REFERENCING Years

12 & 13
GUIDE
Contents
What is referencing? ............................................................................................................................................... 2
Why is referencing important? ........................................................................................................................... 2
What should you reference? .............................................................................................................................. 2
How should you reference? ............................................................................................................................... 3
What information do you need about sources? .................................................................................................. 3
Online sources (websites) .............................................................................................................................. 4
Books ................................................................................................................................................................ 4
Interviews.......................................................................................................................................................... 4
Journal Articles ................................................................................................................................................ 5
Video recordings (films or video clips) .......................................................................................................... 5
Podcast ............................................................................................................................................................. 5
Social Media ..................................................................................................................................................... 6
Software ............................................................................................................................................................ 6
What should your bibliography look like? ......................................................................................................... 6
What are in-text citations? ..................................................................................................................................... 7
What should an in-text citation look like? ........................................................................................................ 7
How do you use in-text citations? ..................................................................................................................... 7
Printed sources (books) ................................................................................................................................. 7
Examples of direct quotations........................................................................................................................ 7
Example of paraphrased text: ........................................................................................................................ 7
Multiple Authors ............................................................................................................................................... 7
Online sources (websites, electronic databases) ....................................................................................... 7
How do you acknowledge illustrations and tables? ............................................................................................ 8
What do you need to include in a citation for an illustration? ....................................................................... 8
Citing images in your work ............................................................................................................................. 8
Images found online ........................................................................................................................................ 8
Citing your own images .................................................................................................................................. 8
Tables.................................................................................................................................................................... 9
Should you use footnotes? ..................................................................................................................................... 9
Can you use generative AI? .................................................................................................................................. 9
Should you use a Research Manager? ............................................................................................................... 9
Where can you check that you are doing the right thing? ................................................................................. 9
Example of a bibliography .................................................................................................................................... 10

Page 1 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23

 What is referencing?
Whenever you perform research for an essay, report, project or presentation, the content you consume
will be from resources created by other people. If you then use those ideas in your own work, you
must give credit to the people whose ideas you have used. This is called referencing or citing your
sources.

Why is referencing important?

All the work you do at school is part of the academic conversation about ideas. Any work you prepare is
making a contribution to this conversation and you need to give credit to those who helped you make
your contribution.

“All DP students are expected to acknowledge fully and in detail the work, thoughts or ideas of another
In order to follow good academic practice, all ideas, words or work of other people must be properly
and appropriately acknowledged (International Baccalaureate Organization. Effective..).

If you use someone else’s ideas or information as if they were your own, you are essentially stealing
their ideas. This is considered to be plagiarism.

Plagiarism is treated as a serious matter at ISH and by the IB and will result in a severe penalty.
You can be given a 0 for an assignment or fail the course.

What should you reference?

You are expected to acknowledge any materials or ideas that are not your own:
• someone else’s ideas or analysis;
• information that is not general knowledge;
• opinions that are not yours.

The term “materials” means written, oral or electronic products, and may include the following:
• written text (articles, books etc.);
• visual materials, such as images, charts, graphs, maps or tables;
• lectures, interviews, letters, emails;
• audio visual materials (e.g. broadcasts, podcasts, radio, videos).

Basic and common knowledge within a field or subject does not need to be acknowledged (e.g. you
will not cite your physics textbook in a physics assignment). For example, “the sky is blue” is common
knowledge, but the scientific explanation of why the sky is blue is not. However, if you are in doubt
whether the source material is common knowledge or not, you should cite!

You should always check whether a source is reliable or not. You can find out by evaluating your
sources for authority (who?), currency (when?), accuracy (where from?), relevance (what?) and
purpose (why?). If you cannot find information about from where the information originates, you should
consider omitting it from your work as an unreliable source. You should verify the information in other
sources.

Page 2 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23

 How should you reference?
There are a number of referencing styles that are recognised worldwide. At ISH, we use the Modern
Language Association (MLA), 9th edition. Here are some important MLA terms:

Works Cited: a list of all the materials you have actually cited (referenced) in your work.
Citation: another word for a source or reference listed in your bibliography.
Bibliography: a list of all the materials you have consulted whether you refer to (cite) them or
not.
References: another word for the sources you list in your bibliography and that you refer to in
your text.
In-text citation: a short indicator of the source of information or quoted material in the text, which
links with your bibliography, also known as parenthetical citation.

You can see here the template used by MLA for citations. The idea is
based on containers. The container is the overall work you are drawing
your information from: the website, the book, the journal, the video etc.
You should always determine what the container is for any information
you use for your research.

