It could be that Im a good reader but Im not a good writer.

When I write papers I tend to come up

short in lengths so Im striving to make it longer, giving more details to elaborate. It takes me a lot of
time just to make a better composition. Also, one weakness I have is that I dont have a flowery
vocabulary. Thats why I find it hard how to construct my thoughts into sentences using profound word
that will express the ideas correctly. In terms of grammar, I am so reluctant that I dont know whether
my sentence is correct or not. Sometimes I also have hard time how to give my writings a good
introduction and ending but thats the part I want the most making the paper more interesting to the
readers. My strength is that there are lots of ideas, conceptions, and plans that drive me to write but the
problem is I dont know how to turn it into paper. Another is that I can make valid points in my writing.
Whenever I think that some parts need more information, Id like it to reconstruct and add more details
not to offend my group mates but to consider alternative explanations.

Become a Great Technical Writer

even if you are not a great writer
Are you contemplating or beginning a career in technical writing? Have you been asked to create
the user guide for your company's software application? Have you been asked to hire and
manage a writer?
Where do you begin? How can you get an interview
when you have no experience? How do you know if the technical writer on your team is doing a
good job or a poor one? Can you find out before you hire the person?
Technical writers (known as technical authors in the United Kingdom) translate and organize
complex information into user guides that any person can understand and use with ease. But in
the 20 years that I have been in the business, I have often found myself working with writers
who do not really know how to write manuals or use the desktop publishing software, and with
clients who are not entirely sure what to expect from writers. More often, I have had to clean up
a documentation mess left behind by a previous writer. This asymmetry between expectation and
output can create technical writers who unknowingly make the same costly mistakes year after
year, and companies who regard technical writers as a high-cost, low-value drain on the
company's bottom line.
This site, whether you are a manager or a technical writer, will get you all working on the same
page. If you are a writer, you will see that technical writing requires skills other than the ability
to write. In fact, it is possible to write great user guides even if you are not a great writer. You
don't need to spell perfectly (I don't), and you don't need to know the difference between a

dangling participle and a dangling gerund. But although you don't have to be a great writer, you
will probably be happier in the job if you like writing and are a competent writer. If you find it
difficult to organize your thoughts and put them down in writing, you might find the job boring,
unpleasant, and unrewarding.
In fact, writing is only a fraction of what you will do as a technical writer. This site, therefore,
does not show you how to become a great writermany other sites exist to help you with your
grammar and stylebut it does provide you with information, skills, tips, and techniques that
can help you become a great technical writer.
Notes For Managers
If you are a manager, this site shows you what you can expect from the technical writers on your
team. Although this site speaks mainly to the writer, you will easily be able to develop from the
information provided your own expectations and requirements for your writers. This site will
also help you distinguish between good and bad technical writing and it will tell you what to
look for when hiring a writer. In particular, you should read the first three articles below.

Tips for Academic Writing and Other Formal Writing

The following is a list of solutions to problems I have encountered repeatedly in my students' formal
writing, such as coursework, research papers, and literature surveys.

It is a long list. People have a lot of problems.

Some of the items sound picky or trivial, even to me. Yet bad grammar, bad style, and poor
organization will make it very difficult for you to convey your ideas clearly and professionally,
and will limit your academic and professional success. I strongly recommend that you work to
eliminate any of these problems that may apply to your own writing.
-- Dr. James A. Bednar

General guidelines
Rules for formal writing are quite strict, though often unstated. Formal writing is used in
academic and scientific settings whenever you want to convey your ideas to a wide audience,
with many possible backgrounds and assumptions. Unlike casual conversation or emails to
friends, formal writing needs to be clear, unambiguous, literal, and well structured.
Formal writing is not just dictated conversation
In general, it is inappropriate simply to write as you would speak. In conversation, the listener
can ask for clarification or elaboration easily, and thus the speaker can use imprecise language,
ramble from topic to topic freely, and so on. Formal writing must instead stand on its own,
conveying the author's thesis clearly through words alone. As a result, formal writing requires
substantial effort to construct meaningful sentences, paragraphs, and arguments relevant to a

well-defined thesis. The best formal writing will be difficult to write but very easy to read. The
author's time and effort spent on writing will be repaid with the time and effort saved by the
(many) readers.
Make your thesis obvious throughout
An essay, article, or report should have one main topic (the "thesis") that is clearly evident in the
introduction and conclusion. Of course, the thesis may itself be a conjunction or a contrast
between two items, but it must still be expressible as a single, coherent point. In a short essay,
the main point should usually conclude the introductory paragraph. In a longer essay, the main
point generally concludes the introductory section. The reader should never be in any doubt
about what your thesis is; whenever you think it might not be absolutely obvious, remind the
reader again.
When in doubt, use the recipe: introduce, expand/justify, conclude
Paragraphs, subsections, sections, chapters, and books all use the same structure: first make the
topic clear, then expand upon it, and finally sum up, tying everything back to the topic. At each
level, you need to tell the reader what you will be trying to say (in this paragraph, section, etc.),
then you need to cover all the relevant material, clearly relating it to your stated point, and
finally you need to tie the subtopics together so that they do indeed add up to establish the
point that you promised.
Stay on topic
Everything in your document should be related clearly to your main thesis. You can write other
papers later for anything else you might want to say. The reason your reader is reading this
particular paper of yours is that he or she wants to know about your main topic, not simply
about everything you might want to say (unless for some narcissistic reason "everything you
might want to say" is your clearly stated main topic).

Conversely, there is no need to bring up items simply because they relate to your main
topic, if you do not have anything to say about them. If you do bring something up, say
something important about it!
Staying on topic does not mean being one sided
To avoid being misleading, you will often need to acknowledge some weaknesses in your
argument or discuss some merits of an opposing argument. It is quite appropriate to discuss
such opposing views when they are relevant, i.e., when they relate directly to the main topic of
your paper. For instance, if you are reviewing a paper and arguing that it was not written well
overall, it is usually a good idea to point out the few things that were done well, e.g. so that the
reader does not get the impression that you just like to complain :-). Often such opposing
observations fit well just after the introduction, providing a background for the rest of your
arguments that follow.

Whenever you do include such material, i.e. things that go in the direction opposite to
your main thesis, be careful to put it into only a few well-defined places, reorganizing
your argument to achieve that when necessary. Jumping back and forth will confuse the
reader unnecessarily. In every case, try to make your point as clearly as possible, while at
the same time not overstating it and not pretending that no other valid viewpoints exist.
Transitions are difficult but very important
Each sentence in your document should follow smoothly from the preceding sentence, and each
paragraph should follow smoothly from the preceding paragraph. The world is arguably an
unstructured jumble of ideas, but anything that you expect the reader to read from start to
finish needs to be a linear progression along one single path. Transition words and phrases are
what make it possible for a reader to follow you easily as you explore the various ideas in your
paper. Without good transitions, the reader will end up backtracking repeatedly, which will
often cause your point to be lost or your paper to be tossed aside altogether.

