Assignment writing guide

Introduction
The first few attempts at academic assignment writing can be a worrying and
uncertain time. Writing an assignment is never easy but the process does become less
arduous and more focused through experience and reflectio n. To a certain extent
assignment writing is a skill learned through practice. An assignment should be a
succinct presentation of your own thoughts, analysis, research findings and so on,
regarding a particular topic or issue, supported by or with reference to existing
literature.
Different institutions and courses may require different levels and amounts of work.
However there are some commonly accepted standards expected of written
presentations and essays at a graduate diploma level. Details may vary but all
academic papers should follow a similar format, as a brief perusal of any reputable
academic or professional journal will show you. This does not mean to say that your
material should be indistinguishable from a doctoral dissertation, but it does mean that
your work should start to look and feel 'academic'.
In your early attempts at assignment writing, when each component is painstakingly
conscious, you can seek help from the many resources available. After a couple of
successful papers you should acquire some of the basic skills and the process will
start to become easier. These skills need to be continually developed though, as there
is usually room for improvement. Outlined below are some of the basic requirements
of assignments, a list of some tips regarding assignment writing and where further
help may be sought.

General guideline
The text of your assignment should demonstrate the following:
• knowledge and understanding of the relevant material in set texts or readings
• evidence of having sought out, studied, reviewed and analysed some other
material relevant to the topic, including various academic journals, books,
monographs and, if relevant, the press; pay attention to how recent the
publication is and try to use primary sources as much as possible for quotes
and definitions
• an argument, point of view or analysis that is original but supported by your
reading and research.

Presentation
Your essay is expected to follow the standard presentation of academic papers and
include:
A title page that clearly shows (see appendix 1):
• your student number
• university
• department
• course name
 • subject number
• title of your essay
• due date and the approximate number of words
• subject co-ordinators name

Text that:
• is typed
• is double spaced on A4 paper
• has three- four centimetre margins to allow room for the markers comments
• is written on one face of a page only, on numbered pages

A standard, well recognised reference system that is consistent throughout the

assignment, ensuring that each author and/or source is properly identified 1 . A
bibliography must also be included for any material you have read that has influenced
your work but has not been cited in the text.

Layout
Any essay should have a clear beginning, middle and end. This sounds rather obvious,
but is important to bear in mind, so that the finished product is easy to follow for the
reader. It is easy to fill your assignment with ideas and quotes, but without structure
and logical flow the reader can easily become lost and many good ideas may go to
waste. Correct grammar and sentence structure is also very important. Therefore your
assignment should have:

(i) An introduction
This informs the reader of the topic or question for discussion, introduces the main
issues and outlines the main body of the assignment. An introduction may include
references. How long an introduction should be is difficult to gauge. As a rough
guide, we consider that an introduction may be up to a page long for assignments of
3000 words.

(ii) The main body

Picking up from the direction given by the introduction, the main part of your essay
should be a logical development or sequence of ideas derived from and supported by
your reading with quotes, references and examples. An argument or point of view
may develop, with a critical analysis, review and weighing up of the literature. With
many assignments a degree of originality and your own thinking should be evident.
Have a look at the ‘sample’ proforma at the end of this guide for a bit more detail.

(iii) A summary or conclusion

The last part of your assignment should re-acquaint the reader with the main points of
the assignment and bring them all together. Your conclusion does not have to be the
definitive answer and may even also pose a further question or suggest direction for
further inquiry. It should however, reflect the main body of the assignment, very
briefly mentioning the main points, and can include references.

(iv) Headings

1 The APA citation style is preferred, however alternative referencing systems are acceptable
Headings are very useful to both the reader and the writer in delineating various parts
of your work. Headings and sub- headings help the writer keep the assignment
organised and give the reader a basic idea of the structure of the work before actually
reading the text. You do not necessarily have to write the words 'Introduction' and
'Conclusion', but this is a good way to start. Again articles from various journals and
publications will give you some ideas.

