Today Beth visited my morning seminar, introducing the style of referencing I should use throughout my assignments. I had already been told about APA 6th referencing, however I was yet to learn the ways in which to set my references out on paper. Referencing is important to stop plagiarism as well as helping my tutor understand my thinking around the facts I've gathered. There is a software tutors's can use to spot any work that has been copied, called Turnitin. It picks up matches from assignments, and shows whereabouts the work I've wrote is initially from. If I have used the APA 6th referencing system correctly, the quotes, parts of text, images etc. are fine to use.
There are two ways to reference work: In text citations and the full referencing list.
Short hand in the main body text of my assignment, is called 'in text citations' e.g. (Kessler, 2003) using brackets and then the surname of the writer, and year of publication. This gives the reader/my tutor a heads up that the information I am using is research that I have found rather than my own description. It is also key to add a page number that the quote is from if I found it from a book, journal etc. It is to be used when explaining someone else's: theory, idea, data, concept, statistics throughout my writing. For larger quotes, I will need to indent the paragraph rather than using quotation marks.
If I am referencing an image throughout my assignment, I need to remember to write a caption/title then use the surname of the creator and a date, just like I would with a quote. A figure number is also helpful underneath the image, so when it comes to writing the reference list at the end, I can put the figures in order and it will be easy to find the full reference for each image.
If I am referencing an image throughout my assignment, I need to remember to write a caption/title then use the surname of the creator and a date, just like I would with a quote. A figure number is also helpful underneath the image, so when it comes to writing the reference list at the end, I can put the figures in order and it will be easy to find the full reference for each image.
The reference list at the end includes full details of each quote, piece of research and image. This list will need to be in alphabetical order of the authors names. The details will include the authors name or a website name, a date of publication, a title, then finally a URL or book that its from.
My tutor wants to read my own words to avoid too many quotes, so I need to change the phrases that I want to use so that they fit my own personal writing. However these own words are still theorys and facts and still need referencing. An example of changing a piece of research would be:
Brown (2001) points out that there is a tendency in modern TV society to oversimplify issues..
Or according to Brown (2001) there is a tendancy...
I went onto the Library services on the University website and there are guides, helpers and all sorts to help keep my referencing together, and also help to put my referencing in the right format.
I went onto the Library services on the University website and there are guides, helpers and all sorts to help keep my referencing together, and also help to put my referencing in the right format.