One clue that your writing needs better transitions is if you find that you can cut and
paste paragraphs from one section to another without doing substantial rewriting of how
the paragraph begins and ends. If making such rearrangements is easy, then you have not
been linking your paragraphs into a coherent narrative that reads well from start to finish.
In practice, making smooth transitions is very difficult. Learning to do it takes a lot of
practice at first, and actually making the transitions smooth takes a lot of effort every
time you write or revise something. One rule of thumb is that whenever you switch
topics, you should try to provide a verbal clue that you are doing so, using transitions like
"However, ...", "As a result, ...", "For comparison, ", etc.
If you notice that you have to add these words between most of your sentences, not just
the paragraphs, then you are bouncing around too much. In that case you need to
reorganize your document to group related thoughts together, switching topics only when
necessary. Once the organization is good, all you can do is read and reread what you
write, rewording it until each new item follows easily from those before it.
Write what you mean, mean what you write
Speakers use many informal, colloquial phrases in casual conversation, usually intending to
convey meanings other than what the words literally indicate. For instance, we often speak
informally of "going the extra mile", "at the end of the day", "hard facts", things being "crystal
clear" or "pretty" convincing, someone "sticking to" a topic, readers being "turned off",
something "really" being the case, etc. Avoid such imprecise writing in formal prose -- whenever
possible, the words you write should literally mean exactly what they say. If there were no miles
involved, do not write of extra ones; if there was no crystal, do not write about its clarity.

Among other benefits, avoiding such informal language will ensure that your meaning is
obvious even to those who have not learned the currently popular idioms, such as those

for whom English is a second language and those who might read your writing years
from now or in another part of the world. Formal writing should be clear to as many
people as possible, and its meaning should not depend on the whims of your local dialect
of English. It is a permanent and public record of your ideas, and should mean precisely
what you have written.
Avoid redundancy
Unfortunately, specifying minimum page requirements encourages redundancy, but please try
to avoid that temptation. When two words will do, there is no need to use twenty. Whenever
you finish a sentence or paragraph, read over it to see if any words or sentences can be
eliminated -- often your point will get much stronger when you do so. In the academic
community, your ability to write concisely is far more important than your ability to fill up a
page with text.

Academic courses specify page minimums to ensure that you write an essay of the
appropriate depth, not to test whether you can say the same thing a dozen different ways
just to fill up space. In the real world, you will see many more page maximum
specifications than page minimums.
Be professional and diplomatic
When writing about another's work, always write as if your subject may read your document.
Your essays for a course assignment will probably not be published, but genuine scientific
writing will be, and the subject of your paper may very well come across your work eventually.
Thus it is crucial to avoid pejorative, insulting, and offensive terms like "attempt to", "a waste of
time", "pointless", etc.

If some of the essays I have seen were read out loud to the author under discussion, a
fistfight would probably result. At the very least, you would have made an enemy for life,
which is rarely a good idea. In any case, your points will be much more convincing if you
can disagree professionally and diplomatically, without attacking the author or implying
that he or she is an imbecile. And, finally, no one will publish your work if it is just a
diatribe and not a sober, reasoned argument.
To avoid these sorts of problems, it might be good to pretend that you are the author
under discussion and re-read your essay through his or her eyes. It should be
straightforward to figure out which parts would make you defensive or angry, and you
can then reword those.
Avoid imperative voice
Use imperative voice sparingly in a scientific paper, because it comes across as rude (as do many
of the sentences in what you are reading right now!). E.g. do not say "Recall that ...". Of course,

an occasional imperative in parentheses is not objectionable (e.g. "(see Walker 1996 for more
details).").

Document organization
A formal document needs to be structured at all levels, whether or not the structure is made
explicit using section labels or other visible clues.
Overall structure
The standard format for an effective essay or article is to: (1) present a coherent thesis in the
introduction, (2) try your hardest to convince the reader of your thesis in the body of the paper,
and (3) restate the thesis in the conclusion so that the reader remains quite sure what your
thesis is, and so that the reader can decide whether he or she was convinced.

Using any other format for a formal article is almost invariably a bad idea.
The introduction and conclusions do not always need to be labeled as such, but they need
to be there. Note that an abstract is no substitute for an introduction; abstracts act as an
independent miniature version of the article, not part of the introduction.
Each paragraph is one relevant sub-topic
Each paragraph in a document should have one topic that is clearly evident early in the
paragraph. Every paragraph should have a clear relationship to the main topic of your
document; if not, either the paragraph should be eliminated, or the main topic should be
revised.
Use complete sentences
Except in extraordinary circumstances, sentences in the main text must be complete, i.e., they
must have a subject and a verb, so that they express an entire thought, not just a fragment or
the beginning of a thought. Note that most "-ing" words are not verbs. "The light turning green"
is just a fragment, i.e., a start to a sentence or a part of one. To be a sentence that you could use
on its own followed by a period, it would have to be "The light turned green", which has both a
subject and a verb.
Put appropriate punctuation between sentences

Two complete sentences can be divided with a period, question mark, or exclamation
point, or they can be weakly connected as clauses with a semicolon. However, they can
never be connected with a comma in formal writing! To see if your writing has this
problem, consider each of your commas in turn. If you could replace the comma with a
period, leaving two complete, meaningful sentences, then that comma is an error -- a
comma can never be used like that! Instead, replace the comma with a semicolon, in case

you have two sentences that need to be linked in some generic way, or make the linkage
explicit with a conjunction, or simply use a period, to leave two complete and
independent sentences.
Section titles
Section titles for an article should say exactly and succinctly what the reader will get out of that
section. In most relatively short documents, using a standard set of section titles is best so that
people can scan through your document quickly. Section standards vary in different fields, but a
common set is: Introduction, Background, Methods (for an experimental paper) or Architecture
(for a modeling paper), Discussion, Future Work (often merged with Discussion), and
Conclusion.

