Composing a research paper is a complex balance between product (the formal conventions and rules of discourse communities) and process (the non-linear, recursive act of writing) that demands extensive reading and critical literacy skills. The aim of this study is to examine this balance in detail by looking at the literature in two areas (how process and product in writing have been perceived by academics, and how reading is an integral part of the writing process) to see what problems students have with writing research papers and the skills they need to develop to overcome them. This will provide a theoretical underpinning for a pedagogical approach to teaching research papers that give second language students of English the means to survive and function effectively in an academic environment where such papers are often required. The four parts of this interwoven approach (topic selection, mid-project draft, annotated bibliography, and final paper) is rooted in the author's experience with first and second year students at both Korean and Japanese universities.