• If you are just using part of the work then you identify which part it is.

• You should look for who is responsible for the work. Is it a person or an
organization?

• If you are using part of the source ie. a specific web page on a site, an
article in a journal or an encyclopedia, a podcast from a series you should
identify the specific source you are using.

• You should also look for a publisher of the information – who is

responsible for making it available to the public – sometimes an
organization or company is the same responsible party for creating the
information.

Fig. 1 MLA Template of Core • If you cannot find who is responsible for publishing the information you
Elements should definitely question the validity of the resource.

What information do you need about sources?

This is the information you should always look for in any source:

a. The author or person or company responsible for creating it.

b. The name of the work you are using ie. Webpage title, book title, article title, title of
photograph, title of video, description of diagram.
c. The container of the work – what is the name of the website, journal, database, source of
video, source of podcast.
d. The publisher – the organization or people responsible for sharing it. If it’s a webpage
find the name of the website or the publisher of a website, the publisher of a book, the
hosting site of an online video
e. Date of publication or creation.
f. URL for all online sources.

Page 3 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23

 Online sources (websites)
Author’s Last name, First name. “Title of Web Page.” Name of Website, Publisher, Publication date or
revision date, URL (do not include http://). Date accessed (date you read it).

Examples
If there is no author, start
Gibson, Angela. “URLs: Some Practical Advice.” The MLA Style Centre, Modern with the title of the web
page, article or resource.
If there is no publisher or
Language Association, 11 November 2016, style.mla.org/urls-some-practical- it is the same as the title
of the website, skip this
item. If you have a
advice/. publication or revision
date you do not need to
put in a date accessed.
“MLA Formatting and Style Guide.” OWL Purdue Writing Lab, Purdue University,

2018, owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/747/01/.

Books
Author’s Last name, First name. Title of Book. Publisher, year published.

Rosling, Hans, et al. Factfulness : Ten Reasons We’re Wrong about the World - and Why If there is no
author, start
with the title of
Things Are Better than You Think. Flatiron Books, 2020. the book. Do
not use
Shakespeare, William. Much Ado about Nothing. Hodder Education, 2012. “Author
unknown.”

Interviews
Last name of person interviewed, First name. Type of interview. Date of interview, Medium of
publication (Web, television, DVD etc.).

There are various types of interviews: interviews conducted by you (personal, telephone, or E-mail
interview) or interviews you have heard on television, the radio or a DVD, for example as bonus
material.

Example of an interview conducted by you (with Maria Kingsley):

Kingsley, Maria. Personal interview with author. 15 August 2018.

Kagame, Paul. "Paul Kagame: Transforming Rwanda." Al Jazeera, Al Jazeera Media Network,

www.aljazeera.com/program/talk-to-al-jazeera/2021/11/20/paul-kagame-transforming-rwanda.

Interview.

Page 4 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23

 Journal Articles
You are encouraged to use quality research resources, such as the databases available via the library.
In these databases you will find quality magazine and academic journal articles. Journal articles are
published by subject experts and are quality reviewed by other experts before publication.

Author last name, First name. “ Title of article”. Title of Journal, Volume, number, Date of publication, page

numbers. Name of online database.

Journal articles in print

Austin, Martin, and Guy Walker-Springett. “Coastal Sand Dunes : Storms and (Over-)

Stabilisation.” Geography Review, vol. 35, no. 2, Nov. 2021, pp. 8–13.

Journal Articles from an online database

Mitchko, Jane, et al. “E-Cigarettes and Young People: Communicating an Emerging Public Health

Risk.” American Journal of Health Promotion, vol. 33, no. 6, July 2019, pp. 955–57,

search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=s3h&AN=137477478&site=eds-live.

EBSCOhost.

Magazine articles from an online database

Rendell, Julian. “Germany to Quicken Pace of Switch to Electrification.” Autocar, Jan. 2022,

infoweb.newsbank.com/apps/news/document-

view?p=AWGLNB&docref=news/1877A674D47BA318. Access Global NewsBank.

Video recordings (films or video clips)

Author’s name/uploader’s username. “Title of Video.” Name of Website, Name of Website’s publisher,

date posted, URL. Date accessed if no posting date.

Example
Taylor, David. "MLA In-Text Citations 9th ed. - Complete Guide (2023)." YouTube, David Taylor,

www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sT8GpUqkcI. Accessed 13 Apr. 2023.

Podcast
Author’s name/Host. “Title of Episode.” Title of the Podcast, Season, episode number, Date if

available. App or hosting site, URL (if available).