If you do not use the standard titles, e.g. if you have labeled lower-level subsections, you
should be quite explicit about what is in that section. Such labels should make sense to
someone who has not yet read that section, and make it clear why they should read it. For
instance, a section about adding a second eye to a simulation of single-eye vision could
truthfully be called "Multiple eyes", but that title is meaningless to someone scanning the
document. Instead, it should be something like "Extending the model to explain stereo
vision" whose meaning will be clear to the type of person likely to be reading the paper.
Everything important goes in your introduction and conclusion
Everyone who looks at your paper will at least skim the introduction and conclusion, and those
who read it in depth will remember those two sections the best. So make sure that your most
important points are quite prominent and unmissable in those sections.
Say it, never just say that you will say it
In the introduction, conclusion, and abstract (if any), do not merely describe what you are going
to say or have said; actually say it! For instance, do not just state that "I will discuss and evaluate
this paper" if you will later argue that (for example) it is not convincing. Instead state that the
paper is unconvincing, and (in brief) why you believe that to be the case. Then you can elaborate
on that point in subsequent paragraphs.
Subsections
If you have sections 1, 1.1, and 1.2, there must be introductory material between 1 and 1.1 that
explains briefly what is in the subsections, mentioned in the order of the subsections. That is,
1.1 should never follow just after 1 without some intervening text. If you have 1.1, there must
always be a 1.2; otherwise 1 and 1.1 should be merged. Each 1.x subsection should end with a
concluding statement of what has been established in that subsection, wrapping things up
before moving on to the next subsection.
Figure captions

Different communities have different expectations on what to put into figure captions. Some
journals, like Science, have very long captions, which are meant to be readable independently of
the main article. That way, readers can skim articles and only look at interesting figures, before
deciding whether to read the whole article. In such cases, you must ensure that all of the main
points of the figure are also mentioned in the text of the article, so that someone reading the
article straight through will not miss them. Other journals and other publications like books,
theses, and proposals tend to have very little in the caption, with the figures being
understandable only when reading the main text. Even in such cases, I myself prefer to put all
the graphical details like "the dotted line represents" in the caption, plus enough context so that
the import of the figure is clear. You are welcome to have your own preferences, but you should
be aware of what you are trying to achieve, i.e. whether you want the caption to be readable on
its own.

Word-level issues
Try hard to avoid ambiguous references
Conversation is replete with ambiguous words like "this", "these", "his", "it", "they", etc. These
words have no meaning in themselves, but in conversation the meaning is usually clear from the
context. In written text, however, the intended meaning is quite often not evident to the reader,
because there are e.g. many possible interpretations of "it" and "this".

It is a good idea to read over anything you write, searching for this sort of word. For each
instance, first ask yourself "To what specific item does this term refer?". For such a
reference to make sense, the object, person, or concept must have been explicitly
mentioned just prior to your reference. Often you will find that "it" or "they" refers to
something vague that was not even discussed explicitly in your paper, in which case you
should reword your text entirely.
Even if the item to which you refer is explicitly mentioned in your paper, ask yourself
whether there is any chance that the reader might not know to which of several items you
might be referring. E.g. for the word "he", were there two or three people being
discussed? If so then state the actual name of each; "he" would be ambiguous.
Often an ambiguous "this" or "these" can be disambiguated by adding a noun that
specifies precisely the type of object or concept to which you are referring. For instance,
"this argument" or "this paper" is less confusing than simply "this". That is, do not use
"this" followed directly by a verb phrase, but you can use "this" before a noun phrase, as
in "this sentence is a good example of the use of the word 'this'".
Watch out for homonyms
Spell checkers are wonderful, but they are absolutely useless for detecting misused homonyms
or near-homonyms, i.e., actual words whose meaning is confused with other actual words. As a

result, homonyms are probably the most common spelling errors in word-processed text. Even if
you are lazy and let the spell checker fix all of your other words, make certain that you know the
differences between words like:

it's, its
their, there, they're
whether, weather
to, too, two
site, cite, sight
waste, waist
whole, hole
fare, fair
great, grate

affect, effect
discrete, discreet
forth, fourth
past, passed
roll, role
lead, led
lie, lye
throughout, through out
seem, seam

new, knew
illicit, elicit
complement, compliment
extent, extend
obtain, attain
pair, pare
personal, personnel
suit, suite
principal, principle
bear, bare

If you do not know the difference, you must simply avoid using any of these words. Yet
because the spell checker takes care of all the other words you may misspell, learning to
use these few words correctly is surely not much of a burden, and is crucial for
convincing your readers that you are competent and trustworthy.
Avoid "comprise"
Apparently the word "comprise" has now been used incorrectly so many times to mean
"compose" that this usage is now becoming acceptable. But it is much safer simply to avoid
"comprise" altogether, as anyone who does know what it started out meaning will be annoyed
when you use it to mean "compose".
"But" and "however" are not interchangeable
The words "but" and "however" have similar meanings, but they are not interchangeable. If you
take a grammatically correct sentence containing "but" and replace it with "however", or vice
versa, the result will almost always be incorrect, mainly because of comma punctuation.

Correct examples:
"I like oranges, but I do not like tangerines."
"I like oranges. However, I do not like tangerines."
"I like oranges; however, I do not like tangerines."
"I, however, do not like grapefruits."
"I like oranges however they have been prepared."
If you exchange any of these "but"s and "however"s, then the sentences would become
incorrect, and in some cases meaningless.
A "point" is a single item

The word "point" can only be used for a single, atomic item. Thus it is not appropriate to discuss
a "sub-point", "part of a point", the "first half" of a point, etc. Instead use "topic" or "section",
etc.
"A research"
There is no noun phrase "a research" in English. Use "a study" or just "research", never "a
research". Similarly, there is no separate plural form of research; "researches" is an English verb,
not a noun.
Avoid capitalization
When in doubt, use lower case. Capitalization is appropriate only for specific, named, individual
items or people. For example, capitalize school subjects only when you are referring to a specific
course at a specific school: math is a general subject, but Math 301 is a particular course.
Similarly: Department of Computer Sciences vs. a computer science department, the president
vs. President Bush. When in doubt, use lower case.
Avoid contractions
Contractions are appropriate only for conversational use and for informal writing, never for
technical or formal writing.
Hyphenate phrases only when otherwise ambiguous
In English phrases (groups of several words forming a unit), hyphens are used to group pairs of
words when the meaning might otherwise be ambiguous. That is, they act like the parentheses
in a mathematical expression. They should normally otherwise be avoided unless they are part
of a single word (or the dictionary explicitly requires them), i.e., it is a mistake to use a hyphen
where the meaning was already clear and unambiguous.

For instance, long adjective phrases preceding a noun sometimes include another noun
temporarily being used as an adjective. Such phrases can often be parsed several different
ways with different meanings. For example, the phrase "English language learners" as
written means "language learners from England", because, by default, "language"
modifies "learners", and "English" modifies "language learners". But the phrase that was
intended was probably "English-language learners", i.e. "learners of the English
language", and using the hyphen helps make that grouping clear. Note that there would
never be a hyphen if the same phrase were used after the noun it modifies, because in that
case there would be absolutely no chance of ambiguity: "a learner of the English
language" (NEVER "a learner of the English-language"; the hyphen effectively turns the
noun phrase "English language" into an adjective, and a prepositional phrase starting with
"of the" must be completed with a noun, not an adjective).
Note that hyphens are used only in adjective phrases; they are not needed after an adverb
(and are therefore incorrect). An adverb explicitly modifies the adjective immediately

