Evaluating Publications
Bob Corey 2008
Overview
The purpose of this assignment is to:
1. Expose you to professional publications that are representative of your major and area
of interest
2. Increase your knowledge of available resources to help you remain well-informed and
current in your area of interest
3. Provide an overview of various material and information related to your area of
interest
4. Practice conveying information clearly through reader-centered writing by
considering audience, purpose, and context
The assignment contains two parts:
Part I
Identifying/Surveying Major-Specific Literature
Part II
Summarizing Major-Specific Literature
All three parts are based on publications related to your major and/or area of interest. To
complete these assignments, you will need to have access to professors, textbooks, trade
journals, newspapers, journals, manuals, pamphlets, and any other regularly published,
relevant material. For this assignment, you may use only 3 sources from the Internet or
other online databases.
Part I: Identifying: Weeks 2-7
Assignment: Over the next six weeks, find 6 publications relevant to your area of
interest: books, magazines, journals, or other applicable information. Depending on the
topic, publications should be no more than three (3) years old (in some fields even
information 3 years old is too old). If you have any questions about this, see me. Using
the proper APA format found in your textbook, create a Reference Page and list the 6
sources you have found.
Part II: Writing a Summary
Assignment: Fill out the following information for each of the five articles selected from
your reference page. You may wish to transfer this information to your computer.
1. Fill out the bibliographical information for your publication in its proper form.
2. After reading your article, state the main idea/thesis.
3. List the main points mentioned in the publication.
4. Read the article carefully and summarize it.
5. What is the author’s purpose or reason for writing the article?
6. Why is this information important to your area of interest?
7. What useful information did you find in this publication? What did you learn from it?
9. Was the article interesting? Explain why or why not. (Did the author have something
important to say? What was important? Important to whom?)