It's too late to learn APA when you're finishing your thesis

Frankly, I'm amazed how far people can get without learning the basics of citation styles. I've edited many Master's theses and even a few PhD dissertations in which key parts of citations were done incorrectly. These things should be mastered in first year college.

Let's review the purpose of citation. We use citations to provide credibility to the arguments we are making. A citation answers the question "How do you know?" for each fact that you assert.

APA style uses two criteria to show how much weight a source has: author and date. It assumes that later citations are more likely to be correct than earlier citations. It also assumes that some authors are more credible than others.

But APA doesn't want you to fill up your page with a lot of other junk that's not necessary to show the credibility of your source. That's why the URL and publisher information are listed in the reference section. The whole idea is to keep the body of the paper nice and tight, and leave it up to the reader to check out the reference section if he/she wants more information or to track down the original source.

I just finished editing a Master's thesis in which almost all of the in-text citations did not appear in the reference list. In the reference list was a whole bunch of stuff that was not cited in the paper. It's a complete disaster from a credibility point of view. The reference list is not suggested extra reading for anyone with a burning interest in the topic. The point of a thesis is to make an argument and to show that the facts behind your argument are credible. References should be strictly a list of sources of information actually used in the paper.

Don't Master's programs require you to write a number of essays in courses leading up to your thesis? I know that some undergraduate teachers can be lazy or inconsistent in checking writing for APA style, but surely there must be some kind of course for people who are required to write a thesis? I'm actually shocked at some of the people working in graduate-level programs. I think (private universities are particularly guilty of this) that the admissions offices looks at the tuition fees more than the academic ability.

I think part of the problem is the move to teach undergraduate courses by sessional instructors. These instructors are underpaid and over-worked. They may not have the luxury of time to carefully critique papers, thus teaching undergraduates how to write proper academic essays. When I was early in my education, I thought references were for the birds. I was casual about citing sources. A great teacher set me straight. After that I was diligent in citing sources, but rarely did I get a paper back where a teacher had corrected some technical aspect of my citations. Really, it took until I became a professional editor that I learned about sources like Purdue's OWL, which sets out clearly all the formatting to properly reference a paper in MLA or APA style as well as providing other writing instruction.

If you are an undergraduate and you intend to go to graduate school, or continue your academic career in any way, you need to ensure you understand how to use citation styles properly. Access your school's writing resources, or take the time to look things up online. Even if your mark doesn't depend on it now, it may be important later. And it could be too late then.

Colon or Semicolon: a brief lesson

Many people are confused about how to use the colon or semicolon. A colon (:) is used to expand or explain; a semicolon (;) is used to form parallel structure and for lists where items contain commas.

In the British Columbia province-wide high school exams, the "use of a variety of sentence structures" is one of the criteria for marking. One of the ways to do this by expanding your repertoire of punctuation beyond commas and periods. However, when I'm editing college (and even graduate level essays) I see the poor semicolon and colon misused horribly. So let's clarify how to use these punctuation marks, and you can see your essay writing marks improve instantly.

First a warning: this is intermediate level stuff. If you are still struggling to write a coherent sentence, stick to writing simple sentences. I often tell beginning writers to get used to writing subject-verb-object-complement (SVOC) sentences. It's like any other art. You must learn the basic rules before you go off into doing fancy stuff. In other words, "walk before you run."

But once you can write basic sentences consistently, it's time to write more complex sentences.

Colon or Semicolon?

The graphic above provides the basic rules for colons and semicolons. A colon introduces a list, or the part after the colon expands or explains the part before the colon. In essence, these are the same things: a list provides details (expands). Notice from the graphic that we can use the colon whether or not the list is in the form of bullet points. However, the use of the colon depends on the structure of the sentence.

Use a colon to expand or explain.

If the first example had begun with "The expeditions goals were to..." then a colon would be incorrect. No punctuation would be needed to introduce this list. "The expedition's three goals were to explore, seize land, and find gold.  This would be true even if the sentence were structured in the form of a bulleted list.