following it, never a noun. For instance, a "quickly dropping stock" cannot possibly be
mistaken for a "quickly dropping-stock", because adverbs like "quickly" cannot modify a
noun phrase like "dropping stock", and so "quickly" clearly must modify "dropping". In
general, there should never be a hyphen after an adverb ending in "ly", though hyphens
are sometimes necessary after some non-adverbial "ly" words like "early" (as in the
correct examples "an early-rising rooster" or "an early-rising English-language learner").
You may want to search through your finished document for "ly-"; nearly all examples of
those three characters in a row will be mistakes.
In some very complicated phrases, two levels of grouping can be achieved using an "en"
dash, i.e. a slightly longer dash than a hyphen. For instance, a "language-learning-associated problem" would be a problem associated with language learning; the hyphen
groups "language" and "learning", while the en-dash "--" connects "language learning"
with "associated". Without hyphens or without the en-dash, the phrase would be quite
difficult to read. But in such cases it is often clearer just to reword the sentence to avoid
the ambiguity, as in "a problem associated with language learning".
In cases where the word grouping is quite obvious because the pair of words are so often
used together, the hyphen can be omitted even when it would strictly be required to avoid
ambiguity. For instance "chocolate chip cookies" is unlikely to be misread as "chocolate
chip-cookies", despite that being the literal interpretation, and so the hyphen can usually
be omitted.
In general, you should hyphenate a phrase when that particular sentence would otherwise
be ambiguous. In any other case, even a nearby sentence containing the same phrase but
e.g. after the noun it modifies, you should leave out the hyphen.
American vs. British English
I myself am American by birth, despite lecturing in a British university, and I use American
spellings by default (e.g. "organization", not "organisation"). Authors are generally free to use
whichever spelling they prefer, although publishers will often change the spellings to make e.g.
all the papers in a certain edited volume use the same conventions. Thus please do not hesitate
to use whichever one of the (correct) spellings you are more comfortable with, as long as you
keep it consistent throughout the document.

Additional guidelines specific to academic writing

Academic writing includes texts like original research papers, research proposals, and literature reviews,
whether published or not.
Formatting and grammar rules

When in doubt about grammar or page format, researchers in psychology and computer science
generally follow the APA style guide; biological fields use similar standards. Unfortunately, the
official APA guide is available only as a physical book, at a not insignificant cost.
Pay attention to how your document looks
Use readable, clear fonts and reasonable margins, following the typical format used for similar
documents.

If your word processor cannot make the spacing regular between words (e.g. most
versions of Microsoft Word), turn off right justification. Poor spacing makes the page
look jumbled and seem incoherent, even if the writing is not.
Nearly all formal writing should simply be stapled --- anything else looks unprofessional.
For instance, using a fancy cover and binding for a short paper or report is distracting and
makes it difficult to photocopy the paper; such binding is necessary only for long papers
that a staple would have trouble keeping together. At the opposite extreme, it should be
obvious that folding one corner is not an acceptable substitute for a staple.
Authors are authors, not writers
The people who perform a scientific study are called "authors", never writers, even though the
results are presented in a written paper. Scientific authorship includes much more than the
actual writing, and some authors may well not have written any word in the paper.
Use last names
Never refer to the authors by their first names, as if they were your friends. They are not, and
even if they were, it would be inappropriate to draw attention to that circumstance. Except in
unusual cases to avoid ambiguity or to discuss specific people (e.g. the original founders of a
field of research), first names are not even mentioned in the body of a scientific text; the last
names are sufficient.
Author names are keys -- spell them properly
In academic writing, an author's last name is like the key in a database lookup -- if the name is
misspelled (e.g. "Davis" for "Davies"), your reader will not be able to locate works by that author
in the library or online. Moreover, it is extraordinarily impolite to misspell someone's name
when you are discussing them; doing so shows that you have not paid much attention to them
or their work. So you should make a special effort to spell author names correctly, double and
triple checking them against the original source, and ensuring that you spell them the same way
each time.
Use appropriate pronouns

Use appropriate pronouns when referring to the authors. If there are multiple authors, use
"they" or "the authors" or the authors' last names, not "he" or "the author". If there is only one
author and you can determine the gender with great confidence, you may use "he" or "she";
otherwise use "the author" or the author's last name.
Referring to other texts
Use double quotes around the title of an article when you refer to it in the text. Italics are
reserved for books or other works of similar length. Avoid underlining altogether --- underlining
is just a way of indicating that handwritten or typewritten text should be typeset in italics, and is
thus inappropriate when italics are available (as they are on any modern word processor).
Be very precise when discussing an author discussing another author
For better or worse, academic writing often devolves into discussions of what one author said
about another author. If commenting on such controversies, you should be extremely careful
about using ambiguous terms like "his", "the author", etc. Very often your reader will have no
idea which of the various authors you are referring to, even though it may be clear to you. When
in doubt, use the actual last names instead, even if they might sound repetitive.
Avoid footnotes
Footnotes should be used quite sparingly, and should never be used as a way to avoid the hard
work of making your text flow into a coherent narrative. Only when something genuinely cannot
be made to fit into the main flow of the text, yet is somehow still so important that it must be
mentioned, does it go into a footnote.
Avoid direct quotes
In scientific (as opposed to literary or historical) writing, direct quotes should be used only when
the precise wording of the original sentences is important, e.g. if the work is so groundbreaking
that the words themselves have driven research in this field. In nearly every other case,
paraphrasing is more appropriate, because it lets you formulate the idea in the terms suitable
for your particular paper, focusing on the underlying issue rather than the way one author
expressed it.
Be careful with arguments about grammar
If you are going to criticize the grammar or spelling of an author in writing, you should be
extraordinarily careful to verify that you are correct. Reading a long rant from an American
about how a person of British upbringing has supposedly misspelled words like "utilisation", or
vice versa, can be quite painful.
There is no need to mention explicitly reading the paper

A lot of students use phrases like "while reading this paper, I ..." and "In this paper the authors
...". Try to avoid this redundancy. If you use the word "author" you need not also use "paper",
and vice versa. Similarly, it is clear that whatever you discovered about the paper, you
discovered while reading the paper; we do not need to be reminded of this. Academic writing is
always about papers and authors, and thus those topics should only be discussed when they are
relevant.
Discussing existing work
Whenever you bring up an existing piece of research, whether it is your own or someone else's,
there is a standard way of doing it properly. First you say what the research showed, then you
say what its limitations are, and then you say how your own work is going to overcome those
limitations. I.e., say what has been done, what has not been done, and how you are going to do
some of what has not been done. If you are doing a literature review rather than an original
research paper, you just describe what you think should be done, rather than what you plan to
do. Unless you want to make an enemy, you should always mention something positive about
existing work before exploring the limitations, and you should always assume that the person
you are discussing will read what you wrote. Of course, sometimes there is a good reason to
make an enemy, e.g. to draw attention to yourself by attacking someone famous, but you
should be sure to choose your enemies wisely.
Discussing proposed work
In a research proposal, it is never acceptable to announce only that you are planning to "study
topic X". In the context of research, studying is a vague and unbounded task, with no criterion
for success and no way to tell if you are getting anywhere. Studying is something you do in a
course, where someone can tell you what to focus on and can test you to see if you got the right
answer; research is not like that. In research, you need to spell out the specific questions you
are going to try to answer, the specific phenomena that need explanations, and so on -- it's up
to you to define the question and the methods, and until you've done so, it's not research, just
idle speculation.
Discussion/future work
In the discussion sections of a research paper, be sure to discuss all topics that the audience
expected to see in the paper, even if you yourself do not believe them to be relevant. The
reader is more likely to assume that you have been sloppy about your literature review than to
assume you knew about the work but believed it not to be relevant. Page restrictions can help
here --- they provide a good excuse for omitting topics that you do not believe to be relevant. In
a longer article or thesis without page limits you have no choice but to address the issue and
explicitly state why the topic is not relevant despite the common belief that it is.
Bibliographies

