What is the longest paper your high school student has written?

[history_junkie]

I am a homeschool grad teaching in the homeschool community, and I'm just looking for some perspective. I am teaching a Rhetoric class and, while we have a lot of assignments, most of them are not very lengthy.

 

The longest paper I wrote was about 15 pages and that wasn't until my senior year. My husband wrote a 30 page thesis in his Honors level PS class.

 

What do you think is reasonable? How does that compare to the college experience you/ your dc had/anticipate?

 

Thanks!

[Gwen in VA]

Wow.

 

The longest my kids wrote in high school was ~5 pages or so.

 

At college no one could believe they hadn't written longer papers, but they did well and were able to overcome the lack of sufficient paper-writing in h.s.! :001_smile:

 

It probably didn't help their h.s. paper-writing that dh and I went to an engineering school -- until I wrote a thesis, I never had to write a paper onger than 5 pages! But my kids successfully wrote 15 page papers and theses, etc. Dd2 will continue the tradition of graduating not having written more than a 5-page paper!

[Sunshine State Sue]

In 10th grade, the longest paper ds wrote was a 10 page research paper (for Laurel Tree tutorials - highly recommend). 8-12 pages were required. Ds's had 3175 words.

 

In 11th grade, the longest paper ds has written so far was for CC Honors Composition 1. Required 700-1200 words. I'll have to see if I can find his paper.

 

I have a bachelor's in math and a master's in Industrial Engineering. I avoided writing like the plague all during high school, college, and grad school. Took the non-thesis grad option...

[Harriet Vane]

My longest paper in high school was a 12-page research paper my junior year.

 

I teach literature and writing now. My model in giving assignments was a teacher I had in high school for speech class. We gave sooooo many speeches that year. It was the very best way to make us comfortable with the process. Now, as a teacher myself, I require a ton of short essays with one or two longer papers (4-6 pages) per semester. A typical book might run like this:

 

Week one--Read a large assignment, taking notes on certain features as assigned. Their notes are highly informal, jotted quickly in short phrases so that their reading speed isn't slowed. Their notes almost always relate to a later essay assignment.

 

Week two--Finish the book if possible. (If not, there is an extra week built in similar to week one.) At this stage students will EITHER write a short essay (1-2 pages) that is lighter in nature, OR submit an outline for a longer paper (4+pages).

 

Week three--Final discussion on the book. Rough draft of long paper is due, OR a second, really short, light essay is due.

 

Week four--Start new book. If they are doing the longer paper, then the final draft is due this week. If they are doing a longer paper, often this week's reading assignment will be much, much shorter (poetry or a short story, or possibly just a shorter page count to read).

 

Doing it this way gives them experience in both a variety of short essays as well as in longer literature analysis. We also avoid a lot of insipid reading comprehension questions and busywork.

[Harriet Vane]

I should add, I also teach writing classes. For that, my students do the following:

 

--15 minutes daily writing. This is to both increase their ability to express themselves through writing and to practice specific skills (like writing a good introduction).

 

--2-3 page short essays all semester AND one longer paper each semester. First semester the long paper is a literary analysis; second semester the long paper is an 8-12 page research paper.

[Vida Winter]

Ten pages plus a few more pages for references, written for a Bravewriter class (research paper).

[Joan in GE]

In 10th grade, the longest paper ds wrote was a 10 page research paper (for Laurel Tree tutorials - highly recommend).

 

Yes - my son did this in 9th grade, then in 11th he did at least one longer paper for AP Eng language class (can't remember the number of pages) and then graduated....He's in engineering now and doesn't write any papers.....

 

-15 minutes daily writing. This is to both increase their ability to express themselves through writing and to practice specific skills (like writing a good introduction).

 

Getting my dd to write is one of my difficulties - could I ask what your students write about each day? Do you have a list of topics? I just can't generate the ideas to motivate her to do this kind of daily writing - but it is very important for her to get that fluidity...and the practice of writing fast...

 

Thanks,

Joan

[history_junkie]

Thanks for all the replies! Any more??

