6 Step 6: Synthesizing & Writing
What is synthesizing?
Synthesizing is a critical skill to learn during the writing process. In fact, it is one of the main skills you gain by researching, organizing, and writing a paper on a topic. Your instructors are not asking you to write a paper to make your life hard or just so you can fulfill an elective in your English course. Essay production teaches you how to present and defend information as well as make your own conclusions based on evidence.
The Purpose of Synthesizing
Combining separate elements into a whole is the basic dictionary definition of synthesis. It is a way to make connections between numerous and varied source materials. The synthesis must demonstrate a critical analysis of the articles assembled as well as an integration of the analytical results. All included sources must be directly relevant, and you as the writer should make a significant contribution. Your thematic chart, annotated bibliography, and simple outline were the beginning of the synthesis process. Completing a more detailed outline, which we are naming a rough draft outline, will further your synthesizing by incorporating targeted freewriting.
Quick Note: At this point you should have thoroughly read the articles and pulled some significant quotes that connect your own thoughts to what the researchers have said.
Writing: Implementing a Different Strategy
For the rough draft outline, consider doing some targeted freewriting. Target freewriting is different from the freewriting you did at the start of your project. It still requires nonstop writing; however, it is more focused. You will reflect on your thematic chart, annotated bib, and any quotes you may have pulled while reading your resources deeply. By the end of this targeted free writing exercise, you should have be able to compare, contrast, and otherwise investigate relationships and opposing arguments within your chosen resources.
An example of our process is below.
After completing this process, you can now move on to using citation style guides to properly organize your paper. This will be explored in the final step of this toolkit.
Checklist
- Have you completed an annotated bibliography?
- Have you completed an information chart?
- Have you created a simple outline?
- Have you read the articles?
- If so, use all of the information you gathered so far to start compiling a rough draft outline.
Information Adapted from : Sourcing, summarizing, and synthesizing: Skills for effective research writing | Wendy L. McBride | University of Arkansas CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
