Editing Sample: Correcting Harvard Referencing in a Report Extract

Model Answer

Original Extract (Before)

With Tracked Changes

Homework has long being a subject of debate within primary education, with researchers holding differing views on its effectiveness.Homework has long been a subject of debate within primary education, with researchers holding differing views on its effectiveness. According to Cooper, homework can improve student achievement when it is set appropriately, however other researcher such as Kohn 2010 disagree and argue it place unnecessary burden on young learner and their families.According to Cooper (1989), homework can improve student achievement when it is set appropriately; however, other researchers, such as Kohn (2010), disagree and argue that it places an unnecessary burden on young learners and their families. Editor: Missing publication years — Harvard in-text citations must always include the year

A study by (Hattie, 2009) found that the effect size of homework in primary schools is considerably lower than in secondary schools, this is supported by further research done by Fan et al which look at over 60 studies about homework outcome.A study by Hattie (2009) found that the effect size of homework in primary schools is considerably lower than in secondary schools. This is supported by further research by Fan et al. (2017), which examined over 60 studies of homework outcomes. Editor: Comma splice separated into two sentences; incomplete citation ‘Fan et al’ given a year As Fan, Xu, Meng, Zhu and Ping said in their paper, “the relationship between homework and achievement was found to be weak for younger student compare to older student” (no page number given), which raise question about whether homework should be set at all in the primary phase.As Fan et al. (2017, p.24) state, “the relationship between homework and achievement was found to be weak for younger students compared to older students,” raising questions about whether homework should be set at all in the primary phase. Editor: Direct quotations require a page number — added, and the author list shortened to the standard ‘et al.’ form for four or more authors

Furthermore, the department for education, 2016, recommend that school should use professional judgement rather than fixed rule when deciding homework policy.Furthermore, the Department for Education (2016) recommends that schools use professional judgement rather than a fixed rule when deciding homework policy. Editor: Organisation name capitalised and given a proper Harvard bracketed citation This is echoed by a separate research by Sharp 2018 as cited in Williams 2020, who note that the parent involvement in homework can positively or negatively affect the outcome depend on how the homework is structure.This is echoed by Sharp (2018, cited in Williams, 2020), who notes that parental involvement in homework can positively or negatively affect outcomes, depending on how the homework is structured. Editor: Secondary referencing must follow the ‘cited in’ convention with brackets — reformatted, and corrected subject–verb agreement

Cost and resource were also mention as a factor by teacher in some study, Smith (2015:45) found that many primary teacher feel they do not have enough time to mark homework properly which limit its usefulness as feedback tool.Cost and resources were also identified as a factor by teachers in some studies. Smith (2015, p.45) found that many primary teachers feel they do not have enough time to mark homework properly, which limits its usefulness as a feedback tool. Editor: Incorrect page-number format (‘2015:45’) corrected to standard Harvard style (‘2015, p.45’) another source, a blog post from TeachWell.co.uk without a date, claim that some school have move away from traditional homework toward optional home learning activity instead, although this claim is not really supported by strong evidence and should probably be treat with caution.Another source, an undated blog post from TeachWell (n.d.), claims that some schools have moved away from traditional homework toward optional home-learning activities, although this claim is not strongly evidenced and should be treated with caution. It should also be note that Ofsted 2019 report touch briefly on homework but does not give clear recommendation either way, which mean that school are largely left to decide their own approach base on their own context and pupil population.It should also be noted that the Ofsted (2019) report touches briefly on homework but offers no clear recommendation either way, meaning that schools are largely left to decide their own approach based on their own context and pupil population.

Overall the evidence about homework in primary school is mixed and school leader need to consider the research carefully when developing there homework policy for younger pupils.Overall, the evidence on homework in primary schools is mixed, and school leaders need to consider the research carefully when developing their homework policy for younger pupils.

Clean Edited Version (After)

What the Editor Changed and Why

Referencing (years): Several in-text citations were missing publication years, including ‘Cooper’ and ‘Kohn 2010’, which is not valid Harvard format. Years were added and bracketed throughout so every source cited in the extract can be traced back to its origin.

Referencing (quotations and page numbers): A direct quotation from Fan et al. lacked a page number, and ‘Smith (2015:45)’ used a colon instead of the Harvard ‘p.’ convention. Both were corrected, and the multi-author citation was shortened to the standard ‘et al.’ form.

Referencing (secondary and undated sources): The Sharp/Williams citation did not show that Sharp’s work was read via Williams rather than directly, and the TeachWell source had no date at all. Both were corrected to ‘cited in’ and ‘n.d.’ formats respectively, per Harvard convention.

Grammar: Tense and agreement errors, such as ‘has long being’ and ‘school leader need’, were corrected to ‘has long been’ and ‘school leaders need’ to meet the standard of academic English expected in a university report.

Structure and clarity: One long sentence joined two ideas with a comma rather than a full stop, creating a comma splice. This, and a similarly overloaded sentence about resourcing, were split into shorter sentences so each idea reads clearly on its own.

Academic tone: Organisation names such as ‘the department for education’ were capitalised to reflect their status as proper nouns, reinforcing the formal, precise register expected of an academic report written for a university audience.