Referencing
It is easy to get stuck when quoting and paraphrasing. Should you quote an author
directly or paraphrase the material into a sentence of your own? Similar to how long
an ideal sentence should be, there are no clear guidelines on when to quote. Two good
rules of thumb are 1) quote directly if the author has said exactly what you wanted to
say and you can't make it fit any better and 2) try and keep to only one or two direct
quotes per 1000 words. Other points can be paraphrased, that is written in your own
words, so as not to disrupt your own style. The reference is still cited of course. If you
have made a point without using a quote and not exactly paraphrasing an author, but
feel he or she has been a big influence in your thinking, then cite that author.

Different systems
There are guidelines regarding how to identify an author once cited and very definite
guidelines regarding how to quote. There are several possible ways of citing authors:

(i) A direct and often used method is placing the author’s name in text with the list of
references in alphabetical order at the end:

"...the period when adolescents most often experience, whether justified or not, a
sense of alienation from their families" (Lestat, 1994, p. 30).

Lestat (1994) believes that this is "...the period when adolescents most often
experience, whether justified or not, a sense of alienation from their families" (p.30).

(ii) Ano ther often used system uses a number at the end of the phrase to be referenced
that corresponds to the end of the essay:
"...the period when adolescents most often experience, whether justified or not, a
sense of alienation from their families". 4

Distance education students will note that this is the method employed in the topic
notes of your study material.

Identifying authors
It is best to seek out a manual for a thorough explanation of how to identify authors.
Space does not allow for a comprehensive outline here, but some examples of usual
conventions are:

(i) You do not need to give a page number if not quoting directly:
Adolescents often feel alienated from their families, often without real cause (Lestat,
1994).
(ii) Give the page number if quoting from the source exactly. Sometimes it is
expedient to leave out a few words from a quote. You can show this with three full
stops and is acceptable as long as this is not misrepresenting what the author is
saying:

"...the period when adolescents most often experience . . . a sense of alienation from
their families" (Lestat, 1994, p. 30).

(iii) If two authors have written a cited article, use both:

"...the period when adolescents most often experience, whether justified or not, a
sense of alienation from their families" (Lestat & Marius, 1994, p. 30).

(iv) When there are three or more authors, all should be cited the first time a reference
is used:
...the period when adolescents most often experience, whether justified or not, a sense
of alienation from their families (Lestat, Marius, Armand & Pandora, 1994, p. 30).

(v) However for subsequent citations of the same reference, 'and colleagues' is used
when the authors names are outside of the brackets, and the Latin abbreviation 'et al'
is used when the reference is in brackets:
Lestat and colleagues (1994) found that . . .
. . . a sense of connectedness (Lestat et al., 1994).

(vi) Direct quotes of forty words and longer should be indented from the main text,
with no quotation marks, single-spaced and in a slightly smaller font.

Footnotes and appendices

Footnotes may also be used to include additional information that is not directly
relevant to the flow of the argument, but you feel may be of interest. Footnotes for
this reason, should not be confused with the footnote style of referencing and should
be used sparingly. Large amounts of material should be put into an appendix at the
end of the paper, with a note in the text of the assignment.

Appendix material can include full transcripts of interviews, other original data, lists
of names of organisations and large extracts of supporting documents. Each appendix
(there can be more than one, that is ‘appendices’) should be on a separate page and if
there are many, may necessitate the inclusion of a table of contents at the beginning of
the paper after the title page.

What to include in a reference list or reference footnote

Whether using footnotes or a system such as the Harvard system, the same
information should be provided, the format varying slightly for books and journal
articles. Book references require surnames and initials of authors, year of publication,
full title and edition, publisher and place of publication. For journal references you
should include surnames and initials of authors together with year of publication in
the journal, title of article, title of journal, volume or issue number and page numbers.
One accepted format is:
(i) Books:
Leaqz, K. (1985) Professional Ethics: Power And Paradox, Abingdon Press, Nashville
Texas.

