Reporting Style Guide

Purpose

The purpose of this style guide is to establish common practices and guidelines for Assumption College semester reports, according to contemporary grammar, punctuation and spelling. Teachers must ensure that spelling and grammar are correct.

The full stop

Use for ending a sentence. Do not use for abbreviations, acronyms, a person’s title or initials.

• Anzac

• Ms B Smith

• ACK

The hyphen

Use for compound adjectives or joined words. Generally do not use for compound nouns.

• co-curricular program

• end-of-semester examinations or report

• good-natured

• hand-eye coordination

• hands-on experience

• mid-year examinations or reports

• parent-teacher-student interviews

• problem-solving skills (problem-solving used as an adjective should always be hyphenated but when used as a noun no hyphen is used)

• self-disciplined

• self-control

• non-fiction

• cross-country

• well-mannered, well-behaved, well-presented, well-structured, well-earned. These words are used without the hyphen when used in a predicative position (after the verb). She is a well-respected student or she is well respected.

However, there is no hyphen in the following words:

• classmate

• cooperative

• coordinator

• email

• homework

• interhouse

• multimedia

• proofread

• teammate

• teamwork

• textbook

• throughout.

Capitalisation

Use for all proper nouns such as names of people, names of titles, places, days, months, names of firms, churches, schools, languages, titles of books or subjects outside general areas of study and language subjects. The seasons do not need a capital. Only use a capital when absolutely essential, and do not capitalise a word just because you think it’s important. However, the sacraments are capitalised as is Mass.

• Assumption College, the College (this archaic capitalisation is retained)

• College Code of Conduct

• First XVIII, First XI (or lower case if ‘all firsts teams’, or ‘a member of the firsts’ is used)

• French

• Italian

• Interhouse Athletics Carnival (this is the official title or lower case if ‘the athletics carnival’ is used)

• Interhouse Swimming Carnival (this is the official title or lower case if ‘the swimming carnival’ is used)

• Le Rosey Chapel (or lower case if ‘the chapel’ is used)

• Marlhes Restaurant, Heinrich Centre, Montagne Centre, the Hermitage

• McAuley House

• Principal, Deputy Principal – Learning and Teaching

• PowerPoint (one word with two capitals)

• Relay for Life

• Assumption-Sacred Heart Exchange (not Sacred Heart Exchange). Use lower case if ‘the exchange’ is used)

• To Kill a Mockingbird or ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’ (see the section on the use of italics)

• VCE Religion and Society

• World War II

• Who’s the Boss?

Do not use capitalisation for subjects that are generic areas of study:

• drama

• humanities

• mathematics

• religious education

• science.

Do not use capitalisation for subject criteria, co-curricular activities and associated titles, specific locations in the school or sub-groups within the school:

• best and fairest award

• captain of the firsts (or captain of the First XVIII, Firsts netball coach)

• coach’s award, or coaches’ award when more than one coach

• football, hockey, netball, soccer, softball etc.

• house activities

• house captain

• infirmary

• library

• music program

• reception

• student representative council

• school-based apprenticeship

• semester 1, this semester, first semester

• senior band

• swimming team, junior netball team

• term 1, this term, first term

• work experience

• year 8, year 12.

For names of teaching units (topics) and assessment tasks in SIMON learning areas, capitalise only the first word:

• Analysis task

• Fundamental motor skills

• Summary report of practical activities

• Water safety and sun smart.

Italics

• Use for book titles e.g. To Kill a Mockingbird (as italics are not available in SIMON, use single inverted commas).

Apostrophes

Use to indicate possession or ownership. Do not use for an era or period of time or for plurals.

• coach’s award or coaches’ award (when more than one coach)

• The student’s books (singular)

• The students’ examinations (plural)

• Jess’s assignment. This is controversial. (The print media prefer Jess’ assignment, however, The Monash and Cambridge University style guides and the Australian government style manual, Style Manual: For Authors, Editors and Printers (2002), favour adding an extra ‘s’ for all names. This approach also sounds better on the ear.)

• Do not use for 1990s

• Do not use for girls sport or boys sport. (These are attributive or adjectival cases and not possessive cases so do not need an apostrophe.

