Create a Title PageA title page is a page which is placed at the beginning of an academic paper. According to APA format, your title page should contain the title of your academic paper, student’s name and student’s institute name. There is no need to write more than 12 words on the title page of an academic paper. There should be double spacing between all the words of a title page.
Write an AbstractAn abstract is a brief summary of an academic paper. It provides an in-depth analysis of an academic paper and after reading an abstract, one can easily get an idea about the purpose of an academic paper. According to the APA citation style, the abstract of an academic paper should be created on a new page. It should not exceed 200 words. For the title of an abstract, we should use the page header. The title of an abstract should be given in the centre of a page.
Place the Main Body of an Academic PaperThe body is considered as the largest part of your academic paper. In the body of an academic paper, you will have to provide enough evidence in order to prove your arguments. While writing the body, the headings are divided into five levels. The first level of the headings is for the main titles of the body. The first level headings should be placed in the middle and these headings should be bolded. You should also try to capitalize the first letter of important words of a title. This is known as in-title case capitalization.
Divide Your Paper Into SectionsWhile writing an academic paper, we have to divide it into some major sections. In other words, there should be different sections of the body of an academic paper. The titles of these sections of the body of an academic paper should be bolded. The students should also try to use in title-case capitalization for these titles. These titles of an academic paper should be aligned to the left. These kinds of headings are known as level two headings.
Format Level 3, Level 4 and Level 5 HeadingsLevel three headings should be aligned to the left of a page and we should try to use sentence case capitalization for level three headings. In the sentence case capitalization, we place the capital word at the beginning of a heading and we use a period at the end of a heading. The level four headings should be placed with the help of the boldface letters and an indentation. These headings should also be aligned to the left of a paper. For level five headings, we use an indentation at the beginning of each line. At the end of each level five heading, a period is placed.
Write Your References PageAt the end of an academic paper, we have to provide a list of all the resources from where we have gathered the data for an academic paper. These resources are written in the form of a reference page. While writing any resource on the reference page, we should try to use hanging indentation. The hanging indentation means that the first line of a resource is started at the beginning of a line and the second line is started with the help of an indentation. Some essential tips to write the citations in the references page are given below;
- The library books are considered as the most authentic resources to gather the data for an academic paper. While providing a reference of any library book in the references section of an academic paper, we should follow a specific format. According to an APA format, first, we place the writer’s last name. Secondly, we write the first initial. Thirdly, we write the date of publication. Fourthly, we write the title of the book. Fifthly, we write the place of publication. At last, we write the name of the publisher.
- Sometimes, while writing an academic paper, we have to provide in-text citations in the references section of an academic paper. One can easily use the in-text citation by writing the last name of the author, date of publication and page number.
- One can also gather some data from an essay for his academic paper. After gathering data from an essay, it is also an unavoidable thing for us to provide a reference to this essay. While providing a reference for an essay in an academic paper, first, you should write the author’s name. Secondly, you should write the editor’s name. Thirdly, you should write the essay’s title. Fourthly, there should write the title of the book. At last, there comes the page number of the book.
- There are also some students who try to cite the journal articles in an academic paper. They can easily cite a journal article in an academic paper by writing the name of the journal, volume of the journal and arrangement of the page.
There are also some general guidelines about the APA citation style. In these general guidelines, we should choose a white page of legal size. We should keep a one-inch margin from all sides of the page. Before starting the first word of a new paragraph, we should try to use indentation. The best style of an APA format is Times New Roman and its size should be 12 points. There should be double spacing between all the words of an academic paper.