This document provides guidance on writing at the master's level. It discusses that master's writing should be more sophisticated, critical, and referenced than undergraduate writing. It emphasizes the importance of articulating one's work with the existing literature through comparing and contrasting other works, and critically questioning sources. The document recommends including numerous references that have actually been cited or discussed in the text. It also notes that both older and newer sources can be relevant depending on the topic, and that considering the context is critical to fully understanding events related to education.

1. Writing at Master’s Level
Dr David Matheson

2. Academic writing
• There are many good guides to academic
writing
• I have written one
– “Afterword: now that I have read about education,
how do I write about it?”
– This is the last chapter of An Introduction to the
Study of Education. 4th edition. London: Routledge

3. How is Masters writing different from
undergraduate writing?
• The difference is one of degree
• Masters writing is expected to be
– More sophisticated
– More critical
– More referenced
• Masters writing needs to articulate with the
literature

4. Articulation with the literature
• Spend a few minutes or so to consider:
– What you understand by the term articulation
with the literature
– What purpose is this articulation intended to
serve?

5. Articulation with the literature
• Have others attempted similar tasks?
• What did they find?
– Were the challenges encountered similar?
• In what ways?
• How do their findings / reported feelings compare to yours?
• Is their evidence sound?
• Do you agree with them?
– If so, why?
– If not, why not?
• Can you glean any lessons from the experience of others in
this regard?

6. How many references are sufficient?
• The literature needs to be used to the full.
– Only include in your reference list, sources you
have actually quoted [or referred to] in the text.
– Do not include titles that you have read but not
quoted or referred to.
– Articulation with the literature is essential at this
level. This means that you make as much relevant
reference to the literature as you can.
– If you do not show strong evidence of using the
literature, you will not pass

7. How many references are sufficient?
• The literature needs to be used to the full.
– Do not cite sources cited by someone else as if
you had read the original.
– These are known as secondary sources and there
are ways of citing them which should be used for
material you have come across in someone else’s
writing.
– See Matheson (2015: pp413-430) for details on
how to do this in ‘Harvard’ style of referencing.

8. Criticality
• In social science, everything can be
challenged.
• There are no right answers; there is only
argument and evidence
• Any claim you make needs evidence and
argument
• Any claim can be refuted if you can find
evidence that contradicts it

9. Criticality
• Example:
– All people over 2m tall are very good looking and
intelligent
– What evidence might support such a claim?
– What would it take to refute such a claim?

10. Criticality
• A much used example:
– All swans are white
– What evidence might support such a claim?
– What would it take to refute such a claim?

11. Criticality
• Criticality is essential. It has two basic modes:
– Juxtapositional criticality which involves comparing and
contrasting how two sources discuss a point;
– Primary criticality which involves you questioning a source
and discussing the soundness of their argument etc.

12. Criticality
When you read an article or a chapter or some
other source, ask yourself the following
questions:
1. Did I believe what I read?
a) If so, why? Did the writing make sense?
b) Was it well argued?
c) Or did it just agree with what I thought already?
2. If I didn’t believe it, why not?
This is primary critique

13. Compare two or more sources
• Consider where they agree and where they
differ
• Who makes the stronger case and why?
This is juxtapositional critique
Question everything you read and
compare it with what you already
know
Criticality

14. Old stuff vs. new stuff
• Old material is…
– Old
• New material is…
– New
• Old material might be out of date
• Use material which is relevant, regardless of
age

15. Old stuff vs. new stuff: example 1
• Plato: The Republic
– Written 2,400 years
ago [roughly]
– Describes a system of
education
– Very relevant to
discussion of
• what education is for
and
• who should be the
leaders [and how they
should be educated]

16. Old stuff vs. new stuff: example 2
• Knox, John et al
(1560): The First
Book of Discipline
– Describes a system of
education
– Very relevant to
discussion of
• what education is for
• who should be the
leaders

17. Old stuff vs. new stuff: example 3
• Wollstonecraft, Mary
(1792): A Vindication
of the Rights of
Women
– Argues for gender
equality in education
– Very relevant to
discussion of
• who education is for;
and
• who should be the
leaders

18. Contexts for education
• Context is critical
– Context = the circumstances
that form the setting for an
event… and in terms of
which it can be fully
understood.
• Place = the building or
space in which the event
occurs
– A school is a place
– A school operating the
English National Curriculum
in 2014 is a context

19. Contexts for education
• Plato’s place was
Ancient Athens
• His context was
– A slave economy
– A Small city state
– Experimenting with a
limited form of
democracy
– Lots of discussion
between citizens of the
topics of the day