Specify Materials and Sources

Assignments don’t always specify which materials and sources students are supposed to use. You should clarify the expectations for using sources for your class. Check with the faculty instructor to determine if students must draw solely from course materials—the course reader, books, course website materials, texts on reserve—or may use outside sources, which some assignments prohibit students from utilizing.

If your students are allowed to do some outside research, they may not be adept at locating, evaluating, and using primary and secondary sources, regardless of how many years they’ve been at UCLA. To increase their information literacy, your students should be encouraged or even be assigned to take UCLA library’s excellent research tutorial, The Road to Research.