STEP ONE:  THESIS

First question to answer:  What are you going to prove in your paper? 

          Essentially, you need to choose one of these statements to guide your paper:

@  CHOICE 1:  What a person does determines what kind of person he/she is because he/she can control his/her behavior with free will, making decisions based on his/her value system.

@  CHOICE 2:  A person's behavior is influenced by forces outside of himself/herself, so a person's behavior does not reveal the kind of person he/she is.

STEP TWO:  LOCATING EVIDENCE

Once you've decided on one of the above theses, the next task is to go about proving it using the resources from Chemistry and English class.

1. Night  (First resource)—find 3+  quotations that show the behaviors of the main people in the book—be thinking about WHY these people behave the way they do; you could consider Elie, his father, any of the people in positions of authority, or other inmates (Meir Katz, Akiba Drumer, et al)
2. Social Psychology Experiments/Texts—find 3+ quotations about the conclusions of these studies—what do these studies disclose about human behavior (WHY people behave the way they behave); You can choose from any of the following (you need to include info from at least 3!)
1. Bystander Effect
2. Asch’s Conformity experiment
3. Milgram’s Obedience of Authority experiment
4. Stanford prison experiment—ascribed labels
5. Blue eye/brown eye video (labels & discrimination)
3. Additional possible source:  Schindler’s List­—how do people behave in this portrayal?  Why do they behave this way?

STEP THREE:  ANALYZING YOUR EVIDENCE & DRAFTING YOUR PAPER

NOW IT’S TIME TO WRITE!  (YAY!)  You’ve found 6+ examples from the various sources.  Copy the examples down, and write a few sentences about each one, discussing what the example is saying, AND concentrating on what the example shows about human behavior .  These will become your mini-body paragraphs.

STEP FOUR:  ORGANIZING YOUR IDEAS

Reread your mini-body paragraphs.  Group the mini-body paragraphs into logical larger body paragraphs—quotation analyses that seem to hold a similar theme should be grouped together.  Once you’ve grouped your ideas, write a topic (main idea) sentence for the body paragraphs.

STEP FIVE:  INTRO & CONCLUSION

Draft an introduction paragraph.  Include:

a.    lead/hook statement (something to get people interested)

b.    reference to the works you’re going to discuss

c.    preview of your major supporting reasons

d.    your thesis

Draft a conclusion paragraph.  Include:

a.     reminder of your major reasons (new phrasing)

b.    reminder of your thesis

c.    final thought—something to keep the reader thinking