Burton, Levar, host. "'D.P. by Kurt Vonnegut." Levar Burton Reads, season 2023 Levar Burton, 23 Feb. 2023.

Stitcher, www.stitcher.com/show/levar-burton-reads.

Page 5 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23

 Social Media
You may occasionally need to cite a trusted source from a social media account. You do need to
identify the user information such as the handle and the name of the poster. You should generally use
the name on the account in the Author element. But if an author’s online handle differs from the
author’s account name, you might add the handle in brackets after the name, if it is the same you can
omit it.

Author [handle if different]. Title or Text (depending on platform). Social media platform. Publisher. Date of

post. URL (if available).

Example
Dent, Suzie [@suzie_dent]. "Word of the day, once more, is 'nod-crafty' (17th century): knowing the art of nodding

your head with an air of great understanding, when you actually tuned out ages ago." Twitter, 11 May

2023, 4.42, twitter.com/susie_dent/status/1645799472444895235?cxt=HHwWhsDT6c_5htctAAAA.

Software
You should only cite software if it is integral to the research you are doing. Software such as
mathematical or GIS software you have used for your research, to produce data, can be cited. Look for
the company or person responsible for producing the software, look for the full name of the software,
version of the software, the release date (the year will be fine if it is all you can find), URL (if its online),
and a date of access if you can not find the year.

Creator. Name of Software. Version. Website name {if online}. Date of release. URL (if online). Date of

access.

Example

ESRI. ArcGIS Pro. Version 3.0. ArcGIS Online, 2023, www.arcgis.com. Accessed 22 May 2023.

What should your bibliography look like?

• Your bibliography should come at the end of your assignment but before the appendices, if you
have any. Begin the bibliography on a new page.

• Double line space between the title and the first citation, and double space all entries.

• If a citation is more than one line, indent the lines following about 1 cm from the left margin.

• Citations should be in alphabetical order by the author’s last name. If there is no author,
use the next element in the citation, such as the title, to alphabetize.

• Do not separate entries by type of source.

• Pay attention to the specific punctuation and font style (e.g. italics for titles of books and
websites) required!

• You should use the name Works Cited and only include the specific works you have used in the
work.

• You will see a sample bibliography at the end of this guide. This is how your works cited list
should look.

Page 6 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23

 What are in-text citations?
If your text includes quotations, maps, charts, tables, diagrams, pictures, music or paraphrased
text, you need to include an in-text citation to acknowledge the source within the text where the
information is actually used. The information in the in-text citation must correspond with the
information in your bibliography.

What should an in-text citation look like?

• You use the first piece of information listed for that source in your bibliography with locator
information.
• The first piece of information is usually the last name of an author or can be a page name
for a website, or a last name of a person interviewed.
• A locator is a page number, chapter number or other specific information to help the
reader locate the exact place the information came from in the source. If you cannot
identify specific locator information you only need to put in the first piece of information.
• The in-text citation should always have parentheses (brackets) around it.
• It should always follow the style of the text in the bibliography. If it is an author it should
be plain text, if it is a title it should have quotation marks.
• Style: (Author’s last name Page number) e.g. (Dickens 202)
• If you have more than one source with the same first piece of information, add some of
the next part of the citation to differentiate e.g. (Shakespeare Much Ado... 27)
(Shakespeare Romeo... 24)

Here are some examples based on the sample bibliography in this document:
(“Blue Whale”)
(Effective Citing and Referencing)
(Gibson)
(Rosling et al. 100)
(Shakespeare 27)

How do you use in-text citations?

Printed sources (books)
Examples of direct quotations
As Estrella says “what was fit company for you once, would be quite unfit company for you now”
(Dickens 202).
Follow this rule when creating in-text citations “Any source information that you provide in-text must
correspond to the source information on the Works Cited page ” (“MLA In-Text Citations: The
Basics”).

Example of paraphrased text:

The effects of climate change are menacing to costal dunes (Austin and Walker-Springett 11).

Multiple Authors
2 authors > ( Author’s last name and Authors Last name Page number) > (Smith and Jones 20)
3 or more authors> (Author’s last name et al. Page number) – et al. means and others > (Rosling et al. 100)

Online sources (websites, electronic databases)

Examples of direct quotations and paraphrased text from online sources (websites):
It needs a lot of food to sustain it, “a single adult blue whale may consume as much as eight tons of
krill per day” (“Blue Whale”).

To allow readers to assess source quality make sure to keep the host name if you shorten a URL in
your bibliography (Gibson).

