This document provides MLA formatting guidelines for a narrative essay assignment. Students are only expected to follow formatting and not include any research. The essay should be double spaced in 12-point Times New Roman font with 1 inch margins. It should include a heading with the student's name, instructor's name and title, course name, and due date in day-month-year format. Each page should have a header with the student's last name and page number. The essay should also include a title in title case, formatted like the rest of the essay. Following these guidelines will earn full points for formatting.

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Joe Vandal
Instructor C. Hill
ENGL 102
3 February 2017
Fonts and Margins and Headers, Oh My!:
All the MLA You Need to Know for Unit 1
Since the major assignment for Unit 1 is a narrative essay, there isn’t any research
required or expected of you yet. So, all the MLA you have to adhere to right now is strictly
formatting. For starters, your essay should be double-spaced in Times New Roman 12-point font.
When double-spacing, make sure that you remove any extra spacing between paragraphs (check
the box in Line Spacing Options). The margins should be 1 inches all the way around.
Your essay should also include a heading just like the one included in this worksheet. The
order should be your name, my title (Instructor C. Hill [include the C since there are two Hills in
the UI English Department]), the course name, and the date this essay is due written in business
style (day month year). Also make sure to include a header on the top right corner of the page
with your last name and the page number. I am aware many MLA resources say to not include
this header on the first page, but I am fine with it staying (removing it is so much needless work).
The easiest way to add a header is to double-click at the very top of the page, prompting the
header and footer options to appear.
And, finally, your essay should include a title, in title case. This title should be creative
and original—that is to say, “Essay 1” is not going to cut it. Play with it; have fun with the first
line your readers will see. However, your creativity should not spill over into how you format the
title line. There should be no extra spacing around the title, bold font, size 28 font, Wing Dings

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font, italicization, underlining—anything. The title should be formatted exactly like every other
line in your essay.
Follow these guidelines exactly and you should easily earn all the possible points for
formatting on your first major assignment!