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English Literature (A-Level Coursework): Getting organised

Worried booksWork smarter, not harder

This guide has been created to help you to find sources to support your English Literature Coursework.

As you look around for secondary sources, you will soon find you have gathered quite a number - but which was the one that had that excellent quote you want to use, and where did you save it....? You will find you spend less time hunting for information that you have lost and more time working with it if you start your investigation with good habits.

Specifically:Folders

  1. Download any good articles you find, save them in a sensible place and give them sensible names. Yes, you may have the URL, but it is so frustrating when articles are moved or websites changed at a critical moment in your assignment. Take a copy!
  2. Keep a running annotated bibliography to remind yourself what you thought was interesting about that source the first time you read it. Your teacher should be able to ask you for a copy of this at any point to see what progress you are making with your investigation. As an added bonus, if you put your citations into it correctly then you can import them directly into your final essay at the end, saving you from that last-minute panic when you can't find the information you need to cite a source correctly.

Images by (Free-Photos and Alexas_Fotos remixed) and LoveYouAll from Pixabay

Organising your digital workspace

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Key takeaways:

  • Save copies of useful documents and keep a note of their URLs
  • Save these documents in a single folder - but make sure that this is backed up.
  • Give them sensible filenames, I recommend Author(Date)Short_title(Source)

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e.g. I would give this article the filename:

Ingersoll(1993)Echoes-of-Orwell(JSTOR).pdf

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Create a folder in a sensible place on your computer to save your work to. Call it something like English Coursework.

Setting up your annotated bibliography

Do it now

Download the Annotated Bibliography template (to the right) and save it into your English Coursework folder, with a name like

Annotated Bibliography <your surname>

Put your name and class in the header.

Adding citations

This video is for Windows PC users - if you usually use a Mac then please view the one on the other tab.

Do it now

 

Add the citation for your main text (and your second text if you have decided on it) to your annotated bibliography document

If you need further information on citing and referencing in Word, use the Citing and Referencing LibGuide.

This video is for Mac users - if you usually use a Windows PC then please view the one on the other tab.

 

Add the citation for your main text (and your second text if you have decided on it) to your annotated bibliography document

If you need further information on citing and referencing in Word, use the Citing and Referencing LibGuide.

Annotated bibliography

Investigative Journal

Use this instead if you are working with a small number of sources and want space for detailed notes. You might choose to use something like this alongside the Annotated Bibliography to make notes on particularly important sources, or you may not use it at all.


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