Page 7 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23

How do you acknowledge illustrations and tables?
Illustrations (images, charts, diagrams, maps) and tables also need a full citation.

What do you need to include in a citation for an illustration?

1. Image creator's last name, first name (or page author’s name, or company name), followed
by a period and a space
2. Title of image followed by a period, in quotation marks (if there is no title, describe briefly
within quotation marks)
3. Date of publication
4. Source in italics, followed by a comma and a space.Either the website or the company
responsible for publishing the image.
5. URL (do not include http:// or https://), followed by a period
6. If you cannot find a publication date use the date of access.

Citing images in your work

For illustrations such as images, write Fig. followed by a number underneath the illustration. The first
illustration in your work is number 1, the second is number 2, etc. You can either
• put in a brief description and add the full citation to your bibliography
or
• write the full citation with the image which you do not need to include in the bibliography.

Example of an online image:

Images found online
If you are citing an image found in
Google Images or any other image
retrieval service, you must use the
URL of the web page where the
image was originally shown. You
should search for images where you
have permission to use the image, for
example Creative Commons licenses

Fig. 1. Ministerie van Algemene Zaken. “De Koningin verricht de opening van het nieuwe gebouw van
The International School of The Hague.” Het Koninklijke Huis, 21 Apr. 2007, www.koninklijkhuis.nl/foto-
en-video/fotos-per-jaar/2007/april-2007.
Or
A picture description with a full citation in your bibliography, an example follows:
Fig. 1. “De Koningin verricht de opening van het nieuwe gebouw van The International School of The
Hague.”

+ Bibliography entry:
Ministerie van Algemene Zaken. “De Koningin Verricht de Opening van Het Nieuwe Gebouw van the

International School of the Hague.” Het Koninklijk Huis, 16 Jan. 2015, www.koninklijkhuis.nl/foto-

en-video/fotos-per-jaar/2007/april-2007.

Citing your own images

Your own photos need to be referenced in your text. You need to label the image and then provide
details about it. If it needs to be anonymous just omit your name.

Fig.#. Author. Description. Date of photograph. Personal collection.

Example
Fig. 1. Flower, Jane. Photograph of tulips in Keukenhof. 23 Apr. 2022. Author’s personal collection.

Page 8 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23

 Tables
When you are presenting data in a grid format as a table, you should insert it immediately after you
mention it in your text. Always refer to the table by its number in your text.
1. Above the table, write Table and a number.
2. If the table does not have a description give it one.
3. Below the table, write Source. You then write the full citation using commas instead of periods to
separate entries. You do not need to include it in the bibliography.

Example of a table:
d

Table 1
Trends and Patterns in Avalanche Accidents
Other Industrial/ Total
Year Skiers Climbers Snowmobilers Recreation Residential Fatalities
1989 3 1 1 NIL 1 6
1990 8 NIL NIL 1 NIL 9
1 NIL 12
1991 11 NIL NIL NIL NIL 6
1992 NIL 4 2 1 NIL 12
1993 3 5 3 NIL NIL 8
1994 3 1 4 2 2 15
1995 4 2 5 NIL NIL 10
1996 5 4 1
Source: "Trends and Patterns in Avalanche Accidents." Avalanche, Canadian Avalanche Centre, 2001,
www.avalanche.ca. Accessed 1 Oct. 2014.

Should you use footnotes?

In the MLA system, footnotes are not used to cite works. However, if you use a term or word that
requires some explanation (e.g. a Latin phrase, an unusual word, or a figure of speech) and the
explanation would disrupt the flow of your argument if placed in the main text, then a footnote
can be useful for the reader.

Can you use generative AI?

AI tools are not recommended as sources for research. If you use AI to help you formulate
research you should request a list of sources for the information. You should check those
sources yourself to verify content. AI tools have been shown to fabricate some sources. The
official position of the IB is that “Students should be aware that the IB does not regard any work
produced—even only in part—by such tools, to be their own” (International Baccalaureate
Organization. "Statement...”).

Should you use a Research Manager?

Students should use the school subscription to NoodleTools to manage their research and to
produce a correct works cited list for their projects. With it you can create source lists, notes
linked to the sources, to-do lists, upload information and share source lists with teachers and
students. The link and guides to help you use the research and citation tools of NoodleTools
can be found on the library portal.

Where can you check that you are doing the right thing?
Consult this expert website about preventing plagiarism by citing properly: http://www.plagiarism.org/
An excellent source for writing research papers can be found at the Online Writing Lab (OWL) at Purdue
University: https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/research_and_citation/mla_style

Page 9 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23

 Example of a bibliography
Works Cited

Austin, Martin, and Guy Walker-Springett. "Coastal Sand Dunes : Storms and (Over-)Stabilisation."

