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Top 10 Sources for Help with APA 6th Edition
Students often find it challenging to write papers that meet APA guidelines. The following table demonstrates how difficult it can be just to cite correctly.
The following is a list of some of the most useful resources to help write a paper that meets APA requirements.
- Purdue Online Writing Lab APA 6th Edition – One of the most excellent resources for all things APA, writing, punctuation, grammar, mechanics, MLA, and more . . . main Purdue site index.
- APA Style Lite for College Papers – Free style guide that gives excellent examples of how things should look in APA 6th edition.
- Sample APA Paper from Owl Purdue – Excellent example of a paper with arrows and text boxes pointing out each area of the paper and how it should look.
- APA 6th Edition Tutorial – Video demonstration of changes in most recent APA edition.
- APA 6th Edition Style Headings – Examples of the different levels of headings.
- Meeting APA 2 Spaces After Periods Requirement – Video of how to easily change from one space to two spaces after periods to meet 6th edition guidelines.
- Long Quotation Requirements – How to space longer quotations in APA 6th edition.
- Removing that Extra Space Between Paragraphs – Video demonstration of how to use the home tab in Word to find paragraph settings to remove any spaces from in between paragraphs.
- Accessing Headers and Page Numbers in Word – Video demonstration of how to set up headers and page numbers.
- Top 10 Most Common Writing Mistakes – Additional APA information, first person explanation, vocabulary, grammar, anthropomorphisms, Wikipedia, and more.
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Best Apps for Students and Everyone Else
It can be hard to keep up with all of the apps out there. There are over 425,000 apps on Itunes now and that number grows daily.
In the article 48 Apps That College Students Love, they have listed some very important apps. The apps are broken down the into the following categories: Essential Tools, Education, Communication, Entertainment, Information Management, Organization, Budget, and News.
This article listed some of my own very favorite apps, including TED, which includes some of the greatest talks from TED.com.
There are also some fun ones like Rate My Professor. Check out Posting Teacher Reviews Online – What is Rate My Professor.
There are a few that I would like to add to the list, though, that I think are awesome apps:
HowStuffWorks – This app has all of their great podcasts including my favorite from Josh Clark and Chuck Bryant of Stuff You Should Know fame.
StitcherRadio – Great way to access multiple ratio stations and more.
GoogleCalendar – Google’s Calendar is a great way to keep things organized.
Words with Friends – I like this version better than Scrabble’s and it can connect to Facebook as well.
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Female Career Choices That May Surprise You
On the first day of work as a pharmaceutical representative in the 80’s, I was struck by the similarity of my newly-hired peers. There were about 10 of us that started at the same time. Nine out of 10 of us were women. I hadn’t given much thought as to whether women dominated in the pharmaceutical business at that time. However, sitting at that long table full of women, most of whom had business degrees, made me realize that things were changing for women and their career choices.
Since I currently teach for many different online universities, a recent article about women and their online degree choices caught my eye. In the article 10 Majors That Are No longer Male-Dominated, the author pointed out, “Historically, women have dominated majors like education, English and psychology, while men were more likely to study engineering, computer science or math. Although this may ring true at some schools, it isn’t the standard at every traditional or online college. More than ever, college women are opting to study traditionally male-dominated majors and are breaking enrollment records while they’re at it. As the line between male- and female-dominated academic fields continues to fade, there will be less segregation in the job market and more opportunities for both sexes.”
The article lists the following online majors as currently female-dominant:
Computer Science
Business
Engineering
Agriculture
Biological Science
Construction Management
Fire Science
Criminal Justice
Information Technology
Sports Management
For more information about the increase in women majoring in each of these areas, click here to read the full article.
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Top Universities Increasing Online Degrees Programs to Meet Needs of over 5 Million Learners
Arizona State University is just one of many major universities that have started to increase the number of online courses they offer. Within the next decade, ASU expects that 25% of their students will be exclusively taking virtual classes. ASU and other schools are keeping up with their learners’ desire to take online courses.
The Sloan Consortium, also known as Sloan-C, is an institutional and professional organization integrating online education into mainstream education. The consortium is committed to quality online education. The Arizona Republic reported, “According to an annual Sloan Survey of Online Learning at 2,500 colleges and universities, 29 percent of students took at least one course online in fall 2009, up from nearly 12 percent in fall 2003.”
In a recent webinar I created and delivered for Sloan-C, there was strong interest by educators to learn how to deliver effective online courses. There is no mistaking the popularity of online education. Even Bill Gates praised online learning in his 2010 Annual Letter stating, “A lot of people, including me, think this is the next place where the internet will surprise people in how it can improve things.” According to a recent survey by the Sloan Consortium, more than 5.6 million students took an online class last fall, which translates to about 30 percent of college students.
The days of thinking that online education is somehow inferior is changing. Arizona’s three main universities are all embracing online learning. ASU is ramping up their online program. University of Arizona (U of A) has nearly 30 degree programs exclusively available online; many of these programs are graduate-level. Northern Arizona University (NAU) has 63 exclusively online programs and anticipates a 10% growth increase per year.
Arizona universities are not the only major universities to get on board with online education. Some other very prominent universities that also offer online courses include:
- Stanford University Online Degree: Their Center for Professional Development offers 23 master’s degrees online and 35 certificate programs.
- New York University Online Degree: NYU offers a number of online programs through its School of Continuing Studies, including certificates and full master of science degrees (including an MBA) in business.
- Harvard University Online Degree: Harvard Extension School offers on-campus and online classes and undergraduate degree programs and graduate programs.
- University of Notre Dame Online Degree: Notre Dame Online offers several degree programs that can be completed entirely online.
If you or someone you know is considering taking an online class, it is important to understand the terminology, the process and the tricks to being successful as an independent learner. For help, check out: The Online Student’s User Manual: Everything You Need to Know to be a Successful Online Student.
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How to Respond Effectively in Online Discussions
Online college students often find that they are required to answer discussion questions in class. With the popularity of texting and the lack of formality used when writing an email, many students are lacking the necessary skills to write an appropriate posting.
Online schools often require that postings are substantive. In other words, the postings should be substantial and have sufficient content to answer questions in depth. Students may be given guidelines or a minimum word count to guide them. However, when responding to fellow students’ postings, there are usually not specific word count requirements. Therefore, it is important for students to respond in a way that is not merely showing their agreement or disagreement with what is being discussed.
A good rule of thumb is to support what the student has said with at least one sentence. That doesn’t mean the student has to agree with the statement; they just have to support the fact that the student has made their point.
Then after supporting them, the student can disagree or agree with the topic at hand. They should include several more sentences explaining their position on the topic. They could give examples and cite sources.
A good way to end the discussion would be with a question that is either addressed to the original student or one that could be addressed to the class in order to bring more participants into the discussion.
It is extremely important that students write in complete sentences, use correct grammar, check spelling and punctuate correctly. For additional help with writing skills, please check out the following links:
Can Spell Check Make Things Worse?
Top 15 Writing and Grammar Mistakes