APA Referencing Style

Using Insert Citation in MS Word 2007

A Students New Best Friend

APA Referencing Style

What do we mean by reference your sources? We mean that you indicate where the information in your reports came from.

APA Referencing Style

Why is it important to reference your sources?

Your teachers want to know what you read and used to write your reports.
It shows your teacher that you did a lot of work for your report. It is honest and good scholarship.

APA Referencing Style

What if you do not reference your sources ? This is stealing the work of an author or plagiarism. It is a form of cheating. HCT does not tolerate students who cheat. You will lose marks or be asked to leave the college.

APA Referencing Style

What does APA mean? American Psychological Association, a professional organization. Why do we have to do it this way ? It is efficient and easy to understand. It would be confusing if everyone wrote in a different way.

Insert Citation in MS Word 2007

A great feature of MS Word 2007 is called Insert Citation.

It automatically writes both In-text Citations and the Bibliography (also called Reference List or Works Cited) at the end of your projects or reports.
It is a students new best friend. It is fast and you dont have to remember each little dot etc.

In Word, pull down the References Tab

For style, choose APA

Click, Insert Citation

Click : Add new source

Choose : Type of Source

Fill in info

Book (in print): Author, Title, Year, City, Publisher. Careful with spelling; there is no spell check. Careful with capital letters; it will not change them. Only capitalize the first word of a book title or proper nouns.

Book Section, i.e. Encyclopedia Article

Author and Title refer to encyclopedia article or chapter. If no author is listed, leave this blank; the title of the article will appear first rather than the author. Book Author (or editor) of entire encyclopedia and Book Title refers to entire encyclopedia not just the article.

Put in pages numbers if you only read some of the book.

Details: Author name

Tick box if the author is a company or corporation.

Last name first, then comma, then first name and/or initials. Word will process the name with initials only. If there is no author, leave it blank- the title will appear first. If there is more than 1 author, put a comma between the names and & before the last author. If there are more than 6 authors, write the first 6 names and then et al.

Details: Title
Use capital letters for the first word & proper nouns.

If there is a subtitle with a colon, capitalize the first word after the colon.
Be careful with capital letters; it will not change them. The ultimate chocolate cake book The house of the spirits Rom: The story of the gypsies

Examples :

Magazine, Journal or Newspaper

2 choices : Journal Article- use only for academic journals with volume and issue numbers as part of the title. Article in a Periodical- use for magazines with a month-day-year date or newspapers. For newspapers, put the section as part of the page, i.e. A5 = Section A, page 5.

Click: OK = In-text citation

Before you click OK, put the cursor at the exact place in your report where you want the citation to appear.

What is an In-text Citation?

It is when you use the exact words, ideas or numbers from a book etc. in the middle of your own words. It is a short form. For more detailed information about in-text references, see the PlugIn lessons. The complete reference (author, year, title, city, publisher, pages, etc.) must be in the list at the end of your report.

Reference List, Works Cited, Bibliography (at the end of your report)

Click : Bibliography, then Insert Bibliography

Put the cursor on the page that you want your Bibliography, usually at the end of your report. Word will put all references in alphabetical order. Check the spacing and indentation. Delete the in-text citation from your Reference List.

Details of a Book Reference

Hemingway, E. (2001). A moveable feast. London: Vintage. Authors last name, initials Year Title of book City Publisher Comma, dot after initials Parentheses & dot Italics & dot Colon Dot

But . . . You dont have to remember any of this because Word does it automatically ! ! !

Web Page / Web Site

Name of Web Pagethe exact page or article you are viewing

Name of Web Sitename of the general site, not the page Use this form for an online newspaper.

Web Page Author

An author can be a person or a company. If there is no author, leave it blank; the title of the Web Page will appear first.

Birds. (2005, June 4). Retrieved September 6, 2009, from Animals: www.animals.com

Web Site: Dates

Year Month Date is when the site was written or updated. If there is no date on the web site, leave these fields blank. It will be processed as n.d. which means not dated.

Year Accessed etc means when you viewed the site.

Details: Web Page

Westerman, M. D. (2003, November 16). Old refrigerators. Retrieved September 27, 2009, from Recycling Household Stuff: www.rhs.com
Author (person or corporation). Date website last updated . Title of webpage. Retrieved (date you found the page) from Name of website. URL Dot Parentheses, dot (Year first) Italics, dot Comma (Year last) Colon
No dot at end

But . . . You dont have to remember any of this because Word does it automatically ! ! !

Copy & Paste from online resources

Many websites and online databases already have an APA citation written at the end of the article that you can copy & paste.

For example . . .

Copy & Paste from Wikipedia

Every Wikipedia article as a Cite this page feature. On the left, 3rd box from the top.

Scroll down to APA style. Copy and paste.

Copy & Paste from Britannica Encyclopedia Online

Any article in the Britannica Encyclopedia Online has a To cite this page feature at the end of the article. Copy & paste.

Copy & Paste from any EBSCO document

Click this little yellow icon, not where it reads Citation.

Copy & paste

Photographs from the Internet or Online Database

Unfortunately, Word 2007 does not do this automatically. Here is the format.
Title of photograph in italics. Dot. Space.

The word Photograph in brackets. Upper case P. Dot. Space.

The word Retrieved upper case R.

Dome of the Rock. [Photograph]. Retrieved October 4, 2009, from Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia. org/wiki/File:Dome_of_the_Rock1.jpg
Month, date, comma, year, comma. Space. Month is written as a full word. Word from then name of general website. URL. Include hyperlink if requested by your teacher. No dot at end.

Final Cleanup of Reference List

Alphabetical order (particularly important if you are copying and pasting from many sources)

Double space between all lines

Left justified first line but all other lines are tabbed over No numbering or bullets

I hope this helps you understand how to write APA references in MS Word and use copy & paste features of online resources. Ask your teacher or your friendly librarian if you have any questions.

Happy Writing !