Geography Review, vol. 35, no. 2, Nov. 2021, pp. 8-13.

"Blue Whale." Encyclopaedia Britannica Online School Edition, Encyclopaedia Briitannica, 11 Mar.

2023, school.eb.co.uk/levels/intermediate/article/blue-whale/576928. Accessed 13 Apr. 2023.

Burton, Levar, host. "'D.P. by Kurt Vonnegut." Levar Burton Reads, season 2023, Levar Burton, 23

Feb. 2023. Stitcher, www.stitcher.com/show/levar-burton-reads.

Dent, Suzie [@suzie_dent]. "Word of the day, once more, is 'nod-crafty' (17th century): knowing the

art of nodding your head with an air of great understanding, when you actually tuned out ages

ago." Twitter, 11 May 2023, 4.42, twitter.com/susie_dent/status/

1645799472444895235?cxt=HHwWhsDT6c_5htctAAAA.

Dickens, Charles. Great Expectations. Ware, Wordsworth Classics, 2007.

ESRI. ArcGIS Pro. Version 3.0. ArcGIS Online, 2023, www.arcgis.com. Accessed 22 May 2023.

Gibson, Angela. "URLs: Some Practical Advice." MLA Style Center, Modern Language Association of

America, 2 Nov. 2016, style.mla.org/urls-some-practical-advice/. Accessed 13 Apr. 2023.

"If the author, publisher, and name of a website are all the same, do I need to list the author or

publisher?" MLA Style Center, Modern Language Association of America, 17 Sept. 2018,

style.mla.org/author-publisher-web-site-names/.

International Baccalaureate Organization, compiler. Effective citing and referencing. Cardiff, UK,

International Baccalaureate Organization. International Baccalaureate, www.ibo.org/

contentassets/76d2b6d4731f44ff800d0d06d371a892/effective-citing-and-referencing-en.pdf.

Accessed 13 Apr. 2023.

---. "Research skills." Diploma Programme, International Baccalaureate Organization, xmltwo.ibo.org/

publications/DP/Group0/d_0_dpatl_gui_1502_1/static/dpatl/guide-research-skills.html. Accessed

18 Apr. 2023.

---. "Statement from the IB about ChatGPT and artificial intelligence in assessment and education."

News about the IB, International Baccalaureate Organization, 1 Mar. 2023, www.ibo.org/news/

news-about-the-ib/

statement-from-the-ib-about-chatgpt-and-artificial-intelligence-in-assessment-and-education/.

Kagame, Paul. "Paul Kagame: Transforming Rwanda." Al Jazeera, Al Jazeera Media Network,

www.aljazeera.com/program/talk-to-al-jazeera/2021/11/20/paul-kagame-transforming-rwanda.

Interview.

Page 10 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23

Kingsley, Maria. Personal interview with the author. 5 Mar. 2023.

Mitchko, Jane, et al. "E-Cigarettes and Young People: Communicating an Emerging Public Health Risk."

American Journal of Health Promotion, vol. 33, no. 6, July 2019, pp. 955-57. SPORTDiscus

with Full Text, search.ebscohost.com/.

"MLA In-Text Citations MLA Citations in the Body of Your Paper." Excelsior Online Writing Lab,

Excelsior University, owl.excelsior.edu/citation-and-documentation/mla-style/

mla-in-text-citations/.

MLA Template of Core Elements. MLA Style Center, style.mla.org/works-cited/

works-cited-a-quick-guide/. Accessed 12 Apr. 2023.

Rendell, Julian. "Germany to Quicken Pace of Switch to Electrification." Autocar (UK), 12 Jan. 2022,

p. 19. Access Global NewsBank, infoweb.newsbank.com/. Accessed 13 Apr. 2023.

Rosling, Hans, et al. Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong about the World and Why Things Are Better

than You Think. New York City, Flatiron Books, 2020.

Shakespeare, William. Much Ado about Nothing. London, Hodder Education, 2012.

Taylor, David. "MLA In-Text Citations 9th ed. - Complete Guide (2023)." YouTube, David Taylor,

www.youtube.com/watch?v=1sT8GpUqkcI. Accessed 13 Apr. 2023.

"Works Cited: A Quick Guide." MLA Style Center, Modern Language Association of America,

style.mla.org/works-cited/works-cited-a-quick-guide/. Accessed 13 Apr. 2023.

Page 11 - ISH Referencing Guide Years 12-13, June 23