The annotated bibliography provides important information about your research, about both the content of the source (summary) and its suitability for your research (evaluation).
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Description
What is an annotated bibliography?
Basically, an annotated bibliography is an alphabetical list of your research sources (“bibliography”). After each source, you write an “annotation” –that is, a brief summary and evaluation of the source.
What is it for?
The annotated bibliography provides important information about your research, about both the content of the source (summary) and its suitability for your research (evaluation). The following four elements therefore need to be included:
• Summary (a brief description of the content)
• Currency (was it published recently enough to have merit as a source?)
• Credibility (how reliable is the source?)
• Relevance (how will you use the information in your assignment?)
How to write one?
• Begin with a full citation in proper APA style (author, title of article, title of source, date of publication, etc.)
• Write a summary of the main arguments of the article (2-3 sentences).
• Include a short critique or evaluation (currency and credibility) (2-3 sentences)
• Explain how you will use this source in your letter (relevance) (1-2 sentences).
To repeat one more time, at least one of the articles must come from the Seneca Library databases.
Below is a sample. Note that it begins with the citation of the source. After the citation, the first three sentences summarize the article, including purpose/audience. The next three sentences evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of the article. The last sentence explains how it will be used in the writing assignment.
Warner, J. (2016, June 16). Why Can't My Students Write [Blog post].
Retrieved from https://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/just-visiting/why-cant-my-new-employees-write.
In a blog written for other post-secondary educators, John Warner argues that college students are not being trained to write for real-world rhetorical situations. Instead, they are taught formulas that help them score high on standardized tests and other assessments in the classroom. These formulas mean that students arrive in the workplace without any practice writing for real audiences in real situations. The article is recent (2016). Warner is a credible source, a writing instructor, novelist and editor who has been writing about higher education since 2010. He uses his own experience as a writing instructor to support his argument and offers an effective comparison between learning to ride a bike and learning to write. A major weakness is that Warner does not reference any studies to support his views; another is that he does not provide concrete examples to illustrate his proposed solution. I will use Warner’s article in the “problem” section of my letter when I explain why the five-paragraph essay is harmful to student writers.
In accordance with APA style formatting, submit your annotated bibliography with a title page.
Please also note that a template for an APA-style AB is available on the Seneca Library website (and the AB tutorial will help to locate this for you). Finally, for any assignment, it’s always a good idea to review the grading structure, which you can use as a kind of checklist to ensure that your submission is measuring up to the requirements of the assignment. I have attached the AB grading scheme on the assignment page.