(ii) Author(s) of a chapter in an edited book:

Cooper, A (1989) Theorizing gender, chapter two in Sex Differences in Britain, Reid,
I. & Strata, E. (eds), second edition, Gower Publishing Co.

(iii) Journals:
Hart, G. (1990). Peer consultation in review, Australian Journal of Advanced Nursing,
5 (4), 22-27.
Stiffman, A., Earls, F., Robins, L. & June, K. (1988) Problems and help seeking in
high risk adolescent patients of health clinics, Journal of Adolescent Health Care, 9
(4), 305-309.

(iv) Reports:
Australian Health Ministers Conference (1995). The Health Of Young Australians: A
National Policy For Children And Young People, Aust. Govt. Publishing Service,
Canberra.

Dept. of Public Health/Uni. of Sydney (1993). Goals And Targets For Australia's
Health In The Year 2000 And Beyond, Lasers Edge Pty. Ltd/Common. Govt. Printers.

(v) Videos:
Alzheimers Disease. Videorecording. Prod. Hospital Satellite Network. American
Journal of Nursing, 1985. 28 min.

(vi) Newspapers/magazines:
Bray, D. "The Ultimate Playground", Courier-Mail, 16 Feb. 1991.

(vii) Television
'Canal Estates'. Nationwide. Reporter Bruce Woolley. ABC TV, Brisbane. 2 Dec
1980.

Remember newspapers and magazines should only be used if particularly relevant.

They are not sufficiently rigorous for the purposes of academic assignment writing.
Don't quote statistics or research findings from magazines, newspapers or the
television.

(viii) Internet sources

Individual works
Author/editor surname, Initial. (Year) Title [online].Edition. Place of
publication, Publisher. Available from: URL[Accessed date].
Example:
Marieb, E. (2000) Essentials of Human anatomy and Physiology: AWL Companion
Web Site.[online]. 6th edition. San Francisco, Benjamin Cummings. Available
from: http://occ.awlonline.com/bookbind/pubbooks/marieb-essentials/
[Accessed 4th July 2001].

Citing electronic journals

Author surname, Initial. (Year) Title of article. Journal title[online],
Volume (part), location within the host. Available from: URL [Accessed date].

Example of an article from a journal available in print and electronic form:

Handwashing Liaison Group (1999) Hand washing. BMJ[online], 318 (7185),686.
Available from: http://www.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/318/7185/686 [Accessed
4th July 2001].

Why use references and how many?

Referencing is required in the interests of scholarly honesty and to facilitate further
inquiry by those who have been interested in what you have written. An assignment,
however, should not be a string of quotes and paraphrases. You must link your ideas
together, with some evidence of original thought, including critique.

The use of the terms 'Bibliography' and 'References' can be at times confusing and
sometimes appear to be used interchangeably. It’s probably safer to stick with the
term 'References' for authors cited in the text and/or 'Other reading' for books and
articles that influenced your work but were not actually cited.

For an essay at Graduate Diploma level we expect eight to ten references for a 2500
word essay. These references should be an even balance of peer review journal articles,
textbooks and articles from other rigorous journals. ‘Peer review’ refers to those journals
that are (usually) discipline specific and that have an editorial panel, with a range of
expertise, who checks and critiques material before publication. Always have a look at
the ‘quality’ of literature you are using. For example, Yo uth Studies Australia is a fairly
respectable reference, that now includes peer reviewed articles, a text regarding a
particular field that has different authors for different chapters and an editor(s) will
probably contain more useful material and represent a number of points of view.

Names of referencing systems have been deliberately avoided in this guide, as they can
be confusing. Increasingly the Publication Manual of the American Psychological
Association is being used as the standard format for essays and assignments in higher
education and we strongly encourage you to use this format for your essay presentation.
Remember: whichever referencing method you use, it must be used throughout the
entire paper.