Students often seem to think that bibliographies are mysterious, tricky things with rules far too
complex to understand or remember. Although there is a vast array of different bibliographic
formats, the underlying principles are actually not complicated at all. Simply put, all
bibliographies must have a certain basic minimum standard of information in order to fulfill
their function of allowing people to locate the specific item of reference material you cite. In
particular, every bibliography entry needs an author, date, and title, every journal article
absolutely must have a volume and page numbers, and every conference paper must have the
title of the conference proceedings, the page numbers, and some indication of who published it.
Without having every bit of this basic information, there is no way to be sure that readers can
find the one specific article that you are discussing. Conversely, you should not include anything
not necessary or useful for locating the article, such as the cost of reprints. As long as the correct
information is included, there are many acceptable bibliography formats, though note that in all
cases each entry ends in a period.
Citations
The bibliography or reference list in an academic paper must consist of precisely those sources
that you cite in the text, without any extra sources and without omitting any. Each citation must
provide enough information for the reader to find the correct source in the bibliography;
beyond that, any number of citation formats will do unless there is some specific standard you
are told to follow. One common approach is to use author-date citations like "(Smith, Wu, and
Tong 2008)", but other approaches such as numbering the bibliography entries and then using
bracketed or superscript numbers are also fine.

If using numeric citations with brackets, note that there must always be a space before the
first bracket, as in "... known [1]", (not "... known[1]").
If using author-date citations, you must remember that any item in parentheses does not
exist, as far as the grammar of the sentence is concerned, and thus it cannot be used as
part of the sentence. Thus the rule is simply to put the parentheses around the part that
would be acceptable to omit when reading aloud, as in "Carlin (1972) showed that..." or
"... as seen in rats (Carlin 1972)." (not "(Carlin 1972) showed that..." and not "... as seen
in rats Carlin (1972).").
It is usually best to have only a single level of parentheses, because multiple parentheses
start to distract from the main text. Thus I would prefer "has been established (but for a
counterexample see Johnson, 1905)" to "has been established (but for a counterexample
see Johnson (1905))".
"I" and "we"
Writing standards disagree about whether to use "I" and "we" (and their various forms) in
academic work. Some argue that those personal pronouns distract from what should be
objective and scientifically valid without recourse to any particular speaker, or even that they

just do not sound "scientific". Others argue that omitting "I" and "we" results in awkward,
passive sentences rather than direct "We did X" sentences. Personally, I believe that academic
writing should use personal pronouns whenever what is being reported was an arbitrary and
specific choice made by a human being, or for opinions or personal judgment, precisely because
these pronouns emphasize that a human was involved in the work. When reporting universal
scientific facts or observations, I would not use personal pronouns, because any reasonable
observer would have reported similar results and thus there is no need to emphasize the role of
the authors. Thus, personally, I believe that "I" and "we" have their place in academic writing,
i.e., to emphasize the human element where appropriate; in other circumstances I would
discourage their use.

Apology: My personal quirks

Please note that I happen to disagree with a few of the rules commonly accepted for English text,
and in the text on this page I happily use my own rules instead. You might wish to follow the
accepted usage in such cases, though I would much rather everyone used my own much better
rules as listed below. If you do agree to join my one-man campaign to fix the English language, I
cannot accept any responsibility for points deducted by less enlightened folks. :-)
Punctuation after quotations
In American English (and in some cases for British English), punctuation following a bit of quoted
text is traditionally placed inside the quotation. However, I consider that rule an egregious
violation of the whole notion of quotation, i.e. an obvious bug in the English language. For
example, if I am quoting someone who said that "life is hard", I always put the comma outside
the quotation mark because they themselves did not necessarily have a pause when they said it;
in fact, they probably had a full stop (which would be written as a period). Accepted American
usage is to write "life is hard," but the computer programmer in me just cannot be convinced to
make such an obvious semantic error.
Spaces around dashes
An em-dash is a long dash, longer than an en-dash and a hypen. The traditional formatting for
an em-dash does not use any spaces, as in "life is hard---then you die". However, I myself much
prefer to put a space before and after the dash. Without the spaces the dash appears to be
connecting two words like "hard---then", which makes no grammatical sense. Grammatically,
the function of the dash is to separate and connect phrases or clauses, not words, and I prefer
to make that visually clear by putting spaces around the dash. Again, in my opinion the accepted
usage is a bug in the language.
Dangling prepositions

Officially, it is an error to end a sentence with a preposition, as in "they arrived at the place they
were heading to". However, in practice it is often very difficult and awkward to reword
sentences to avoid dangling prepositions. Thus I consider this rule to be optional at best.
Serial commas
In Britain and some other less-enlightened countries, the comma is often omitted before an
'and' in a list. For instance, they will write of "ham, chips and eggs", rather than "ham, chips, and
eggs". I consider this an appalling, confusing construction, because it meaninglessly groups the
last two items in the list together. Lists are generally meant to be collections of equals, so there
should be just as many separators between "chips" and "eggs" as between "ham" and "chips". In
many cases, omitting the serial comma is ambiguous. Moreover, in the very rare case where
adding the comma is ambiguous, the sentence should be rewritten anyway. Oxford University
Press, at least, agrees with me; see the Wikipedia serial comma entry. Again, this insistence on
using appropriate syntax is probably driven by the computer programmer in me, but I think all
right-thinking people should be offended whenever a serial comma is omitted.
Commas after "i.e." and "e.g."
Many grammar books state that a comma is always required after "i.e." and "e.g." used in a
sentence, as in "sentences often contain spelling errors, i.e., words spelled incorrectly". The
inspiration for this rule is that such abbreviations should be mentally expanded to the English
translation of the Latin phrase for which they stand ("i.e." translating to "that is", and "e.g."
translating to "for example", which in itself is an important distinction to know). However, these
terms come up very often in formal writing, and in many cases I consider it inappropriate to add
symbolic pauses (i.e. commas) around them. Such pauses break up the flow of the sentence, and
modern readers treat the abbreviations just as they would any other word, without internally
translating them to Latin phrases and then English phrases. Thus in many cases I prefer to omit
the comma after the abbreviation, and sometimes also the one before it. Some people, even
more pedantic than I, disagree.

