Writing Assignment #1

Critical Annotated Bibliography of Five Sources

Summary of assignment

• Task: In this assignment you will write a list of at least 5 sources in alphabetical order in APA format.In addition, each reference will be followed by a short analytical summary of 150-200 words.At the end of the short summary, you will include a sentence or two that critically analyzes the source and that mentions distinctive features about the article and why it may or may not be useful for you in pursuing more research.
• Length:each annotation should be 150-200 words
• Format: APA

Strategies in Selecting a Topic for your Annotated Bibliography

You may select a topic of your choice. However, when selecting a topic, keep in mind that it should be a topic on which a number of studies or scholarly articles have been published.

Examples of topics students have chosen in the past or that would be workable for this assignment are the following:

• The impact of the Internet on research methods of students and plagiarism in student papers
• The impact of The No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act on primary school education
• The impact of mobile devices on cybersecurity

Overall, in considering a topic, you might consider your major, topics that will be covered in future classes you plan to take at UMUC, and your interests.

For example, please examine the following ideas:

• If your major is criminal justice, you might consider researching criminal behavior among homeless individuals, criminal behavior among youth, society’s perception of law enforcement, etc.
• If your major is psychology, you might consider researching counseling strategies, consumer behavior in online shopping, decision-making in upper-management positions, etc.
• If your major is history, you might consider researching theories on the Civil War, studies on labor patterns in the United States, an aspect of military history, etc.
• If your major is social science, you might consider researching community responses to health care threats, co-parenting patterns after divorce, etc.
• If your major is graphic communication, you might consider researching different categories of graphic communication technology, trends in graphic communication through the years, etc.

Whatever topic you consider, keep in mind that it should be a topic on which a number of studies or scholarly articles have been published.

Approach

This assignment will be an analytical/critical/ annotated bibliography.The difference between the descriptive/informative annotated bibliography and the analytical/critical annotated bibliography is explained in the Below Transcript:

Transcript

You have just been given an assignment to write an annotated bibliography. Before you begin, you need to know what exactly an annotated bibliography is and how to get started.

FIRST, WHAT IS AN ANNOTATION?

An annotation is more than just a brief summary of an article, book, Web site or other type of publication. An annotation should give enough information to make a reader decide whether to read the complete work. In other words, if the reader were exploring the same topic as you, is this material useful and if so, why?

HOW IS AN ANNOTATION DIFFERENT FROM AN ABSTRACT?

While an abstract also summarizes an article, book, Web site or other type of publication, it is purely descriptive. Although annotations can be descriptive, they also include distinctive features about an item. Annotations can be evaluative and critical as we will see when we look at the two major types of annotations.

WHAT IS AN ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHY?

An annotated bibliography is an organized list of sources (like a reference list). It differs from a straightforward bibliography in that each reference is followed by a pparagraph length annotation, usually 100–200 words in length.

Depending on the assignment, an annotated bibliography might have different purposes:

• Provide a literature review on a particular subject
• Help to formulate a thesis on a subject
• Demonstrate the research you have performed on a particular subject
• Provide examples of major sources of information available on a topic
• Describe items that other researchers may find of interest on a topic

TYPES OF ANNOTATED BIBLIOGRAPHIES

There are two major types of annotated bibliographies:

1. Descriptive or informative
2. Analytical or critical

Descriptive or informative

A descriptive or informative annotated bibliography describes or summarizes a source as does an abstract, it describes why the source is useful for researching a particular topic or question, its distinctive features. In addition, it describes the author’s main arguments and conclusions without evaluating what the author says or concludes.

For example:

Breeding evil. (2005, August 6). Economist, 376(8438), 9. Retrieved from http://www.economist.com

This editorial from the Economist describes the controversy surrounding video games and the effect they have on people who use them. The author points out that skepticism of new media have gone back to the time of the ancient Greeks, so this controversy surrounding video games is nothing new. The article also points out that most critics of gaming are people over 40 and it is an issue of generations not understanding one another, rather than of the games themselves. As the youth of today grow older, the controversy will die out, according to the author. The author of this article stresses the age factor over violence as the real reason for opposition to video games and stresses the good gaming has done in most areas of human life. This article is distinctive in exploring the controversy surrounding video games from a generational standpoint and is written for a general audience.

Please pay attention to the last sentence. While it points out distinctive features about the item it does not analyze the author’s conclusions.