Semicolons are entirely different kinds of animals. In fact, they used to be known as semiperiods, which I think is a better name. They act like a comma, only stronger. That's why when I'm editing, the most common circumstance when I insert a semicolon is to fix a run-on sentence caused by a comma splice.

Use a semicolon to join two clauses.

A run-on sentence is a sentence where two main clauses are joined improperly. It usually looks something like this: "I went to the store, I bought bread." This is known as a comma splice. The comma is not strong enough to join the two clauses. It needs help. We can fix this sentence with a conjunction: "I went to the store, and I bought bread." Another way to fix the sentence is to use a semicolon because a semicolon is strong enough to do the job. "I went to the store; I bought bread." Two clauses joined together with meanings that are parallel are called "parallel structure." Some nice sentences with parallel structure are what markers like to see when marking provincial exams.

Use a semicolon in a list where items use commas.

Sometimes we need to write a list, but the items in the list contain commas. For example, it is necessary to use commas when writing city names with their states. So it's confusing to the reader if you're writing a list of city names with states and joining them with commas. I went to New York, NY, Springfield, MA, and Dallas, TX. Did I go to Springfield, OH and Massachusetts or Springfield, MA? The semicolon solves this dilemma. I went to New York, NY; Springfield, MA; and Dallas, TX. This is also useful if the list contains commas for other reasons. The body of scientists named for honors included Oppenheimer, father of the hydrogen bomb; Einstein, originator of the Theory of Relativity; and Darwin, whose Theory of Evolution changed our understanding of our place on the planet.

One of the most common errors in using a semicolon is to use it in lists where items do not contain commas. Even if the items in the list are long, there is no need to use a semicolon.

A few easy rules for colons and semicolons will improve your writing:

• Use a colon to expand or explain (e.g. introduce a list)
• The introduction to the list must be structured for the use of a colon
• Use a semicolon to join clauses of equal weight to create parallel structure
• Use a semicolon to join items in a series when items contain commas.

That's all. Happy writing!

Improve your essay writing marks with these 3 tips

Follow these three tips to improve your essay writing marks. These tips are from the Canadian Proofreading site iProof.ca

The first point is simple: create an outline BEFORE you start writing. There are a couple of reasons for this. In creating an outline, you are thinking about the big picture. You can map out how you are going to organize your arguments, and you can make some notes about the evidence you are going to present.

Remember: each paragraph should be organized about some evidence, either a citation directly from a work you are writing about (as in an English essay) or a citation from an expert (peer-reviewed) in the field. Most of the paragraph will be taken up by evaluating the evidence, connecting the evidence to other evidence, or discussing the importance of the evidence for your thesis. So your outline should indicate what evidence you are going to introduce, or what main argument you are going to make with some notes about what evidence supports it. Creating an outline is simply a roadmap to organize your presentation of evidence.

I edit a lot of essays that were clearly written without an outline. They tend to wander. The paragraphs are disjointed. The evidence is not clearly connected with the thesis. They lose marks (less so after I edit them).

Second, condense sentences. The most common problem is as cited in the second point in the graphic. People seem to need to remind the reader that the evidence came from a study. That's not needed. All the evidence comes from studies. That's the scientific method! All you need to do is tell the reader who did the study (and when) and present the findings. The examples shown are not the most egregious waste of words I've seen. Often writers spend a dozen words preparing the reader for some evidence when only a few will suffice. In the proofreading process, I reserve a whole step for looking at sentences thinking about whether there is a way to make the same point in a more concise way. Your professors will be grateful. Of course, if you are filling up words to meet your minimum word count, then you'll pay for that with your marks.

Finally, use transition words. Transition words connect ideas. They can continue an idea, or they can introduce a new idea. Transition words can be used within paragraphs or to connect paragraphs. Often, students are criticized by teachers for their failure to use transition words. This happens when ideas are suddenly thrust into an essay without preparing the reader.

Use of these rhetorical techniques will make your essay flow more smoothly, and your marks will improve.

What other techniques can you suggest for improving essay writing marks? Spam comments will be deleted.