Five Tips to Improve Your Technical Writing

by Doug Nickerson

Books on technical writing contain guidelines on how to write specific technical pieces:
proposals, formal reports, abstracts, business letters. The five writing tips below will improve
your writing no matter what type of technical writing you do.
I. Get More Mileage out of Your Headings
It's hard to imagine tackling a writing project without breaking it down into separate parts. Most
documents longer than a page or two will be divided into several sections, each with a different
heading. Creating headings for these sections should be straightforward, but I frequently see
documents with headings that could use improvement. Many of these documents are my own!
A heading should be a phrase that clearly summarizes a section. If you've worked upon your
material until each paragraph and section has a clear topic or point, you should have no trouble
creating a short phrase that accurately conveys this topic information.
Supplying a heading that relates well to the content has many benefits. For example, a reader is
better able to skim your material, skipping sections that are not of immediate interest.
One problem I've seen in business and manual writing is headings that are too closely
interrelated with the text. In an attempt to avoid repetition, writers write the following (from a
software manual):
Opening a file
"To do this, pick Open from the File menu."
In this example, you must read the heading and the paragraph together or you are lost. In
grammatical terms, the antecedent of the pronoun "this," is in the heading. The text of the
paragraph depends upon the heading. A better approach is the following:
Opening a File (Or: "How to Open a File")
"To open a file, click the File menu and select Open."
In general, don't be afraid to repeat yourself in technical writing. Repetition helps your reader
establish the context of the material, especially when the content is unfamiliar.
Another problem with headings might be called "topic drift." When writing a first draft, I
frequently block out individual sections as they seem to fit, and compose a heading for each on
the fly. In later drafts, sections have a way of taking on a life of their own, and a hastilycomposed heading may no longer be on target.
To combat this, I check headings again after I've completed the first few drafts of a document.
While writing a computer book, I found that the development editor excelled in catching
inconsistencies between section headings and the text. Even if you do have the luxury of an
astute editor, it's still your responsibility as author to go to great lengths not to confuse the
reader!

Which makes me wonder, is "Get More Mileage out of Your Headings" really a good title for
this section? How about, "Keep Your Headings on Target"?
II. Use Present Tense
Present tense brings clarity and immediacy to describing a process or procedure. The cause and
effect nature of procedure writing tempts many writers to use future tense, however. For
example, a software manual may contain sentences such as:
"Click the File Menu, and select Print. The Print dialog box will be displayed."
Better:
"Click the File menu, and select Print. The Print dialog box displays."
True, it's natural (and often necessary) to use future tense when an action really is delayed a
period of time, that is, really happens in the future:
"Click Print and the 20 pages are sent to the print spooler, and will be printed in full color.
Why do writers mix up their tenses in technical writing, sometimes using future and past in the
same sentence? One answer is that it's astonishingly easy to do. Writing only in present tense,
when appropriate, is much harder.
Writers also use future tense to be very accurate when conveying causation (first this happens,
then that happens).
I find that keeping your text in the present tense usually does not confuse the reader. In fact, the
present tense is often easier to understand and enables the reader to skim along at a good pace.
An added benefit: if you're consistent with tenses, the reader begins to trust your writing and
your approach-and may even fill in the blanks in your prose where necessary (though this should
never be necessary!).
III. Identify the Actors in Your Sentences
Experts warn you to eradicate the passive voice from your writing. Not all vague and lifeless
prose derives from using the passive voice, however. It's sometimes more important to identify
the actor in each sentence.
Deciding who is performing the action, then placing this actor in the subject location, leads to
clearer writing. This advice, given by Joseph Williams1, seems especially relevant to technical
writing.
But when writing about technology, computers, or science, how do you identify the actor? It can
take some thought, since on many occasions the only available actor is an inanimate object. For
instance, when writing about a software system, sometimes the best actor is the software system
itself. Suppose you have a software program called Project-X and you write this:
"You are asked which file to open and your data will be graphed."

Better:
"Project-X displays a file open dialog and graphs your data."
Another example:
The opening of a file leads to disk access.
Better:
Whenever Project-X opens a file, it accesses the disk.
As an aside, referring to a software program this way is sometimes called anthropomorphizingyou make the program appear almost human. Some people feel that anthropomorphizing a
computer program is a bad practice. I think such an approach is fine as long as you don't talk
about its thoughts and feelings!
Here's another idea. When writing instructions, urging the reader to perform some action, make
the reader the actor in the sentence. The pronoun "you" will usually be implicit, as in the
following:
1. Assemble the top of the gas grill, following the steps in figure 1.
2. Attach the top to the bottom using the four wing nuts.
This approach gives you a clear actor (the reader), performing an action (assembling, attaching).
It places the sentence firmly in the active voice too. Of course, an editor or a company/publisher
style guide might abhor addressing the reader directly, so always check your local guidelines
first.
To summarize, sentences are bolder when a bold actor performs a bold action.
IV. Follow a Task-based Approach
When doing technical writing, you are often confronted with a mass of detail. If you're
documenting how to shut down a nuclear reactor, there are many details to get down on paper
(and accurately!). Many technical writers today find themselves writing about computer software
or hardware. The same thing applies.
When documenting a system, the first organization that suggests itself is to break a system up
into its parts. When writing about a lawn mower, you describe the parts: the motor, its
subassemblies, the spark plug, the adjustable handle, the blade. For a software system you
describe the interface: menus, screens, and the messages or reports produced by the system.
But consider this: readers are reading your document in order to accomplish something. So,
when writing a user manual for a lawn mower it's best to focus on how to start the mower, mow
the lawn, and stop the mower.
For a software system, you describe how to install, start the software, create a new document,
print a document, work with a document and save it, and how to shut down the system when

