Chapter Sixteen

This chapter sixteen in et. Al Lundsford brought my attention to a lot of things. This chapter is very important for college students who are trying to make the best out of their essays. This chapter is very vital to support your evidence, because it happens very often where a lot of us are not sure if that information we have actually counts as evidence. After reading this chapter, you should be able to present and give your evidence to its strongest potential.

There are several ways to collect evidence from—

- Observations-
When you decide what you want to find out and you observe what you are about to find. It is important for you to make sure that the observation relates directly to your claim, brainstorm before you go and look, develop a system for collecting data, be aware that the way you record your data will affect your outcome, and record the precise date, time, and place.

-Interviews
Determine the exact purpose of the interview, set up an interview in advance, prepare your list of questions, record the exact information, and be sure to thank those you interview.

-Survey and Questionnaires
Write out your purpose, brainstorm the questions you could ask which is really important, figure out how many people you want to contact which is the most vital thing you can do because sometimes it all comes down to how many and who you asked. Make sure your questions is not biased, and it is very important that anyone would not misunderstood your questions because if they do then you lose the whole point.

-Experiments
This relates to science greatly, but for subjects that are looser- experiments could work as evidence to support an argument. You could do an experiment to prove the point you are trying to make.

-Personal Experiences
This is by the far most common evidence. This evidence is so popular but sometimes it doesn’t work because it is up to people to believe if what you are saying is the truth. That is not easy because you have to really get people’s trust before you can say and make people believe what you are saying is reliable.

In Cancan’s blog, she mentioned, “While all the other aspects of firsthand evidence and research are respectable and probably will carry just as equally well. I frankly prefer to use my own personal experience and online sources mainly because it is not difficult and pretty much straightforward.” I can say I agree with what she said. I do tend to lean on my personal experiences or online sources because they are basically easy and provide us much less work to do.