How to Do APA Style Referencing

An Easy Guide to APA Style Referencing
• Questions to ask before starting the APA referencing:
o Is the source reliable?
o What type of source did you use?
o Do you need to do in-text citation for your written source (report, essay, presentation)?

• Information to look for when doing APA referencing:
o Author’s name, if not available, the publishing company’s name
o Publishing date and year
o Title of the source: ex. book title, article title, web document title, etc.
o Publishing company
o If the source is a website, publishing website title
o If the source is a book source, the publishing city
o If the source is a website, the web address

• Doing APA Style Referencing manually using Pocket Guide to APA Style book:
o What type of source did you use? According to the type of source you used, the referencing style differs. Use the table of contents (pages v-vii) in the Pocket Guide to APA book to decide on the method to use.

• Using Microsoft Word to do APA referencing:
1. Click “References.”
2. Choose “Style: APA” in the “Citation & Bibliography” section.
3. Click “Insert Citation”
4. Click “Add new source…”
5. When the “Create Source” window appears, choose the “Type of Source.”
6. Fill in the information boxes according to the information you have. If you need help, look at the example shown on the bottom of the “Create Source” window.
7. Repeat steps 1-6 for all the sources you used.
8. If you need to place in-text citation, use the “Insert Citation” to place in-text citation where needed. The sources you cited will appear under the “Insert Citation” after you do it once; hence you don’t need to repeat the steps repeatedly.
9. When you are done with in-text citation and/ or inserting all citations, click “Bibliography” under the “Citations & Bibliography” section in the “References.”
10. Click the first option under the “Built-In.”

• Checklist
o Are the sources cited in the bibliography or the works cited page in alphabetical order?
o Is the reference list double-spaced?
o In the reference list, are the first lines in normal margin style and the subsequent lines indented?
o Did you place in-text citation to all the sources used in your document?

• Other sources you can use to do APA referencing:
o http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/10/