Digital Literacies as Postgraduate Attribute?

Implementation study – Online Synchronous Academic Writing Instruction

Stephen HillInstitute of Education, University of London

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The following slides were used in real time online instruction in the learning platform Collaborate, to teach an important element to writing in higher education – the use of sources.

Instructors using these slides will want to familiarise themselves with JISC guidance on the learning platform Blackboard Collaborate (see Chatterton, 2012), and will want to adapt these materials and activities to the needs of the students. Instructors will also likely want to incorporate asynchronous activities (i.e. homework exercises into these sessions).

These slides are presented as they were used in the real time session. The session consisted of a PowerPoint presentation with instructor commentary (shared audio), student led discussion (shared audio), and Collaborate webtours (screen share with shared audio discussion). 2

Lecture

Citation in higher education – an overview

It is important to know why you cite in university writing as well as how you cite

Why you cite – e.g. to support your ideas

How you cite – e.g. directly and indirectly through the use of ‘styles’ e.g. APA, MLA (these are associations that give specific guidelines)

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Why you cite

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How you cite

Why you cite How you cite

Webtour

We are going to look online at the contents pages of the following two books – the first book (Neville) gives guidance as to why you cite, the second book (Pears and Shields) gives guidance as to how you cite, make a note of any questions that you would like to ask in our discussion afterwards 5

Exploratory reading

You are going to look at citation guidance given by the American Psychological Association (APA) and the Modern Language Association (MLA)

http://www.apa.org/index.aspx

http://www.mla.org/

While you view these sites make 3 questions about APA and MLA that you are going to ask a partner in a breakout room.

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Exploratory reading questions

APA

1.2.3.

MLA

1.2.3.

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Guided reading – plagiarism

I would like you to read the first five points in the following policy document (you can copy paste it into any internet search engine)

Code on Citing Sources and Avoidance of Plagiarism for Students Registered at the Institute of Education

While you read I would like you to write your thoughts into the chat box (lower left hand side to your screen)

We will discuss as a group when you are finished

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Homework

The following are reporting verbs (in bold)

Jones (1999) statesJones (1999) arguesJones (1999) proposes

Hyland (1999) suggests that different disciplines (e.g. biology, applied linguistics) use reporting verbs differently.

I would like you to look at the table in the following slide and find journal articles in one of the disciplines mentioned by Hyland. You may want to choose a discipline based on your current studies.

I would like you to make a note of the reporting verbs that you find.

Do your findings coincide with Hyland (1999)? We will discuss this at the beginning of the next class.

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Discipline Reporting verbs

Biology describe find report show suggest observe

Physics develop report study find expand

Electricalengineering

propose use describe show publish develop

Mechanicalengineering

describe show report discuss give develop

Marketing suggest argue find report propose show

Applied linguistics

suggest argue show explain find point out

Sociology argue suggest describe note analyze discuss

Philosophy say suggest argue claim point out hold think

Overall suggest argue find show describe propose report

Adapted from Hyland (1999, p. 349)10

References

Chatterton, P. (2012). Designing for participant engagement with Blackboard Collaborate. Retrieved 20 / 03 / 13, from http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/ programmes/elearning/Collaborateguidance/Blackboard%20Collaborate%20Good%20Practice%20Guide.pdf

Hyland, K. (1999). Academic attribution: Citation and the construction of disciplinary knowledge. Applied Linguistics, 20, 341-367.

Neville, C. (2007). The Complete Guide to Referencing and Avoiding Plagiarism. Maidenhead: Oxford University Press.

Pears, R., & Shields, G. (2010). Cite them right: The essential referencing guide (8th ed.). Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillian.

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