GCC English 101: Common Final Assignment for Spring, 2008

Topic: Driving while Texting

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Documenting sources

College teachers expect students to not only develop their own thinking but also to connect their thinking to the ideas presented by others. Doing so demonstrates that you understand the history, background and context of your topic. This is especially important in an argument, where what you think can be bolstered by demonstrating that others agree with you. It is also important to demonstrate that you understand the positions of those who disagree with you, that you have considered those ideas carefully before disagreeing with them.

When you include in your essays the ideas, words or information provided by others, you must give credit to those sources. This includes material that you summarize, paraphrase, or mention in addition to material you quote. See the English Department Guide to Documentation or your textbook for examples. The English Department uses the Modern Language Association (MLA) documentation format.

Watch "You Quote It, You Note It!" a short tutorial from Vaughan Memorial Library at Acadia University for help understanding the proper use of sources.

In general, it is best to summarize or paraphrase information from others in order to maintain a consistent tone and vocabulary in your essay. However, sometimes you will come across words or phrases that are so distinctive that you would lose some meaning in a paraphrase. Those "quoteworthy" phrases should still be integrated into your own sentences. Otherwise there might be a startling difference between what you have written and what you have included from others. Read this story about the "Quotation Interloper" to hear what that sounds like.

Include the author or title of any source whose ideas or exact words you quote or paraphrase in your essay by citing it in your sentence or in parentheses at the end of a sentence. Then list the full citation for each source in a Works Cited list at the end of your essay. Your Works Cited list should include all sources you use in your essay. Make sure your sources are listed in alphabetical order. For example, if you use ideas or information from the article in the Futurist, you should include the author's last name at the end of your sentence and then include the full citation at the end of your essay (Weiss).

Weiss, Merkel. "Confronting Driver Distraction." Futurist 41.1 (Jan. 2007): 16-17. Academic Search Premier. EBSCOhost.
Glendale Community College Library Media Center, Glendale, AZ. 18 Oct. 2007.

Submitting your essay

Once you have completed your essay, follow your instructor's instructions for submitting it to be graded. Then follow these instructions to submit a copy of your essay for reading by the English Department as part of its Assessment Program.

• Save your document to the desktop using your section number and eGCC username: 1234astudent.doc
• Close your document and exit from Word. <---very important!
• From My Computer, navigate to your S drive. Go to Courses | English 101 | Department Assessment.
• Drag your saved document into this folder. This is a drop box, so once you drop it into the folder, you will be unable to see it.

Home ~~ Practicing thinking and writing ~~ Documenting sources

	Last updated by Karen Schwalm on April 03, 2008 .  Legal Notice. http://web.gccaz.edu/english/Assessment/Spring08/Final/page3.htm