THE LEARNING WEB: ARTICLE-SUMMARY WORKSHEET
Original resource, 19 October 2026
Guide: https://thelearningweb.net/guides/how-to-summarise-an-academic-article/

BLANK WORKSHEET
Assignment, audience and word limit:
Required reference style and permitted-tool rules:
Article title, authors, year and DOI/stable URL:
Article type and current publication/correction status:

SOURCE MAP (repeat for each important statement)
Role: question / argument / method / finding / qualification
My note in my own words:
Exact source location (page, section, table or figure):
Copied wording, if any, clearly marked as a quotation:
What this does NOT establish:

DRAFT
Identify and attribute the article:
Explain the central question or thesis:
Retain enough method/reasoning to understand the finding:
Report the central finding with its units, population and timing:
Keep the important limits:
My evaluation, if requested, separately identified:
Full reference in the required style:

FINAL CHECK
[ ] Every material statement can be traced to its source.
[ ] Measures, denominators, timing and qualifications are retained.
[ ] The language and structure are independently written.
[ ] Exact borrowed wording is quoted and cited.
[ ] Source claims, results and my evaluation are distinguishable.
[ ] Word limit, references and permitted-assistance rules are met.

FILLED PRACTICE SOURCE (ENTIRELY FICTIONAL)
Everything in this report is fictional, including the authors, article title, students and results. It is a compact practice source, not a real study or evidence for buying an annotation tool. The section letters are stable locations you can use in the worksheet.

A. Purpose. Lin and Ahmed’s fictional 2026 report, “Shared annotations in an online history seminar”, asks whether discussing annotations helps students compare two historical sources. It examines an immediate task, rather than long-term learning.

B. Method. Forty-eight students in one seminar are randomly allocated to two groups of 24. Both groups receive the same two texts and 20 minutes. One group can see and discuss shared annotations in a digital document; the other writes individual notes in the same document environment. Everyone then completes the same individual 12-point source-comparison task without access to the notes.

C. Result. The report gives mean scores of 8.5 out of 12 for the shared-annotation group and 7.0 for the individual-note group. It does not supply score distributions, confidence intervals or a significance test. The authors suggest that discussing interpretations may help explain the difference, but they did not measure that mechanism separately.

D. Scope. The report covers one seminar and one immediate task. It provides no later assessment, course grades or evidence about other subjects. It also does not separate the effects of discussion from those of viewing other people’s annotations.

FILLED SOURCE MAP
Question | Section A | Does shared annotation change performance on a short source-comparison task?
Design | Section B | 48 students; random allocation; two groups of 24; the same texts and 20 minutes.
Finding | Section C | Mean immediate scores of 8.5 and 7.0 out of 12; no uncertainty estimates supplied.
Boundary | Section D | One seminar and an immediate task; no later assessment or course-grade measure.

WORKED PARAGRAPH (FICTIONAL AUTHORS AND REPORT)
In their fictional report “Shared annotations in an online history seminar”, Lin and Ahmed (2026) examine an immediate source-comparison task. Forty-eight students were randomly allocated to shared annotation with discussion or individual notes, using the same texts and study time. The shared-annotation group averaged 8.5 out of 12, compared with 7.0 in the individual-note group. However, the report supplies no uncertainty estimates and measures neither later performance nor course grades. It also does not isolate discussion from access to peers’ annotations. The result therefore describes a higher mean on one immediate task; it does not establish a lasting learning benefit or identify which part of the activity produced the difference.

SHORTER VERSION (SAME FICTIONAL REPORT)
Lin and Ahmed’s fictional study (2026) reports a higher mean immediate source-comparison score after shared annotation with discussion than after individual notes. It covers one seminar, supplies no uncertainty estimates and measures no later learning. Discussion and shared annotations were not evaluated separately.

The fictional report has no DOI or real bibliography record. Do not cite it
as research. Replace the practice details with a real verified article.
This worksheet is an aid, not an assessment rubric or a promise of grades.
No application, sign-up or online upload is required to use this text file.