3 Stages of Computer Science Research Paper Writing: 3 Tricks to Use

Writing guide
Posted on February 6, 2019

Everything starts with… a dream? Many people believe that everything starts with the science – knowledge about the world based on examining, testing, and proving the facts. It is worth to state that in the mid- to late-19th century, everything started to conform to computer science. Today, a career in the field of computer science is worthwhile and gainful for any young enthusiastic scientist.

Is it your dream to become highly competent in Computer Science? So, be ready to work hard not only on programming languages, scientific computing or software engineering, but also in academic writing. Many research papers are expected of students to be prepared during a term. Have already felt the pressure of academic works? This guide is to simplify the paper writing process so that more time will be found for the other activities on Computer Science like programming a useful app.

3 Stages of Successful Research Paper Writing

You should treat research paper writing as an activity that takes considerable time and efforts. It cannot be a one-step affair – just take a pen or a keyboard to create a research paper. The basic rule of any type of writing, including research paper writing, is to know what you are going to write BEFORE you start writing and go over your writing a few times AFTER you finish writing.

Let’s divide the writing process into 3 distinct stages: prewriting, writing, and post-writing. It is important for any writer to work through each of these stages in order to ensure that a polished, complete piece of writing is produced.

  1. Prewriting is a process when you get prepared for writing itself. It doesn’t mean that you don’t need to write at all at this stage. You can be engaged in taking notes while gathering information for your research. For example, you can research in the library or on the Internet. Besides the researching process, this stage involves thinking (here you are better to have strong critical and analytical thinking skills), brainstorming, outlining, and so on. In other words, you are involved in generating some research ideas. However, this activity occurs throughout the writing process, so be open to new discoveries.
  2. Writing is a process when you have enough knowledge and data to write a research paper. Here is a stage where you need to connect your idea into sentences and even logically complete paragraphs. Don’t neglect drafting at this stage. You can’t get the content of your research paper on Computer Science out of your head and down on paper as a neat-book. You should have a rough draft before completing a paper. Otherwise, you risk losing essential marks on the poorly-written/ organized papers. Don’t risk in such a way. Tell yourself what you know and think about a research topic, then present it to your readers fully.
  3. Post-writing is a process when you refine your research paper. When you see that everything you want to cover on a topic is mentioned in your research paper, it is time to revise the entire paper by checking it for mistakes in grammar, sentence structure, spelling or punctuation. Your task is to make each sentence and paragraph as concise and accurate as possible.

3 Prewriting Tips for Your Research Paper

It may be very difficult to get started with research paper writing. ‘Today, I have headache attack’, “Tomorrow, I’ll need to come to a birthday party” are typical flimsy denials from doing a research paper. However, there are real serious obstacles in starting to write a research paper. For example, you simply have no idea about WHAT you need to research. Exactly at the prewriting stage, you should foresee what you want your final research paper on Computer Science to look like.

Let’s base on the experience of David J. Malan, Gordon McKay Professor of the Practice of Computer Science from Harvard University.

    1. Define the research area of Computer Science and a relevant topic for it. The given subject combines many other fields in which different research areas are open for your paper. Find a narrow angle from which you will develop your research paper. Make sure you are aware of any specific requirements you may have from your instructors – any study limitations or methods. Analyze all possible information sources if needed to make the right decision concerning a topic. It should correspond to 3 important points when selecting it.

computer science research

  1. Budget your time needed to write a computer science research paper. Remember that even a college essay 1000 words long may take a few days to properly complete. So, it isn’t a good idea to postpone research paper writing to the last minute! According to the guide for effective time management, it is possible to control procrastination if you plan when you will do a specific research task, for example, to do a literature review.
  2. Brainstorm any ideas and thoughts for your computer science research paper. If you think that the idea to discuss the SQL schema is relevant to your research, come up with it in an outline. Truth be told, having an outline in front of your eyes allows you to brainstorm much more quickly. Arrange your preliminary ideas in an outline with a logical order. It should suit the common paper structure: introduction, body (literature review, methodology, results, discussion), and ending. Put ideas in sub-groups accordingly to develop them into paragraphs in every section.

basic structure
Trick #1. ‘How to avoid plagiarism in my research paper on Computer Science?’
Despite the fact that most of your research paper should be written in your own words, you may use someone’s words or ideas. When using sources in your research papers, you can avoid plagiarism by placing those words and ideas within quotation marks and crediting the information source in the reference list.

