live because there are many opportunities to experience natural beauty.

Typically, you will only need three claims. But, this really only results in a few sentences, not enough for a whole paper! This is where your sources will come in!

Find three facts for each of the three claims you’ve made. We’ll use our first fact to show an example of how you might do so.

We want to show that there are a lot of things to do in Nevada. You can start with the Las vegas Strip. This one doesn’t really need a source. You can talk about the things you have experienced, like the Bellagio fountains, and say how much fun they are. You may also want to talk about other things you can do in Las Vegas, but you want to show that the facts you’re citing aren’t just your opinion, but established facts! For this, you’ll need references. For our example here, we’ll use my webpage and after we say “Another great thing to do in Nevada is go to Madame Toussaud’s wax museum!”*1 and put a little number(Just like the one you see there after the quotes.  There are ways to make them look cool in word processors like Open Office, I can show you how.) next to your claim. Then, at the bottom of your paper, you add a bibliography, which tells your reader where they can get the information that you got. In this case, the bibliography entry for this item would look like this :

*1 http://willharris.me/2010/09/fun-stuff-to-do-in-las-vegas/

You would create a reference using *2 for your next claim, if it isn’t just your opinion, and make another line in your bibliography at the end. When you get older, you’ll do this in a more formal way, because there are rules that you need to follow for formatting, but in your grade group, you don’t need to be too formal.

You should write three facts for each of your three claims. So, nine sentences total, in three paragraphs (one for each claim.)

3. Finally, at the end of the paper, you’ll quickly recap your thesis, and come up with a conclusion. For your papers at your grade level, you will mostly just say your thesis again, and tell the reader again that it is true, and remind them that you have included lots of sourced facts to prove your point. This will be enough to convince them and give you a good grade.
I would also like to include a reminder about language. You are writing a research paper, not having a conversation with your friends. Don’t use conversational English. You want to write your paper with a very proper and professional tone. You aren’t supposed to be friendly to your reader, like I am being for you in this cheat sheet. You want to leave out slang words, silly phrases, and things like “I bet you didn’t know that!” or other phrases that aren’t important to your point. You want to make sure that every sentence is important and factual. If you need to know how to write, use examples from your sources. Your sources used will almost always be encyclopedias, books and websites at your age, and all of them write in a non-passionate and professional way. It will be hard at first, and it is OK if you don’t get it right, but you should always strive to write like the people on Wikipedia, they do a very good job.

Always remember that your father loves you, and if you ever need help, Daddy is always there to help you with your schoolwork or anything else in life.  You’re the best, I’m really proud of you, and I can’t wait to see your first paper after you’ve read this.  I think if you learn how to write papers the right way, you’ll really have an advantage throughout your whole school career.

Someone asked this question of me online, and I thought more people might like to know from an American’s perspective how things work with respect to the Japanese specifically.

In simple Japanese they will often use two character sets called Katakana and Hiragana which are basically analogous to our alphabet, but with vowels, so, there will be characters for “Ha, He, Hu, Hey, Ho OR ka, ke, ku, key, ko…etc (sounds like)” for most consonants with some missions consonants like L and some added combinations like sh, which is why some Japanese people have difficulty with their Ls and it sounds more like R when they’re speaking.

Children write with these, and most simple things like safety instructions are written like that for ease of understanding. Upon further study and growing older people will learn more and more Kanji, and a good part of most testing in school is learning your Kanji. Kanji are the complicated and numerous pictograms you see, and wonder, how can anyone learn a picture for every word? The answer is, its very difficult and takes years of study.

If you use language with no Kanji you may be seen as simple, so people do often use them in casual writing out of habit, or not wanting to appear stupid.

On the computer, the katakana and hiragana will be automatically translated from their romanji (roman languages) phonetics, or even to Kanji, by the PC, and as you “sound out the word” different possibilities will appear on your screen for you to choose from, at least on English language operating systems I’m using.

Interestingly, many Japanese people spend 6+ years in school learning English, so they can read and write quite well, and even understand you if you modify your pronunciation to be more Kata/Hiragana-esque.

For example : instead of Ham Sandwich, you would say hah-moh, san – do – wi – chu. Or, Macdonalds is mah-koo-doh-nah-roo-do (I made the spelling more like it sounds than the proper representations of katakana and hiragana) so you can speak to almost anyone in Japan and while you may not carry on an in depth conversation, as a tourist you can really get your point across without worrying about the language barrier.

