Academic Writer

Academic Writer™ content and tools are organized into three centers.


Learning Center

Content and samples in the Learning Center are designed to teach and reinforce APA Style as well as academic research and writing. Associated graded assessments are available for most Learning Center quick guides and tutorials.


Reference Center

Forms in the Reference Center are designed by APA Style experts to help students with formatting while they build a collection of references.


Writing Center

Tools and services in the Writing Center are designed to assist students with formatting their papers, allowing them to focus on thinking critically about the content.

Using Academic Writer

  • Getting Started

    1. Once Academic Writer has been added to your LMS as a tool provider, you can add assignment and quiz links to your course. Please refer to our Creating Content Links for instructions on adding links to your course. For more information about Assignments and Grading and Best Practices, please refer to those pages.


    2. Consider attending one of our teaching and learning sessions for more information about how Academic Writer can help meet your student learning objectives for APA Style.


    If you’ve used Academic Writer in a previous term, most LMSs allow you to copy your course content into a new course shell. Launch URLs will still work, but you may want to link settings to make sure they're still opening in a new tab and that the due dates and point values are accurate. If you have questions about copying your course, check with your LMS admin.

  • Next Steps

    1. Think about additional ways you could use quick guides and tutorials in your course. For example, if your students struggle with citing references in text, you can assign the quick guide on Citing References in Text or the tutorial How to Avoid Plagiarism and Self-Plagiarism for a completion score.


    2. Consider how you might scaffold assignments leading up to research papers by using Research Lab Book tools like Develop My Research Idea and Annotated Bibliography.


    3. Link to the Learning Commons so that your students can get help using Academic Writer when they need it.

  • FAQs

    Where is the instructor view of Academic Writer?

    Instructors and students enjoy the same Academic Writer view, with one exception – quizzes. As an instructor, you’ll automatically see the quiz dashboard when you select a quiz link in your course. When you assign lessons like quick guides and tutorials, grades will appear in your gradebook. (Keep in mind that lessons are graded for completion, whereas quizzes are graded for accuracy.)


    How are student assignments graded?

    Academic Writer lessons are graded for completion. Students can see their progress in the left-hand navigation area after they select the “Start Learning” button.


    Progress is measured in one browser session, so students should plan to complete the lesson in one sitting, instead of returning to it later.


    Additional details are available on our Assignments and Grading page.


    Where do students enter their access code?

    Students can enter their access code the first time they access Academic Writer from your LMS course, or at any time during the trial period (14 days from the start date of your course). They will be required to enter a code if the trial has expired, whether or not they had accessed and been using Academic Writer during that period.


    Please note that if you’re bundling Academic Writer with PsycLearn, students must enter their access code from a PsycLearn link to activate their Academic Writer access.


    Additional details are available on our Access Codes page.

Academic Writer Features 


Orientation Lessons 

Two lessons, Getting Started with Academic Writer and Writing in Academic Writer, are available (and can be graded for completion). These lessons orient students to the Academic Writer platform and familiarize them with terminology used not only in Academic Writer, but in APA Style and scholarly writing. Check your onboarding spreadsheet for the specific URL to add to your course modules.


Reference Center

Mostly used in conjunction with the Writing Center for in-text citations, reference lists, and annotated bibliographies, the Reference Center houses students’ collection of references. Students can create their own references using forms or import RIS files from research databases and reference management software. RIS import can be particularly helpful for nursing and education students who may not be adding to their collection from the search of adapted APA PsycINFO references.


To help find and organize references, students can add and save tags, notes, and specific quotations to each reference in their collection.


Grammar Check

Academic Writer’s paper editor has several tools to assist students as they’re writing, including grammar and spell check. By using this feature, both students can focus on the content of their paper, and you spend less time correcting basic grammatical errors. The grammar check tool looks for 


  • subject-verb agreement 
  • split infinitives 
  • mood (indicative versus subjunctive) 
  • pronouns as subjects and objects (who versus whom) 
  • readability 


The tool also checks punctuation and abbreviations, especially those that should only be used inside of parentheses, as recommended by APA Style guidelines.


Research Lab Book

Each Academic Writer paper includes five Research Lab Book tools: Develop My Research Idea, Plan and Track My Research, Create an Annotated Bibliography, Describe My Tests and Measures, and Track the Flow of Participants. Any of these tools can be assigned independently or as iterative submissions in conjunction with a paper assignment. For example, you could ask students to submit their research idea or plan and annotated bibliography for approval or feedback before turning in their paper assignment. 

Teaching With Academic Writer


We've put together some guides on sequencing assignments depending on your learning outcomes. We currently have these curricula for introducing APA Style and academic writing as well research-focused writing and composition.



If you're using Academic Writer with PsycLearn: Research Methods, you may also want to check out our documentation that aligns modules with Academic Writer activities.

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