Common points and pitfalls

There are some grammatical points to bear in mind when assignment writing. It is not
a complete or exhaustive list, but something to get you thinking and watching out. If
you have little or no experience in assignment writing it is important that you read up
on the techniques of essay writing before you start your own work. A list of helpful
books is at the end of this guide.

There are many common mistakes in grammar. When writing an assignment it is

important to have as close to correct grammar as possible. It is equally important not
to agonise over every tiny detail.
Academic essays should be clear and concise and are quite different from press
reporting, novel writing and everyday speech. Although you have to assume a certain
level of professional experience and understanding on the part of your reader, you
cannot assume particular knowledge of what you are writing about. You may feel you
are spelling everything out, but it is better to err on the side of caution. Check out peer
review journals for a sense of this.

Beware of words and combinations such as disinterested and uninterested, continuous

and continual, less and fewer, similar to and different from, due to and owing to, and
many others. For example you may be uninterested in a subject whereas an umpire
should be disinterested in who wins.

Use of the first person is acceptable but should be used very carefully and sparingly.
The term 'I' may be used fairly simply however it is safer to avoid ‘we’, ‘they’ and so
on. If you wish to refer to yourself but are uncomfortable with the first person use 'the
writer' or 'the author' instead:

“The author’s experience is at variance with that of Taffeta (1979), who stated that he
had seen several examples of practical . . .”

Often you can write from a first person point of view but minimise the use of ‘I’. For
example if you were writing a project report you may like to say that ‘a survey form
was developed’ rather than ‘I drafted a survey form’.

Be careful with apostrophes, colons, semicolons and words of similar spelling but
different meaning:

(i) The colon precedes a list.

This was the list of goods he needed before he began: hammer, nails, saw and ruler.

(ii) The semicolon separates two phrases that could well exist alone as sentences, but
which you feel would have more impact if in one sentence.
Going home late is not too much trouble; going back to work in the morning,
however, is hard.

(iii) Here the book belongs to an individual student:

It is the student's book.

(iv) In this case there is more than one student, but no possession.
The students had a very busy semester.

(v) Here the lounge belongs to a group of people:

This is the students' lounge.

(vi) Here the apostrophe indicates the abbreviation of 'it is'.

It's raining in Hamilton at the moment.

(vii) When using its to denote possession the apostrophe is not used
The dog is looking for its ball.
Words ending in ‘ent’ and ‘ant’ are often confused. For example dependent means to
be conditional, whereas dependant is a noun, meaning a person who is reliant on
another. Practise is a verb; practice is a noun.

There are also some tricky plurals such as phenomena, bacteria, agenda and data the
singular being phenomenon, bacterium, agendum and datum. (The plural of sheep is
sheep!)

Try to avoid abbreviations where possible. Avoid writing words such as 'it's', 'doesn't'
and 'hasn't', unless you are quoting someone directly, say from a reference or an
interview. It is more in keeping with academic style to write 'it is', 'does not', 'has not'
and so on. The same applies to writing numbers. It is better to write 'twenty-five
people', rather than '25 people', or 'on thirteen occasions', instead of 'on 13 occasions'.
Of course there are exceptions. It is more sensible to write larger numbers, for
example 2754, and years can always be written in numerals. Similarly you may find
yourself using a long phrase or name repeatedly, such as 'Royal Children's Hospital'.
In this case you may possibly opt to write 'Royal Children's Hospital (RCH)', using
'RCH' in the text following. You will have to make a judgment for each case and seek
advice as necessary.

With some points of grammar there are clear rules. Sentence length is not one of these
and is a difficult area where you may need guidance, but must also find your own
balance. Sentences that are over two and a half lines can become unwieldy. Too many
short sentences give the essay a staccato quality. Try varying sentence length and
splitting a long sentence into two short ones if it becomes bogged down. If you are
unsure about sentence length it can help if you read the passage out aloud, if it doesn't
sound quite right there is probably room for improvement. Keep in mind flow and
structure!