Analytical or critical

An analytical or critical annotation not only summarizes the material, it analyzes what is being said. It examines the strengths and weaknesses of what is presented as well as describing the applicability of the author’s conclusions to the research being conducted.

For most of your annotated bibliographies, however, you will be writing analytical or critical annotations.

For example:

Breeding evil. (2005, August 6). Economist, 376(8438), 9. Retrieved from http://www.economist.com

This editorial from the Economist describes the controversy surrounding video games and the effect they have on people who use them. The article points out that most critics of gaming are people over 40 and it is an issue of age not of the games themselves. While the author briefly mentions studies done around the issue of violence and gaming, he does not go into enough depth for the reader to truly know the range of studies that have actually been done in this area, other than to take his word that the research is unsatisfactory. The author of this article stresses the age factor over violence as the real reason for opposition to video games and stresses the good gaming has done in most areas of human life. This article is a good resource for those wanting to begin to explore the controversy surrounding video games, however for anyone doing serious research, one should actually examine some of the research studies that have been done in this area rather than simply take the author’s word that opposition to video games is simply due to an issue of generational divide.

Please pay attention to the last sentence. It criticizes the authors research.

Please note that in these samples, the citations follow the APA format. Your instructor may require you to use another citation format, such as MLA, so check first.

TO GET STARTED

Now you are ready to begin writing your own annotated bibliography.

• Choose your sources Before writing your annotated bibliography, you must choose your sources. This involves doing research much like for any other project. Locate records to materials that may apply to your topic.
• Review the items Then review the actual items and choose those that provide a wide variety of perspectives on your topic. Article abstracts are helpful in this process.
• Write the citation and annotation When writing your annotation, the complete citation should always come first and the annotation follows. Depending on the type of annotated bibliography you are writing, you will want to include:
• 1. The purpose of the work
  2. A summary of its content
  3. For what type of audience the work is written
  4. Its relevance to the topic
  5. Any special or unique features about the material
  6. The strengths, weaknesses or biases in the material

Annotated bibliographies may be arranged alphabetically or chronologically, check with your instructor to see what he or she prefers.

GUIDELINES FOR FORMATTING THE CITATIONS

Remember, the citations themselves must be formatted properly. these guides to help you correctly format citations according to APA, MLA or Chicago Style. Remember to check with your instructor if you are unsure which style to use.

Submitting the Work:

• Please submit a first draft of the essay to me a before 12 hours or 24hours before due date.
• I will review and provide comments to it. Using the comments, you do the corrects and provide the final draft.

Sources to be use:

Please find the attached pdf files. I have 5 copies attached (WA# source1 – 5) for the five sources to be written. Please do let me know if we can use these sources. Also, you can equally do you own research just make sure to cite correctly. Can you go through the articles and list me the topics you will be writing on before you proceed to write?

TIP: Please use this template “Template for Taking Notes on Research Articles” that will help you write the assignment

Template for Taking Notes on Research Articles: Easy access for later use

Whenever you read an article, pertinent book chapter, or research on the web, use

the following format (or something similar—LaTex or Endnote, for example) to

make an electronic record of your notes for later easy access. You may think you’ll

remember everything you read in researching class assignments, professional

papers, proposals, or your thesis, but details will slip away. The time spent filling

out the form will help you understand the reading and will save you hours of

rereading when you write a Background, Related Work, or a Literature Review

section. Put quotation marks around any exact wording you write down so that you

can avoid accidental plagiarism when you later cite the article.

Complete citation. Author(s), Date of publication, Title (book or article), Journal,

Volume #, Issue #, pages:

If web access: URL; date accessed

Key Words:

General subject:

Specific subject:

Hypothesis:

Methodology:

Result(s):

Summary of key points:

Context (how this article relates to other work in the field; how it ties in with key

issues and findings by others, including yourself):

Significance (to the field; in relation to your own work):

Important Figures and/or Tables (brief description; page number):

Cited References to follow up on (cite those obviously related to your topic AND any

papers frequently cited by others because those works may well prove to be essential

as you develop your own work):

Your comments on the work:

How this reading relates to others you have read:

Helpful Resources and Websites

The following are some links to sample Annotated Bibliographies. Some of them give examples in APA format. You may want to observe these examples and perhaps model your work after them.

• A variety of samples from The University of North Carolina Writing Center, including these specific examples of APA-style annotations.
• Some instruction from Cornell University. The website also provides more information on the process of writing an annotated bibliography.
• Some instruction from East Carolina University.