The 4 Steps of Paraphrasing
Use this poem to practice paraphrasing:
- Longer, shorter
- Change the order
- Change the words
- And cite the author
What is meant by each step?
- Longer, shorter: add or remove information
- Change the order: move chunks around, such as prepositional phrases and clauses.
- Change the words: find synonyms and antonyms for the words
- And cite the author: explain where you found the information
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Original: 3,140 people from Toronto and Vancouver said they have been attacked by a Canada Goose, a bird known for its aggressive tendencies. Kai Johnson, Animal Attacks Monthly, 2009 |
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Longer, shorter |
3,140 Canadian residents said they have been attacked by a Canada Goose. |
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Change the order |
Canada Geese have attacked 3,140 Canadian residents. |
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Change the words |
Canada Geese have attacked over 3,000 Canadian residents. |
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Cite the author |
Canada Geese have attacked over 3,000 Canadian residents (Johnson, 2009) |
Compare:
- Original: 3,140 people from Toronto and Vancouver said they have been attacked by a Canada Goose, a bird known for its aggressive tendencies.
- Paraphrase: Canada Geese have attacked over 3,000 Canadian residents (Johnson, 2009).
More Explanation:
LONGER, SHORTER: We will often remove unnecessary details to simplify the information for the reader. We might also simplify the text to make it more like our own writing style.
When will you ADD information? To explain a point or add context to the information. You might explain more about what they are talking about by defining a word or breaking down a concept. Just be careful – you might need further citations to support information added if it’s not somewhere in the original source.
CHANGE THE ORDER: It is good to be comfortable with English sentence structure to help with this. You might:
- Move a preposition of time from the beginning to the end, or vice versa
- Switch clauses around – if you can identify a conjunction, that’s something that can likely be moved
- Change a passive sentence to active, or active to passive
- With verbs like be and have and their synonyms, it’s easy to flip the sentence around, with the subject and the predicate switching places.
CHANGE THE WORDS: Students normally are very comfortable finding synonyms for words, but they’re less proficient with using antonyms.
- More dangerous = Less safe
- Less expensive = More cost-effective
- Smaller = Decrease in size
CITE THE AUTHOR: Provide an in-text citation – see here for the basics.