Semi-colons

• Used to connect two sentences whose thoughts are closely linked

• In sentences that already contain commas, e.g. Lucy has completed a legal studies assignment, for which she received a very high result; a persuasive speech on Australia’s government and …

Numbers, dates, time

• Use figures for year levels: year 12, year 7

• semester 1, term 2 (or first semester, second term)

• 7pm (not 7.00pm) and no space between the ‘7’ and ‘pm’

• 8.30am (not 8:30am)

• 6 o’clock

• For dates, use figures and do not use st or th e.g. July 17, 2015.

Noun and verb agreement

Singular nouns have singular verbs. Plural nouns have plural verbs.

• The students have worked hard

• His classwork and homework have been completed thoroughly

• Classwork and homework are completed thoroughly.

• The team has played well or The team have played well

• The class has worked hard or The class have worked hard.

Take care that the same collective noun is not treated as both singular and plural in the same sentence.

• The debating team has had a successful season or the debating team have had a successful season; both work. Also, the media has or the media have. It is acceptable in standard English for media to take either a singular or a plural verb because it is treated as a collective noun.

• None can be used with a singular and a plural verb, depending on the context and the emphasis needed.

Indefinite pronouns (each, anyone, none, neither) have singular verbs

• Each student is required

• Neither was completed satisfactorily

Less and fewer

Use less when referring to singular or collective nouns. Use fewer when referring to plural nouns (less is quantity/ fewer is number)

• Less work

• Fewer students

• Fewer than eight items (despite what you see at the checkout).

Who and whom

Use who whenever, he, she, they, I or we could be substituted. Who is the subject of the sentence. Use whom whenever him, her, them, me or us could be substituted e.g. The students with whom she worked.

Spelling

• Names are sometimes spelt unconventionally e.g. Jonathan or Jonathon, Jeremy or Jeremey, Kimberley or Kimberly. When in doubt, please check spelling on SIMON. To avoid spelling names incorrectly when writing pastoral care reports, teachers should always use %N (the name substitution function in SIMON).

• s/z words – use ‘s’ e.g. organise (in accordance with the Macquarie Dictionary)

• examination not exam

• program not programme (in accordance with the Macquarie Dictionary)

• affect (verb) (to cause a reaction; to influence); effect (noun) (the outcome or result)

• compliment (to comment favourably); complement (to make something complete)

• lead (present tense), led (past tense)

• past (before the present time); passed (verb – past tense of to pass)

• practice is the noun and practise is the verb e.g. She should practise her writing.

• focused (should be used rather than focussed)

• Marlhes Restaurant

Expressions and general guidelines

• ACK is acceptable

• criteria – plural; criterion – singular.

• LM or LMG is not to be used. Use the terms e.g. Learning Mentor, Learning Mentor group

• solid - can be used but avoid using the word solid as an adjective describing a student.

• full name of subject e.g. mathematics not maths.

• full name of pastoral care groups e.g. Frayne 6 not FR6

SRC is acceptable or use student representative council, however, avoid other initialisms (except VCE, which is well known) and acronyms (except VCAL and VET) because they are a barrier to clarity.

• One space only is required between sentences. Although this is a controversial point, in modern typography, the one-space approach is most common and most style guides prescribe the use of a single space after terminal punctuation in final written works and publications (See Fogarty and Leonard below).

• Similarly, underlining text (except in manuscripts to indicate italics) is archaic, harking back to the typewriter era. Use italics instead.

Further reading

http://www.monash.edu/about/editorialstyle/editing/capitalisation

http://www.ox.ac.uk/sites/files/oxford/media_wysiwyg/University%20of%20Oxford%20Style%20Guide.pdf (see p. 4)

https://www.cam.ac.uk/brand-resources/guidelines/editorial-style-guide (see capital letters)

http://www.dailywritingtips.com/avoid-gratuitous-capitalization (author, Mark Nichol, is a former editing instructor for University of California, Berkeley. He edits trade and academic books for various publishers).

Leonard, Kristi et al. (10 October 2009). The Effects of Computer-based Text Spacing on Reading Comprehension and Reading Rate. AECT1 February 2010.

Fogarty, Mignon (2008). Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing. New York: Holt Paperbacks. 240 pages.