Basic Paper Format Standards

Heading

• You should head your paper on the top right-hand side of your paper like this example:

Last name, First name
Period
Date

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How to do a Title

• The title of your paper should be centered at the top of your paper’s first page.
• Capitalize the first letter of your title and all the longer important words in your title (not of, and, etc.).
• When typing, make the title two font sizes larger, but do not underline or italicize it.

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Basic Text Formatting

• For handwritten papers, write in blue or black ink unless your teacher allows otherwise.
• For typed papers, use some standard black font of 12-point type.
• When typing a paper, always double-space.
• Be sure to indent all of your paragraphs 5 spaces (at least a quarter of an inch or one tab).
• Do not put an additional line between paragraphs.
• For formal papers, use margins of one inch on both sides.

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Using Italics, Underlined, and Bold in Text

Italics

• Put the titles of longer works (films, books, newspapers, websites, etc.) in italics.
• Use italics for foreign language words not common in English.
• Do NOT put the titles of short works (letters, speeches, newspaper article titles, etc.) in italics, use quotations marks.

Underlined

• When handwriting, underline the titles of longer works.
• In general, do NOT use underlining when typing since it makes the text look like a link. Do not underline titles.

Bold

• Use bold to focus attention on a specific phrase or word.
• Do NOT add bold to quotes unless you explain that you are the one doing the bolding. (You don’t want to mislead your reader that the original author bolded the text.)
• Do NOT use bold or italics for quotes.