From a City and Guilds 730 Microteaching exercise...

Task: writing a bibliography in a consistent order

Wellington House
125 Strand
London WC2R 0BB

© L.B. Curzon 1976, 1980, 1985, 1990, 1997

First published 1976
Fifth edition published 1997
Reprinted 1990, 1991 (twice), 1992, 1993, 1994, 1996, 1999

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Curzon, L.B. (Leslie Basil), 1921-

Teaching in further education: and outline of principles and practice.-5th ed.
1. Great Britain. Further education institutions. Teaching
I. Title. II. Series

ISBN 0-304-70255-2

Phototypset by York House Typographic Ltd.

Printed in Great Britain by Redwood Books, Trowbridge, Wilts.


It is from this data that we can make the bibliographic reference for this book. An entry is made in the bibliography of an essay if the book or source is used in any way.

In an essay or other piece of work, directly using, or even closely following, a source's text or argument, requires a reference.

Numbering or symbols in superscript usually refer to footnotes or endnotes (and where these refer on to a book/ source, they have their own convention of greater bibliographic detail first and lesser at repeat references).

Normally referencing to acknowledge a text is usually done immediately after with a bracketed text of author surname, comma, first name/s or initials, comma (other authors likewise), the date, comma and the range of pages (up to two, after which add et al.). If the authors surname/s are mentioned close by, only the date and page/s are needed. If two or more sources from the same year are used, put a or b or c etc alongside the date without a gap, and therefore this letter should also be done in the bibliography. If there is no date, put nd instead of the date. If there is no known author, put the main title there instead.

The bibliography itself at the end of a piece of work should only contain a range of pages if a specific area of the source was used and no other. The bibliography may be complete, or the remainder of sources not already fully referenced in the endnotes/ footnotes.

In the bibliography, the article in a book or other source is surrounded by quotes, but the title of the source is either underlined or in italics.

There are several conventions for a source's details. One of the most popular is Havard. However, order in itself does not always matter - consistency throughout does.

The order is: author surname, comma, author initials, the date in brackets, comma, italicised capitalised title (and if a subtitle then colon, subtitle), comma, the publisher, comma, the location, (and if relevant then comma with the range of pages), full stop.

Do not give any reprint date, and only give the last copyright date if there is no last publication date. Optionally add the edition after the title or subtitle (what matters is the date!).

An article title in quotation marks precedes its italicised source (book, magazine, periodical) title. The date is in the usual place after the author but may be repeated in the details of the publication's number, month, issue etc. Be consistent for all publications. An example:

Gluckman, M. (1962), 'Les Rites de Passage', in Gluckman (ed.), Essays on the Ritual of Social Relations, Manchester University Press, Manchester, 1-52.

In the case of the Internet, the publisher and location is replaced (or followed) by a square bracketed "Online", then details of the online URL (web address) and date and time of access (very important). Incidentally, due to ghosting of actual web addresses with domain names and frames, right click and open the frame in a new window to expose its actual web address. The square bracketing also works for "E-mail" and "CD-Rom". An example:

Worsfold, A.J. (2000), Task: Writing a Bibliography in a Consistent Order, [Online], Available World Wide Web, URL: (Accessed August 30, 2011, 19:09).

Your task is to write in the box the bibliographic information for the details at the top of the worksheet.



You are required to achieve...
Quotation carried out that follows instruction on principles of succinctness, illustration, flavour and allowing analysis of author's exact words and which gives evidence of these considerations.Either pass or fail
Bibliography of one book in a logical order based on the worksheet instructions.Either pass or fail



Bibliography of one book in a logical order based on the worksheet instructions.PassFail


Whilst the best quotation is probably:

Curzon, L. B. (1997), Teaching in Further Education: An Outline of Principles and Practice, Cassell, London.

Variations around this are completely acceptable: first name/s in full, no brackets, no punctuation, missing out London, putting London before the publisher, lower case subtitle to capitalised title, adding in fifth edition... The important point is that a satisfactory arrangement is made from the bibliographic data presented at the top of the worksheet.

The student fails when the author and date are uncoupled (as this is emphasised in the logic of referencing) and the title is not emphasised in some way or is emphasised incorrectly within quotation marks (which is article only).


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