you're done. The structural approach, on the other hand, leads to sentences such as:
"The File menu (to the left of the Edit menu), contains the options New Document, Save, and
Save As, Print, and Exit"
A structural organization of technical material is not "wrong." In fact, you have to include
structural information if your document is to be complete. It is, however, prudent to study how
your information will be used. A software user (or a person mowing a lawn) wants first of all to
accomplish a task, and find out about bells and whistles later.
A task-based approach also affects the overall structure of your document. One approach is to
identify common tasks, place these first, followed by less-used tasks or features. The structural
material can be woven into the main text, or grouped it in a later reference-style section.
What tasks does the reader of your document want to perform? This analysis is difficult, but with
effort you can come up with at least the most obvious tasks you must document. Put those in
first, then continue. Your writing will benefit in terms of organization, readability and usability.
V. Thinking Is Writing Too
When considering (and estimating) the total effort involved in a writing project, don't overlook
the work done to analyze your topic.
In creative writing it's recognized that the down time spent away from the keyboard (or pen and
paper) is important. James Thurber, journalist, novelist, humorist, and New Yorker staffer, was
asked when it was that he wrote: "I have a hard time telling when I'm not writing," he is
supposed to have said.
The down time of technical writing may be less unconscious (though I'm not so sure the
unconscious doesn't play a role here too). During your down time, you analyze the product,
process, and procedure to be documented. You need this time to understand what you are writing
about.
In organizations with staff technical writers, writers may have access to people who are expert in
the subject being documented. They may be the creators or designers of the system being written
about. Sometimes known as Subject Matter Experts (SMEs), these people are crucial to
establishing what needs to be communicated.
Today, technical writers often call themselves technical communicators and think of themselves
as "advocates" for the user. That is, they explain a system clearly from the user's perspective,
anticipating the questions and problems of an average user.
In some situations, technical writers may suggest changes to the system or procedure while it's
being designed. Constantly thinking about the user's perspective makes them uniquely able to
make such suggestions.
In my experience, whether their suggestions are accepted depends upon the personalities and

politics of the organization, and upon the technical feasibility of the suggestions. But success
here, as well as generally, depends on the ability of the technical communicator to communicate.
These five tips may help.

Identifying Your Writing Weakness and Overcoming It

Posted on April 27, 2011 by Trish Loye Elliott
To achieve success in life we need to be able to identify our weaknesses and compensate for
them. We should always work towards our strengths, but we cant just ignore our weaknesses.
They can hold us back or limit us if we ignore them.
To achieve a successful writing career we dont just need talent. We need perseverance and
discipline. My post today isnt about identifying the weakness in our writing, such as poor
dialogue, messy plot structure or what-have-you. This is about identifying the weakness in our
writing practice.
Once our writing weakness has been identified, we can focus on ways to offset it. Below are
some of the major challenges facing a writer. Not all of them will apply to every writer. The key
is to acknowledge what you face and find ways around it. Here are seven key writing practice
weaknesses and some ideas on how to work around them:
1. Disorganization: The disorganized writer spends the first five minutes at her desk clearing
away papers and books, so she can see her keyboard. When everything is finally clear, she starts
to write, unfortunately its not the scene she wanted to write originally because she couldnt find
her notes for it. She tells herself that it probably wasnt that good of a scene anyway.
A disorganized person makes extra work for themselves. A few tricks to help might include
getting an organized friend to help set up a filing system, or perhaps to indulge in a writing
program that allows for note-taking and compels organization, such as Scrivener.
2. Lack of Attention to Detail: (A subset of Disorganization) This writer might successfully
finish a first draft, but realizes on the first read through that all secondary characters and
locations are exactly the same because he couldnt remember what the secondary characters or
locations looked/talked/walked like. He never takes notes because *he taps his head* its all up
here.
The obvious solution to this dilemma is for the writer to take notes. Jot down each new
character/location/idea in a notebook, in a spreadsheet, or whatever works for you. Ask friends
how they do it and try different methods until you find something that works. Believe me, it will
make revisions much easier.
3. Procrastination: Why do today what can be done tomorrow? We all have to deal with this
devil at some point. And if you dont ever procrastinate? I dont think I want to know you.

Routine can help with procrastination. Knowing you sit down every day at a certain time to write
will make it a habit and procrastination doesnt work as well with habits. If you are a writer who
grabs time wherever you can, then try reminding yourself of how much you love writing. Much
more than cleaning the kitchen, paying the bills or whatever youve decided is more important at
the moment. Remember writing is a priority to you.
4. Easily Distracted: Actually a subset of the Procrastinator. Oh! My email dinged, back in a
sec Im back. It was just my mother. Oh! I love this song. Im just going to check iTunes for
something similar for my writing playlist Okay, Im back. Wait What was I writing about?
A To-Do list will help keep this writer focused and on track. Also, (since this is a personal
problem of mine) keep a timer handy. Use it to time either your writing or your distraction time
(meaning how long you can surf the net for). Another solution for those who are distracted
mainly by the Internet is to turn it off completely. For those of you who are distracted by
anything, such as pretty views or noises, then you should probably work in a quiet room with
bare walls. Or a cave.
5. Someone Unable to Say No: I dont have this problem but Ive seen it attack many friends
(and my husband). Commitments theyve made pile up and they struggle to find time to write.
Theyre stressed. They want to write. Yet, as soon as someone needs them to add one more thing
to their already hectic life that sucks away more of their writing time, they say yes.
If youre a writer like this then talk to someone significant in your life, a friend or spouse. It
doesnt matter who as long as theyll tell it to you straight. Tell them you have a problem (yes, it
is a problem) and get them to help you sort out your priorities. Talking it out, really does help. If
youre a serious over-committer then perhaps you should talk to your significant someone as a
precaution before you say yes to anything. Enough stopping and talking/thinking will hopefully
allow you to realize that you dont need to do it all yourself.
6. Insecurity: This is an awful problem that we all go through at one point or another. The writer
who is insecure or fearful, never attends a writing group, writing class or conference for fear that
she might have to show her writing. This fear of rejection prevents learning and growth.
This is a hard step all writers must get beyond. While your writing may be your baby it is not
you (even if it does feel like a piece of your soul thats being bared to the world). If someone
critiques your writing, it is no reflection on you as a person. Perhaps try an online writing group
to share your work with. Ive never done this, but the relative anonymity might be appealing to
some.
7. Waiting for My Muse: In my opinion the Muse strikes when we are feeling our best. For this
writer, everything must be exactly in place before he can start to write. The stars, moons and
desk chair must be aligned perfectly for the words to flow from his mind, to his fingers, to the
page. He must have had enough sleep, enough food and enough downtime before he will sit his
butt in a chair to write. (Can you tell I dont have much sympathy for this writer?)

I do believe that we write better when we take care of ourselves; food, rest, exercise, downtime,
etc This is what allows our creativity to really flow. I also believe that unless you are a
wealthy hermit, to consistently write you must steal time from other things; rest/sleep,
family/friend-time, or downtime. The Muse visits all of us, but theyre sporadic visits at first.
And if you wait for her? Then you wont write at all.
We all want to be successful writers, and if we limit our weaknesses then well be that much
more able to focus on our strengths. Create the habits that will lead to your success.
Id love to hear what your writing weakness is and how you overcome it.

