HANDOUT: PROCESS PAPERS AND ANNOTATED

BIBLIOGRAPHIES ​Your Process Paper and Annotated Bibliography are important parts of the
judging process. These are the first thing that judges read, so you don’t want to save this part of your History Day
project until the last minute. The written materials include three parts:

1. TITLE
PAGE

• Title of Entry

The Battle of
Port Royal;
Onee Step
Closer to Union
Control
• Student Name(s)
Campbell Smithwick
and Eli Baxter
• Age Division and Entry Category
Exhibit
• Word Count:
500
o​ ​Exhibit​: Include the student-composed word count for the exhibit and the total word count in the
process paper​ ​o ​Documentary and Performance​: Include the total word count in the process
paper ​o ​Paper​: include the total word count in the paper ​o ​Website​: Include this
information on the homepage of your website. Include the student-
composed word count for a website and the total word count in the process
paper
• DO NOT include your grade, school name or teacher name!
 National History Day in
Minnesota
101
2. PROCESS PAPER
(500 words, 4-5
Paragraphs)
• How did you get the idea for this topic?
• Where did you go for your research? What
types of sources (newspapers, documents,
interviews, etc.) did you use?
• How has your understanding of this topic changed as you have worked on your research?
• How did you put your presentation together? What skills did you learn?
• How does your topic relate to the theme “​Triumph and Tragedy in History​?” Why is this topic important in
history?
 My partner and I got the idea to do the Battle of Port Royal when we were randomly looking up
battles in South Carolina and we stumbled across it and we decided to do that because it looked interesting
and therefore we picked it and now we’ve learned a lot about our topic.
I went online for a lot of my research looking through websites and images etc. But we went to
Coastal Carolina’s library and were allowed to research there in the library. I found loads of good
newspapers from that time period that told me a lot about the life back then and how the battle actually was.
My understanding of my topic has changed dramatically because I thought that the battles were just
thrown together when the two sides run into each other somewhere, but, it is all planned out by very
intelligent generals with strong battle plans to try and win a war. This battle is one of the best panned out
battles in the civil war. In the beginning, I thought it was just a regular battle. Turns out it is a very well
drawn out battle and one of the best in the civil war.
I put my presentation together by just basically putting all my research together into a paper and
then I put most of what we wrote on the paper into an exhibit and a diorama. I learned a lot of organization
skills and how to match colors on a board and just simple things.
My topic relates to the triumph and tragedy theme because it was a battle and therefore it has both.
The topic is important to history because it helped write America's history during and after the Civil War. If
this battle had not taken place then the history of America and the civil war would have changed drastically.

3. ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY ​Separate into primary and secondary sources and alphabetize.
Use MLA or Turabian guide for your citations. Use a two-sentence annotation format:
• What is this source?
• How was it useful to your project?

REMEMBER​: All materials must be printed on plain white paper and stapled in the upper left-hand corner. NO
COVERS! NO ARTWORK OR SPECIAL PAPERS! Bring at least four copies of your process paper when you
are judged.