Remember that you don’t need to cite a source when common knowledge is given, What belongs to common knowledge in Computer Science? For example, the fact that Alan Turing (1912–1954) was one of the early founders of the field (his famous paper is entitled ‘On Computable Numbers with an Application to the Entscheidungsproblem’ is in the public domain. Usually, this knowledge is found in reference works, like Encyclopedia.com or any other one. Besides, you can find some field-specific common knowledge, like 10 facts about Computer Science to know.

6 Computer Science Research Paper Writing Tips from Our Academic Writers

Well, you’ve arrived at the most important stage of writing – the stage when you should note everything that you plan. But how to do it effectively? Remember the following points concerning every part of your research paper:

  1. The introduction is a part where you’re expected to discuss the basic ideas that you are going to explore in your research paper. Make it quite informative and direct in the following way:
    introduction
  2. A literature review is a part that discusses published information in Computer Science. As you deal with a particular subject area, you need to write a summary and synthesis of the sources concerning your research topic. In other words, show how your topic is interpreted by the other researchers.
  3. A methodology chapter is devoted to the methods that help you investigate a research problem. Readers need to know how your research findings are obtained for better understanding the problem.
  4. The results section is a place where you’re required to report the findings of your research. It is better to use a systematic approach to the description of your results. Start highlighting the observations that are most relevant to the topic under consideration.
  5. The discussion is a part that is aimed at interpreting and describing the significance of your findings. You can compare and contrast the findings of previous studies to support the overall importance of your results.
  6. The conclusion is a part that summaries the main ideas covered. Additionally, you can provide some recommendations for new areas for future researches in the given field of study.

Trick #2. ‘How to create an informative title for my research paper?’
Making up a title is a really difficult task, especially when it’s a research paper that you are going to working on. Besides you and your professor, there are many people who would like to read your paper. So, how to attract their attention to your research? Specify the type of your research in the title and include the key terms of your topic.

Remember that the readers should know what they take in hand after looking at the paper title. If they meet vague terms, they are unlikely to catch the main idea of your research, whether you were trying to analyze or describe. Be as precise as possible in your title ideas.

Some topics on Computer Science are as follows:

  • Home-based Virtual Reality Systems: An Overview of System Software and Application Software;
  • Networking Protocols Description: What Are Packet Switching Techniques Used?;
  • An Analysis of Wireless Multimedia Sensor Networks and Their Performance;
  • Software Sizing: 3 Approaches of Component-Based Software System: What Is Requirements Engineering?;
  • Artificial Intelligence: A Sentiment Analysis, Automated Reasoning and QA Systems;
  • Is a Natural Language Knowledge Representation Independent/Semi-Independent?;
  • Design and Implementation of Web Services for Information Systems;
  • 5 NoSQL Database Schemas: An Evaluation of Its Significance.

3 Post-Writing Tips for Your Research Paper

No academic paper should be submitted without looking through it at least once! Twice is even better. You should devote all your efforts that are left or can be found in a day or two to prevent any embarrassing mistakes (such as spelling mistakes, or mistakes in word choice). When you revise a research paper, you’re able to evaluate its content. Make sure you actually have what you intended in the prewriting stage.

Trick #3. ‘How to revise a research paper on my own?’
If you don’t trust anyone your work, you should do proofread it on your own like a pro. Go through the following checklist when revising:

  • Did I actually write on the required topic?;
  • Is there enough or too much evidence supporting a topic?
  • Are paragraphs and sentences logically related to each other?
  • Don’t I repeat the same ideas several times?

In addition to the above mentioned, you should pay attention to word order in sentences (in the academic English language, the direct word order is used – Subject → Verb → Object), verb tenses rules (usually, (Present Simple or Present Perfect tenses are used in the academic field), etc. If you doubt in any issue, rely on a real professional in proofreading than to struggle with it alone.

For the better results in proofreading and editing your research paper, you should:

  • Set your paper aside between the writing and proofreading processes. Spend a day without even looking at your paper. But it doesn’t mean that you should wait until the last minute to revise your research paper.
  • Evaluate the overall content of your paper. Don’t correct immediately after you read a sentence or two ones. Sometimes, it happens you read a part of a sentence, start to rearrange it. However, when you read to the end, you realize the whole structure.
  • Focus on what you need to look for. You should identify common mistakes often made by you or your groupmates. For example, if you know that the usage of articles is your weakness, look closer at the cases of their usage in your work.

It is always easier to speak about the writing process on research papers than to do it. Right? But there some researchers who achieve a lot on Computer Science by having written readable research papers that are included in top 10 research papers on Computer Science by Mendeley readership. At least, after reading our computer science research paper guide, to get Computer Science assignment help you can look at the great papers and create your own research paper on Computer Science so that the others similar to you will read it. Good luck!

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