 

I'm teaching a Rhetoric course, so my students write oodles of shorter assignments, but their longest paper is 12-15 pages. If they stick with the course sequence, they will not write a long paper in 12th grade, so my class is their last chance to practice writing a longer paper. I don't think it needs to be longer, but I do wonder if they should have some more 5-8 page papers throughout the year.

[TXMary2]

My son wrote a 10 page research paper his Sophomore year.

[FaithManor]

DD wrote a 22 pager her senior year. It was the necessary documentation on her research for a near-space weather balloon flight attempt.

 

That said, very, very few high schoolers ever produce a research paper. They write reports, maybe even long reports, but these are not research papers. Research papers require a more involved writing process and involve highly ordered thinking skills to pull together. These are normally skills taught at the college level in specific courses. Most freshman and even sophomore college level "papers" are merely reports with lots of documentation to make sure the student knows how to document properly. Unless the student is involved in research early on, they will not need this skill as a high school senior. What they do need are solid writing skills. If they've mastered the essay and report writing plus source documentation, they'll be fine. College professors and TA's will teach them how to write research papers.

 

If the student can manage 5-8 pages of solid content, well written and organized, with proper source documentation and can produce some good essays, everything will fall into place later. The single biggest problem most colleges face is that their incoming freshman cannot write good paragraphs, much less organize a report (not a book report, a scientific or historical report on a properly narrowed topic with five - ten reliable sources properly documented and end notes in their proper form WITHOUT plagerizing) or write a decent essay. So they have to teach high school level writing first in order to then teach college level writing.

 

Your student doesn't need to do a lot of report writing. However, what they do produce needs to be well organized. I give a LOT of coaching on the first two papers produced in high school and then slowly loosen then reins and see how they do on their own. Most of the papers are not for grade and have a tremendous number of rewrites with red ink all over the margins until they become accustomed to how to organize and express the content with relative ease.

 

I would not over burden young writers wth long writing assignments. Shorter bursts, lots of coaching, and provide them with many examples of excellence in writing. Look up award winning essays and papers on a variety of topics and have them read. Find some atrocious examples (you can get these from the AP website...look up some samples of say U.S History free writing and read ones that received high marks, medium marks, and low marks...the low marked ones are generally very, very poor....just wow....incoherent, unsupported, lacking content, grammatical errors every where, etc.) and discuss the differences. There are many sources online for good writing examples and I've had great success with being allowed to print these for ds.

 

Twenty pages? Not necessary at all.

 

It's very sad that so many "college writing" courses actually have to go back to "how to write a paragraph".

 

Faith

[nancy in nj]

The longest paper my daughter has written was a 12 page research paper for a Scholar's Online History class in 9th grade.

 

However, the most challenging paper she has ever written was her 1,500 word limit entry (about 6 pages) for the National Peace Essay Contest as part of her Junior Year AP English Language class with PA Homeschoolers. Her first draft (and most of her classmates) was in the 2,200 to 2,400 range which was the "natural" range given the complexity of the assignment. Editing that paper and scrutinizing the necessity of every single word had a significant impact on my daughter's writing.

 

I would highly recommend a single 5-6 page paper on a complex topic with a tight word limit!

 

Nancy

[history_junkie]

DD wrote a 22 pager her senior year. It was the necessary documentation on her research for a near-space weather balloon flight attempt.

 

That said, very, very few high schoolers ever produce a research paper. They write reports, maybe even long reports, but these are not research papers. Research papers require a more involved writing process and involve highly ordered thinking skills to pull together. These are normally skills taught at the college level in specific courses. Most freshman and even sophomore college level "papers" are merely reports with lots of documentation to make sure the student knows how to document properly. Unless the student is involved in research early on, they will not need this skill as a high school senior. What they do need are solid writing skills. If they've mastered the essay and report writing plus source documentation, they'll be fine. College professors and TA's will teach them how to write research papers.

 

 

It's very sad that so many "college writing" courses actually have to go back to "how to write a paragraph".

