I'm an ancient history student, but this probably applies to all humanities subjects, so:
On my list of essay subjects, it has 'possible resources for your answer include...' and then a list of ancient Greek writers/literature categories. Would I be better off primarily sticking to them, or would that be taken as slight laziness even if the essay is good, and I should branch out a bit? And if I should branch out, what would be a good proportion of their suggestions to stuff I found?
(I got a note back on an essay earlier this year saying I didn't cite enough off the reading list - I read them, I just didn't cite that many of them, but I thought it was pretty obvious I'd read them since that's where I found the sources I ultimately ended up using more of. I don't think I lost marks for it, but it made me a bit more cautious about going too far my own way with the research)
I'm at the end of my first (technically second, because part time) year, so advice from people further into this would be really helpful!