Getting started
It is never too early to start thinking about your assignment, even if you haven't yet
reached the relevant study material. You can be sketching out a rough plan and doing
some other reading. You may only come up with a few headings, but this is a start to
organising your thoughts and line of argument, even if the plan is alt ered as work
progresses. Another idea is to carry an exercise book with you as much as possible
where you can jot down ideas and thoughts as they occur to you, for use later on. You
can also discuss an outline of your assignment with your subject co-ordinator.

You can also analyse the question, for example:

Examine the effect of one of the following on young people’s self-concept and the possible
implications for their health and welfare:
1) politics and economics
2) electronic, film and print media
3) being of a cultural and/or ethnic minority

The question can be analysed in terms of what you are being asked to do (examine),
what ideas need defining (young people, self-concept, health and welfare, whatever of
1,2 or 3 you choose) and what stakeholders are involved (young people). These are
the first steps towards developing a structure for your essay.

Allotting time to the various components of assignment writing is very difficult. Time
is needed to research material, read it, go back to the library and pick up your bag that
you left next to the photocopier, read the articles again, think of what to write, plan
the assignment. One major pitfall is leaving the writing until too late and thus not
leaving enough time towards the end for proof reading, editing and presentation. One
suggested overall time allocation is: 40% research, 40% writing, 20% editing.

Not only is it important to have enough time to check for spelling mistakes and to
tighten up the referencing, but time must be allocated to re-reading the finished
product with a cool head. Your work may seem clear and well expressed to you, but
this may only be because you are now quite close to the subject. Putting your
assignment to one side and reading it a day or so later, with maybe someone else
reading it too, can be invaluable. You should proof read your assignment at least
twice, once for sentence structure and form and once for content, particularly if
English is your second language. Remember that the ‘spellcheck’ on your computer
or word processor will not point out words that are missed or incorrectly used.

Plagiarism and collusion

Students presenting another person's work as their own (ie. unacknowledged
quotations or paraphrasing of ideas) will be asked to resubmit. In addition students
presenting work as entirely their own, when it is another person’s work or has been
completed in collaboration with another, will be asked to resubmit. All students will
be required to complete a Statement on Plagiarism at the start of the course.

Plagiaris m and collusion will be penalised.

Some useful manuals

This list is in no way exhaustive, but is indicative of the type of books and guides
available. They range from how to write simple essays, through to full experimental
reports. It is worth contacting the University Bookroom to find out what is available
and possibly purchase something that meets your needs.

American Psychological Association. (1994). Publication manual. Fourth edition.

Washington, D. C.

Anderson, J., & Poole, M. (1970). Thesis And Assignment Writing, Second edition,
John Wiley & Sons, Milton, QLD
NB. Simple, clear and good examples

Australian Government Publishing Service (1988). Style Manual For Authors, Editors
and Printers, Fourth edition, AGPS Press, Canberra.

Barrass, R. (1978). Scientists Must Write: A Guide To Better Writing For Scientists,
Engineers And Students, Chapman & Hall, London.
Clanchy, J. & Ballard, B. (1991) Essay Writing For Students: A Practical Guide,
Second edition, Longman Chesire, Melbourne.

Kirkman, J. (1992). Good Style: Writing For Science And Technology, E & FN Spon,
London.

Morgan, M. (1991). Essay Writing: It's All In Your Head, The University Of
Melbourne.

Murray-Smith, S. (1990). Right Words: A Guide To English Usage In Australia.

Revised edition. Penguin, Victoria.

We hope this has been of some assistance. Assignment writing is a very common
form of assessment and can be hard. Remember you are supposed to be earning a
graduate diploma, an academic qualification from a tertiary institution. It is expected
that assessment tasks require some effort. Many students have reported to us that
essay writing, whilst not something they would pursue for recreation, was a
rewarding, profitable exercise and an important learning experience.