 

 

That's interesting, because I was expected to know how to research in my college history classes, and the professors absolutely did not take the time to walk us through the process. My students are certainly not producing original research, but I am requiring them to stick to a defensible thesis and steer clear of the report. I know they can report, and I could too, but that wasn't enough for me.

 

I worked as a grader for a variety of freshmen classes, and I was appalled at the number of students who needed instruction on "how to write a paragraph" and "how to draw a conclusion."

[FaithManor]

That's interesting, because I was expected to know how to research in my college history classes, and the professors absolutely did not take the time to walk us through the process. My students are certainly not producing original research, but I am requiring them to stick to a defensible thesis and steer clear of the report. I know they can report, and I could too, but that wasn't enough for me.

 

 

 

Hi, I think this is just a difference in how we define research. A defensible thesis at our house and at my alma mater in longer form was pretty much a very long persuasive essay, so to speak. Research writing, on the other hand, was a very complex level of documentation that included the supporting data for one's original research project approved by faculty and overseen by a faculty advisor - these papers were presented to the faculty of the entire department at the end of term and included oral questioning in which one had to defend one's paper. Since we are a very heavily science oriented house, I forget sometimes that others are referring to a very different thing when they say "research paper" and due to the nature of the research our kids do in their senior year, they also are subject to producing a research project in science with technical writing and oral defense. That's not the norm for most high schoolers and even in classical academies. It's just something we do and sometimes I forget that when others say "research" they mean something very different from what dh and I term "research" and what that meant at our alma mater where very complex research projects began the freshman year so we were definitely taught HOW to accomplish this and document it by faculty advisors or no one would have survived to their sophomore year.

 

Our rocket team writes a research paper and presentation each year. It looks nothing like a defensible thesis per se. Charts, graphs, data collection, proof of authenticity, supporting documents, documentation of research process and experimentation, elimination of variables, outside verification, etc. These are engineering papers and so highly technical and take a specialized form. That's the kind of animal I am referring to and for learning to write persuasively we pretty much stick to 1-3 page essays here.

 

So, sorry for the lack of explanation. When people say, "research" this is where my brain goes - to a very technical place. :D

 

Faith

[history_junkie]

 

 

Hi, I think this is just a difference in how we define research. A defensible thesis at our house and at my alma mater in longer form was pretty much a very long persuasive essay, so to speak. Research writing, on the other hand, was a very complex level of documentation that included the supporting data for one's original research project approved by faculty and overseen by a faculty advisor - these papers were presented to the faculty of the entire department at the end of term and included oral questioning in which one had to defend one's paper. Since we are a very heavily science oriented house, I forget sometimes that others are referring to a very different thing when they say "research paper" and due to the nature of the research our kids do in their senior year, they also are subject to producing a research project in science with technical writing and oral defense. That's not the norm for most high schoolers and even in classical academies. It's just something we do and sometimes I forget that when others say "research" they mean something very different from what dh and I term "research" and what that meant at our alma mater where very complex research projects began the freshman year so we were definitely taught HOW to accomplish this and document it by faculty advisors or no one would have survived to their sophomore year.

 

 

Thanks for the distinction. But, see, you've helped me a lot. Several of my students want to go into medical or science fields, so this is useful info for me to pass along to them. I don't have the science back ground to teach that sort of research paper, but if they can't handle my humanities research paper, they should rethink their career goals.

[idnib]

I wrote a 10 or 12 page paper for AP English but I had to do a 20 page paper with citations for AP Biology.

[Laura Corin]

For the IB, Calvin has to write an extended essay of about 4,000 words. So far, his longest has been more like 2,000.

 

Laura

[TreviFive]

In her senior year, my daughter wrote a 15-page history paper and an 18-page law and society paper. She's a first-year history major and so far has written one 8-10 page and one 15-20 page papers in college. She felt well-prepared.

 

So far, my sophomore hasn't written more than 5-6 pages.

