Parenthetical Citations?

[Paige]

I’m unsure about how strict to be about requiring parenthetical citations at the high school level. In college, I was trained to cite everything that I used that wasn’t my thoughts. So if I wanted to use a fact that isn’t general knowledge I’d put the source in, but not for the discussions of facts and the synthesis which were from me. 

Reading high school papers, I see that practically every sentence would need to be sourced if I went according to how I was taught. Do I double down on it and make them put in the parenthetical citations when facts are used or let some things slide. I’ve heard some teachers dislike lots of parenthetical citations, so I’m not sure if times have changed. 
 

I think my students may need to spend more time on analysis and less on regurgitated facts, but I do t think they are abnormally bad writers for their age. They were in high school last year, and got high scores in a high achieving school. They tell me that they were never hammered on the citations like this. Thoughts? I like APA and they use MLA, but I didn’t  think there was much of a difference in this area. I vaguely remember getting to college and discovering that my teachers had failed to teach me how to properly cite things- especially for sciences. I want my kids to go into college doing it correctly. 

 

[8filltheheart]

Citations are fairly easy in software these days since you can select format when typing in word and use sources like easybib.  I woudn't worry too much about specific format.

In terms of paranthetical citations, I just had this conversation with my college sr about my high school sr's last paper.  She wrote a paper on wind and climate zones and most of the paper was solidly in the simpe fact zone but some areas about how the actual impact/occurences were more complicated.  College dd told me that it depends on the professor, but most hate too many paranthetical citations.  She recommended not citing simple geographic zones and atmospeheric conditions but citing the more complicated interactions, so that is what I had dd do.  In a college scenario, that is a question the student can easily ask and get answered.

[Paige]

32 minutes ago, 8FillTheHeart said:

College dd told me that it depends on the professor, but most hate too many paranthetical citations. 

But would that be because if you are using an excessive amount of parenthetical citations then you aren't saying much? I'm not sure. As I look at my DDs papers, I can see how I would phrase things to minimize parenthetical citations- you can use the authors' names once, for example, and continue with it for a couple sentences with perhaps just a date at the end. Or also, perhaps in college if you are using parenthetical quotes too much then you aren't really adding anything new so the criticism would be because of the lack of content. 

Works cited pages are no big deal, but I feel this shouldn't be something that is up to a professor. Either you cite every fact or idea that has been gained from someone else or not. Maybe the disagreement and where art is involved would be what is considered basic enough information to not need a citation. Charlemagne was from France- probably doesn't need a citation, right?

[almondbutterandjelly]

Hammer them on citations now so that their professors won't take off points for citations (or plagiarizing) later.  (Note:  We used MLA for high school, but my pre-nursing dd is required to use APA in her college classes.  However, I don't necessarily think that English majors have to use APA.)

[8filltheheart]

3 hours ago, Paige said:

But would that be because if you are using an excessive amount of parenthetical citations then you aren't saying much? I'm not sure. As I look at my DDs papers, I can see how I would phrase things to minimize parenthetical citations- you can use the authors' names once, for example, and continue with it for a couple sentences with perhaps just a date at the end. Or also, perhaps in college if you are using parenthetical quotes too much then you aren't really adding anything new so the criticism would be because of the lack of content. 

Works cited pages are no big deal, but I feel this shouldn't be something that is up to a professor. Either you cite every fact or idea that has been gained from someone else or not. Maybe the disagreement and where art is involved would be what is considered basic enough information to not need a citation. Charlemagne was from France- probably doesn't need a citation, right?

That really boils down to what you are writing about.  Are you writing an literary analysis essay or are you writing a process report?  One requires original thought and supporting evidence and one is mostly factual first this and then this easy to find information.  It doesn't matter where you read the information; the process doesn't change.

[Momto6inIN]

For a high schooler I would err on the side of citing too much. Once they are in college they will begin to realize that what is considered "common knowledge" changes depending on who your audience is and what you are writing about.

[Arctic Bunny]

DS15’s grade 9 English teacher had a streak of assignments that were just about quoting. Basically, squeezing in as many quotes as possible into a page-long paragraph. Between history, English, and science, they are really hammering home the different formats. And citations are key. From what I’ve seen, you cannot over-cite in grade 9! Later years remain to be seen.

[Paige]

1 hour ago, Momto6inIN said:

For a high schooler I would err on the side of citing too much. Once they are in college they will begin to realize that what is considered "common knowledge" changes depending on who your audience is and what you are writing about.

Right, because pretty much nothing they are writing about is common knowledge to them yet! 

[elegantlion]

As someone who guides college freshmen on how to cite, please consider being overly thorough. I too hate parenthetical citations and instead ask for footnotes. History is a discipline that uses Chicago/Turabian style. We generally give the students the footnote style, like how the author , publication info should look, but they have to insert footnotes when they quote, paraphrase, or provide information from the source. I have a small percentage of my students who can footnote correctly. My papers are required to be 3-5 pages. On a well written 4 page paper, I wouldn't be surprised to see 15-25 footnotes.

 

The other issue is that many students have no idea how to properly insert footnotes into a paper. I walk them through the process, the professor of record has a video on how to do, but a great majority still do it wrong.