When you are asked to defend your research paper, you may be thinking to yourself “how do I do that”. Many teachers not only want you to write your paper but they want you to present it to the class as well. They may even set it up as a research paper defense. If that is the case, your main objective is to present your evidence and answer the questions that your classmates and teacher come up with.
If you start with a thorough paper, the defense will be easy. There won’t be too many holes in your research that need to be explained. There are some ways to make this process a lot easier. The more prepared you are for your defense, the easier it will be and the less stressed you will be.
Here are some tips to help you survive the defense:
Even though you wrote your paper and likely know everything that it says, read through it a few times anyways. You may find areas that are weaker than others that you can start to build up or you can learn more about those areas to prepare yourself for questions. Plus, you likely didn’t write the entire paper in one night and you may have forgotten some of the information and a quick refresher wouldn’t hurt any.
You can write down some likely questions and your answers to these questions. That way you are prepared for some of the questions that may be asked. You can have a friend or parent read your paper and develop some questions as well, just to get a better idea of what topics may be asked in the defense. Answer the questions and present the answers a few times to gain confidence in your answers. Confident answers will lead to less questions.
You should be an expert on the information that you are presenting in your paper when it comes to this part of the process. You have conducted really good research, broken down points to make a paper, and prepared yourself for any questions that may get thrown your way. Practice presenting the information so that you can do it confidently.
You have done a lot of work to get to this point and now all you have to do is have a conversation about your research. Think of it as a conversation and not a defense and it will come a lot easier.
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