Kathmandu University School of Education

Hattiban, Lalitpur
Academic Writing and APA Style
Course Syllabus
Description
The course gives students an opportunity to practise and improve their
writing skills in English. It focuses on the basics of academic writing and
provides a strong foundation for writing and publishing scholarly papers.
Moreover, it equips students with the skills of academic design standards as
per the American Psychological Association’s (APA) style manual (6th ed.).
The general aim of the course is therefore to help students develop as
writers and prepare them for future academic career. The course basically
helps students to identify and address writing issues that they, as novice
researchers, commonly experience. Moreover, it will enable them to plan,
write and organize their scholarly work effectively. The scope of the course
covers aspects of the writing process, internal organization, formatting style
(citation and references), external structure, academic integrity and more.

Attending this course will not make you a prolific writer overnight, but will
certainly make you a better prepared scholar who can cope with the
challenges of academic writing in post-graduate courses and beyond.

Course Contents
1. Basics of Academic Writing
2. APA: Citation Mechanics
 Quotation
 Summary
 Paraphrase
3. APA: Reference Management
4. Academic Integrity and Honeytraps
 Issues in Academic Writing and Publishing
 Predatory Journals and Bogus Conferences
5. Journal Articles: Writing for Publication
 Title
 Abstract
 Core Paper
 References
6. Scholarly Advice
 Reading a Research Paper
 Strategic (Literature) Search: (Beyond) Boolean Logic
 Publication Strategy: Publishing Your MPhil Research
 Research Communication: Increasing Researcher Visibility
 Free Online Research Writing Courses
Reference Readings
1. American Psychological Association. (2010). Publication manual of the
American Psychological Association (6th ed.). Washington, DC: Author.
2. Bailey, S. (2015). Academic writing: A handbook for international students
(4rd ed.). New York, NY: Routledge.
3. Hartley, J. (2008). Academic writing and publishing: A practical handbook.
New York, NY: Routledge.
4. Swales, J. M., & Feak, C. B. (2012). Academic writing for graduate
students: Essential tasks and skills (3rd ed.). Michigan, MI: The
University of Michigan Press.