[Shelsi]

In 8th grade, yes 8th grade, I wrote a 16 page paper (although double spaced). That was our research paper and it was a private school. During 7th & 8th grade we had to turn in 5 pages a week and 5 finished pieces every quarter that had to be at least 5 pages long each. Someone on another forum recognized this as some sort of specific schooling theory. I can't say what it is but I will say that it sure worked for me!

 

Then I went to public high school and my senior AP English research paper only had to be 6 pages long and had less requirements than the 8th grade paper.

 

Needless to say it was that 8th grade paper (and all the other writing in junior high) that prepared me for college. I did not graduate but I did 3 years as a BS major in meteorology and there were several papers we were required to write. I think I would have failed miserably if I'd only had what I learned in high school to fall back on.

 

My oldest is only in 3rd grade and has dysgraphia so I can't say just how much writing we'll do when it comes to junior high and high school but I do know we'll have a focus on it for sure.

[regentrude]

Hi, I think this is just a difference in how we define research. A defensible thesis at our house and at my alma mater in longer form was pretty much a very long persuasive essay, so to speak. Research writing, on the other hand, was a very complex level of documentation that included the supporting data for one's original research project approved by faculty and overseen by a faculty advisor - these papers were presented to the faculty of the entire department at the end of term and included oral questioning in which one had to defend one's paper. Since we are a very heavily science oriented house, I forget sometimes that others are referring to a very different thing when they say "research paper" and due to the nature of the research our kids do in their senior year, they also are subject to producing a research project in science with technical writing and oral defense

 

 

Thanks for pointing out this crucial difference.

 

When our science students do research, that means they are doing original work and find out things that are not yet documented elsewhere in literature. They are not merely researching what other people have written about a topic - that would be the step they have to perform before they can begin their own work.

 

What is called a "research paper" in high school is usually something where the student collects (and cites) information from a variety of sources, without doing any own original work, but merely synthesizes, summarizes, or interprets the findings of others.

[history_junkie]

 

What is called a "research paper" in high school is usually something where the student collects (and cites) information from a variety of sources, without doing any own original work, but merely synthesizes, summarizes, or interprets the findings of others.

 

 

 

I agree, and this is what I do mean by a humanities research paper.

[regentrude]

I never had to write more than 2-3 handwritten pages in school. Nothing in college - I was a physics major, and we did not have to take any humanities.

My first longer paper was my 60 page Master thesis; my second paper my 100+ page dissertation.

 

My kids have never written more than 4 pages. I do not think writing longer papers is any harder than writing short papers; in fact, I believe the opposite is true.

[Mom22ns]

Ds wrote a 10 page paper his freshman year. The longest so far this year is about 5, but I don't know if I'll assign a 10 page in the spring yet. The longest I wrote in high school was 10 pages and I only remember writing one longer than that in college.

 

I have never done original research which led to a paper. They were all humanities style research papers as defined above.

[history_junkie]

 

My kids have never written more than 4 pages. I do not think writing longer papers is any harder than writing short papers; in fact, I believe the opposite is true.

 

I think this entirely depends on the person and their strengths. I can write short (4-5) page papers easily, but I am always under or just meeting the length requirements. I'm a very succinct writer, so longer papers required me to form more conclusions and engage more deeply with the material.

[regentrude]

I think this entirely depends on the person and their strengths. I can write short (4-5) page papers easily, but I am always under or just meeting the length requirements. I'm a very succinct writer, so longer papers required me to form more conclusions and engage more deeply with the material.

 

I think it depends also a lot on the field. In my field, the hardest papers are the "letters" where the journal limits the length to four journal pages, including all equations and figures. We all find it much easier to write a full length paper of 10+ printed pages, because that enables the writer to give a more thorough introduction into the background, cite more relevant literature, and present and discuss more of the vast amount of data one has created. Making the four page paper interesting and understandable while presenting a substantial amount of new data is extremely difficult. (Which is why our grad students begin by writing long papers; only a very advanced student will be allowed to attempt the more difficult short ones.)

[ScoutTN]

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[Sunshine State Sue]

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