In this third and final session of the series, we will review the process for adding footnotes and endnotes and creating cross-references, which are internal links to other parts of your documents.
This section looks at the footnote and endnote function of Microsoft Word. It will not cover the integration of bibliographic reference management software to store and insert either in-text citations or footnotes/endnotes. This is covered in other personal and professional development programme modules.
Footnotes and endnotes are primarily used for citing sources that have been consulted, but are sometimes used to explain or expand on a point in the text. The insert a footnote or endnote, locate the end of the sentence/paragraph that the note refers to and click on the 'References' tab in the toolbar, then 'Insert Footnote'/'Insert Endnote'. This will add a superscript number or numeral to the line and a field in the footer or at the end of the document for the note text.
Cross-referencing is where you refer to another part of the document. Within the document, Word has some automatic features to make this this work well and to keep it all updated.
Our first example is a reference to an image. To get started, follow the example from our previous session to insert images into the bard_thesis.docx file and add a caption
Now, we want to refer to that first image. Navigate to the first paragraph on page 4 under the heading 'Different Types of Academic Writers' Groups', and just before the first comma, add parentheses and place the cursor inside these.
Go to the 'References' tab and click on cross-reference. Then you need to choose what you want to refer to. And you'll see this. There's a number of different things here. So it could be a numbered item because my headings in this document are numbered, they appear in that list. It could be a heading. So this will include a numbered headings. It could be a bookmark. If you'd set bookmarks in your document, could be a footnote if you've got footnotes in your document or an N note if you've got Word's built-in and notes are an equation, a figure, or a table.
Choose the figure option and this should open a window with some options. You can insert the whole caption or just the label and number, which in this case will be 'Figure 1'. Select the relevant caption and click 'Insert' then 'Close'. You should now see the link inserted inside the brackets. You may notice that the style of the cross-references differs from your default body text in the document. If this is the case, you may need to modify the default style in the style pane, which we covered in Session 1.
Repeat this procedure by inserting a cross-reference to Figure 2 just before the full stop in the first sentence of the paragraph under the heading 'Benefits of Academic Writers' Groups'.
Although cross-references may be unnecessary if your text is close to the first appearance of a figure, if you refer to that same figure later in the document, cross-references can be helpful to jump back to that point.
A final note about cross-references is that, although they are similar to hyperlinks, they are internal links and do not have a default style that makes them visually distinguishable from the rest of the text (i.e. they do not use another colour and are not underlined). This can be changed, but it would need to be done manually.
When considering references in your document, whether external (as in the sources consulted), or internal (as in the sections and objects that you have defined or inserted into the text), it is worth checking the University's Thesis Regulations (RDPD 3). For example, guidance around bibliographical references is as follows:
a bibliographical reference shall be given for every work, published or unpublished, cited in the text; references may be identified by one of two methods, either:
1. by numbers typed as superscripts, or, if on the line, in brackets, immediately following the relevant word or phrase in the text; or,
2. by citing the author’s name and the date of publication in brackets immediately following the relevant word or phrase in the text. the bibliography, if present, shall list all sources referred to or consulted in writing the thesis, but not necessarily all material relevant to it. Entries in the bibliography shall be given either in alphabetic order of originators' names or, if the bibliography is long, according to a conventional bibliographical system. A consistent form of presentation shall be used for all bibliographical references throughout the thesis.
This final section aims to bring the document together, drawing on what we have learnt over the previous sessions. We will look at inserting chapter files into your final document, inserting a table of contents, modifying the table of contents, and inserting a table of figures.
This exercise will involve three chapter files that can be found on the module GitHub page: 'thesis_chapter01.docx', 'thesis_chapter02.docx' and 'thesis_chapter03.docx'. Although we could insert the text directly into the 'bard_thesis.docx' document that we have been working on, we will instead set up the document structure in a blank, new Word document, specifying all of the formatting and layout that we require before we add the contents of other documents. One of the reasons for doing this is that we have greater control over the structure, at the outset. The new document will provide placeholders for the content.
First, save the version of 'bard_thesis.docx' that you have been working on and download the thesis chapter files to your device. Next, create a new document in Word and make the necessary changes to the margins that we covered in Session 2.
Next, define the default formatting. Modify the styles as follows:
- Body text (Normal) change to Arial 11 point
- Heading 1 change to Arial 16 point, bold, black
- Heading 2 change to Arial 14 point, bold, black
- Heading 3 change to Arial 12 point bold, italic, black
Save the file with the name 'thesis_structure.docx'.
Next, on the toolbar, click on 'Insert', then on the Object icon select the down arrow and click on 'Text from File'. Then select 'bard_thesis.docx'.
Then start to set up the following sections using section breaks (note that you will need to create headings for the chapter sections):
- Introduction
- Literature Review
- Research Methodology
- Chapter 1
- Chapter 2
- Chapter 3
- Results
- Bibliography
At the start of each chapter section, repeat the procedure above for inserting the text from each chapter file. You should notice that the heading styles are also imported but have changed to match your new document styles.
Scroll back to the start of the document and set up level 1, level 2 headings where these are currently missing following the guidance in Session 1, and set a numbering style for these headings, ensuring that the font remains consistent.
Next, set up running headers, as defined in Session 2, which follow the sections of the document and appear on the outer page edge.
In the footer, insert the page numbers to display on the outer page edge of the document.
The University's Regulations also stipulate the sequence of material in the thesis, which consists of:
- Title and subtitle
- Abstract
- List of contents
- List of tables, figures, illustrations, etc. (if any)
- List of accompanying material (if any)
- Preface (if any)
- Acknowledgements (if any)
- Text
- Appendices (if any)
- Glossary.
- List of references
- Bibliography (if any)
- Index (if any)
Creating a list of contents is very easy in Word if you have already defined heading styles. Place your cursor on a new line above the 'Introduction' section (section 1). Click on 'References' tab in the toolbar, then the down arrow on the 'Table of Contents' icon. Choose your preferred style from the options or create a custom table. You should see a list of all of the sections of the document appear automatically, together with their relevant page references.
Add a level 1 heading above this table to identify this as 'List of Contents'. If this appears as a multi-level numbered style, navigate to the multi-level list library and remove the numbering for this heading.
Creating a table of figures or tables is very similar. Ensure that you have created adequate captions for your images first, and you can also include an example table as explained in Session 2.
Place the cursor on a blank line immediately after the Table of Contents and click on the 'References' tab again, then click on 'Insert Table of Figures'. This should insert the details for the figures 1 and 2 in the document. You can repeat this process and choose 'table' instead of 'figure' to insert a list of tables. Ensure you have created a heading for this section called 'List of Figures'.
Finally, you will need to update the table of contents to reflect these new sections and any changes to the pagination in the document. Right-click on the table of contents and select 'Update Field', then choose 'Update entire table' and click 'OK'. This should now refresh the table with the latest changes.
This brings us to the end of this module. Over these three sessions, you should now be able to:
- Identify the formatting regulations required for written work at research degree level.
- Decide on an accessible formatting style.
- Structure a document using formatting features.
- Create content, such as tables, images, captions, lists and references.
- Document changes to files using the review function.
- Combine multiple files into a single document.
This module has introduced some of the more common features of Microsoft Word, but we recommend exploring the Microsoft Support pages for further guidance.
If you have any additional comments or queries about the module, please e-mail m.sillence@uea.ac.uk.