A friend of mine recently asked me to make a recommendation for a Pro Tools music recording system and a new Mac.  He didn’t give me much to work with, no price constraints or possible usage scenarios, so I wrote him the following.  What follows might be of some interest for people who are thinking about setting up a home recording studio.

First, for the protools interface, I’m assuming he doesn’t want a $10,000-$40,000 pro level system, so if he has a decent budget the 003 is a good system with lots of inputs for audio and midi and has a 8 channel automated control system (mixing board) for around $2000-$2500.

http://digidesign.com/index.cfm?langid=100&navid=125&itemid=5025

If you don’t care about real time mixing, the same system comes in a rack mount for half the price at $1200, but will require you to do all your board work on the computer using the mouse and keyboard.

http://digidesign.com/index.cfm?langid=100&navid=126&itemid=5028

There are other, cheaper, solutions available ranging from $500-$1000 but they’re mostly meant to be portable and do not have the same kind of power and flexibility as the units above.

For the Mac itself, you only have two reasonable options for recording more than 2 or so tracks at a time.  You need either the MacBook Pro or the Mac Pro.

The MacBook Pro starts at around $2000 and can be upgraded to around $6000 for top of the line, and does not include a monitor (other than the 15″ built into the laptop -  but that is far too small to get any work done in ANY audio software.  20″ (at $599) is the bare, bare minimum, the bigger the better.  If he can afford it, the 23″ at $899 is better, and the 30″ at $2,000 is much better to work with.  If I had to choose, I’d probably go for the 23″ for the price.  All these monitors come from apple.  You can get them slightly cheaper from other vendors, but they’re missing some features and require a $20 adapter to work.

http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/wa/RSLID?nnmm=browse&mco=C44DF186&node=home/shop_mac/mac_accessories/displays

If he wants a tower instead of a laptop, the Mac Pro starts at $2799 and is a very fast machine, which will easily handle anything thrown at it.  You can upgrade this machine to the point of obscenity, for a top end price of over $30,000.  You will still need a monitor, as discussed above.

http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/wa/RSLID?nnmm=browse&mco=7B723683&node=home/shop_mac/family/mac_pro

If this all seems too much, price wise, a PC system can be built for much less, and will perform similarly to the pro tools setup.  When I was recording I actually preferred the interface to systems like Sonar XL and Nuendo…and the hardware was a non issue for me since I couldn’t afford $5000 Pro Tools software plugins anyways.

Note that for any system, Mac or PC, to sound good, you’re going to have to invest in some nice Mic Pre amps and at the very least put your final mix through them for the master.  Avalon single channel Mic pres sound pretty good and can be had for around $500-$1000 a piece.  Stereo channels can get a bit more.

Decent cables, microphones, all that stuff matters.  Pro Tools is pretty dry on its own, so without great equipment it just doesn’t really shine. Pro tools, and all DAW (digital audio workstations) sound best with software instruments or synthesizers.  Its very difficult to make a traditional band sound good with pro tools consumer level gear.  Even the best of the best Pro Tools setups still sound flat compared to high end traditional studio gear.  For an example, check out the difference in sonic quality between Aerosmith’s Get a Grip, which was recorded in 1993, predating many new technologies used in recording now, and Just Push Play, recording entirely on pro tools and sounding much worse because of it (pay special attention to the shimmer of the cymbals and the kick from the guitars.)

For final masters, its still wise to head to a studio, where you can commonly use hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of gear for a few hundred per hour, thus making the choice for the home studio a little cheaper since you can afford to get something a little less powerful, that supports getting your ideas down so that you can later record that stuff in a studio if you plan to distribute the masters.

Expect to upgrade any recording solution completely in 5-8 years, due to exponential power growth in the computer itself and more sophisticated algorithms for recording hardware.  Analog gear (like the mic pre amps) doesn’t usually suffer from this being a very mature industry, so if you plan to spend a lot spend it on the Mic Preamps and the instruments being recorded and be cheap with the recording gear.

Also keep in mind that many people use rack mounted 24 track recorders that use hard drives or DAT when they don’t find themselves doing a lot of complicated editing.  For good musicians that can make it work in 2-3 takes, you really don’t need any more than that and exceptional instruments, cables, and analog audio processors.  If you want to stay pretty cheap overall, these units can be had for $2000 – $10,000 and often include monitor outputs for easy editing.