Enhance Your Writing Skills with Six Simple Tips

Most people dread the thought of writing and dread even more the thought of someone else
reading their work. Starting from a young age, it is stressed how important writing is and how it
is an essential tool in life.
What I have realized about writing is that it is a never-ending learning process. This is one area
where there is always room for improvement. The techniques suggested are tips that I have used
to become a better writer.
Read Your Work Out Loud
This is probably the easiest way to check for grammatical errors in your writing. Turn off the
television, put your phone on silent, and tune out any other distraction. When reading your
writing aloud, speak up as if you are talking to another person and read slowly so you are sure to
speak every word written. At that point, you should be able to hear and spot your errors.
Have Someone Read Your Work and Read Someone Else's Work
This is the practice where you swap essays with another person and edit each other's work.
Letting someone else read your work and reading someone else's work allows for a different
point of view. This is a good exercise, because there may be suggestions of alternate words,
phrases and ways to write sentences. Humans can correct what computers overlook.
Use Your Writing Resources
If you are still in school, take advantage of the after school writing program or the writing center
on campus. These resources are generally free with a specified schedule. From my experience in
college, you are able to reserve an hour for one-on-one time with a writing professional. The
instructors walk you through your paper and you are able to see the mistakes with them. Also,
they provide useful tricks and tips for your future writing assignments.

Use the Thesaurus

Most words have synonyms. I can never get enough of using the thesaurus. This is a great tool
built into Microsoft Word or even using an actual thesaurus. It helps the writer use a broader
range of terms rather than a repetitive word throughout their work. Soon enough, your
vocabulary will become stronger with the use of a thesaurus.
Spell Check
Along with the thesaurus, use spell check once you are done writing. This will clean up the
spelling and punctuations errors. Keep in mind, though, that spell check does not know the
difference between, for example, "there" and "their." Spell check is only concerned with the
spelling of the word, not how the word is implied.
Keep It Simple
As the title suggests, keep your sentence structure simple! Sometimes people forget and try to
write impressive sentences, which turn out to be run-on and/or pointless sentences. Remember to
write sentences that are meaningful to the focus of your work because they will be more affective
with your audience.
I suggest that you do not try to mimic another writer, but rather enhance the writing skills you
were born with!

7 Ways to Improve Your Writing Right Now

Many of you would love to write more compelling blog posts, articles or web copy.
Youve heard all the old advice. Practice makes perfect. Get your 10,000 hours in. Just show up
and write.
And of course, thats all a good idea. It just takes so danged long.
Meanwhile, Ive got a couple of fast ways you can improve your writing immediately. No
waiting for that pesky, tedious practice to kick in.
Way better.
Be concise and be clear

Youve heard this one a million times. Tight, concise, easy-to-read pieces are heaven for readers.
Long, complex, convoluted ones are just confusing.
Very often, the longer you write, the less you hold a readers interest.

If you cant say it simply in just a few words, then youve lost readers. Write short, write lean,
and write clearly, so you dont have to waste words explaining what youve just written.
Keep it short

Not your writing (although thats a good idea), but your line length.
Interestingly, people actually read longer lines faster. But fast reading isnt necessarily what you
want them to be doing. You want readers to be absorbing what you wrote, understanding your
message, and reading comfortably as well.
So go for short. Set your page layout so that its not full width, or if you need that full width,
keep sentences short and use plenty of paragraph breaks.
100 characters per line is optimal for speed but about 45 characters is best for reader comfort.
Stick to three

3 is a magic number.
Its said that people can process 7 bits of information (more or less) at a time. But the number
thats most compelling is the one we like the best: 3.
So have 3 bullet points. 3 steps, 3 strategies. Use the number 3 as often as you can.
Not only will you capture better reader interest by doing so, but youll improve your readers
ability to remember what youve written. We tend to chunk information into groups of three, and
recall those triads more easily.
Watch your tone

Its easy for writers to assume readers can pick up on our mood and tone from our writing.
After all, we certainly know our feelings, humor, intent, and state of mind at the time we write.
But for readers, its clear as mud. Theyre guessing at your tone and they may guess wrong.
Heres an example:
Honey. Please.
Was I exasperated and rolling my eyes? Smiling and gently teasing? Acidly sarcastic? Or maybe
just eating toast and reaching for the bear-shaped bottle?
As a reader, you have no idea unless the words around that phrase cue you into my written tone.

Talk Food, Sex, and Danger

Susan Weinschenk from What Makes Them Click is writing a great series called 100 Things
You Should Know About People.
Go check it out. Its good. Seriously good.
In this resource, Susan mentions that our brains always ask the following questions:
Can I eat it? Can I have sex with it? Will it kill me?
Nice.
Nice for you, too, because if you want people to pay more attention to your writing, bring up
those big three (theres that number again). Use stories and examples that touch on aspects of
food, sex, or danger.
Add descriptors or associative words. Pair it with a nice picture, if youd like. Itll glue them to
the page.
Break it up

Time and again, I see writers spooling out long, chunky paragraphs.
No, no, no.
Make it easy for people to read your work. The easier it is, the more theyll get your point and
enjoy reading and thats what you want.
Reading online is tiring (yes, even for you fresh-eyed Gen Ys out there). So you need to do
everything you can to make it less of a strain.

No more than three sentences to a paragraph, please, and keep those sentences short.
Add bullet points and subheads to guide people along.
Oh, and bump up that font size, would you? Tiny means squint, and thats no good.

Stay on topic

I know how tough this one is I commit the crime of wandering too often myself, and have to
make sure I dont stray too far from my main point.
If I add too many points to a piece of writing, readers get confused about the main point of my
post. Theyll be confused about yours, too.

Building an outline helps. Decide on the main point of your piece and create three (!) sub-points
that support it. Make sure each one ties back to the message you want to get across to readers,
and make sure each sub-point is supportive and relevant.
So there are your quick guides to becoming a better writer today.
How about you? Whats your favorite tip for immediate writing improvement? Let us know in
the comments!
About the Author: If you want to improve your writing skills quickly, easily and with personal
attention, check out Men with Pens and James Chartrands newly-launched writing coach
program today. Youll be on the fast track to word success!
Whether we're composing a blog or a business letter, an email or an essay, our goal should be to
respond clearly and directly to the needs and interests of our readers. These ten tips should help
us sharpen our writing whenever we set out to inform or persuade.
1. Lead with your main idea.
As a general rule, state the main idea of a paragraph in the first sentence--the topic
sentence. Don't keep your readers guessing.
See Practice in Composing Topic Sentences.

2. Vary the length of your sentences.

In general, use short sentences to emphasize ideas. Use longer sentences to explain,
define, or illustrate ideas.
See Sentence Variety.

3. Put key words and ideas at the beginning or end of a sentence.

Don't bury a main point in the middle of a long sentence. To emphasize key words, place
them at the beginning or (better yet) at the end.
See Emphasis.

4. Vary sentence types and structures.

Vary sentence types by including occasional questions and commands. Vary sentence
structures by blending simple, compound, and complex sentences.
See Basic Sentence Structures.

5. Use active verbs.

Don't overwork the passive voice or forms of the verb "to be." Instead, use dynamic verbs
in the active voice.
See Writing Advice From Stephen King.

6. Use specific nouns and verbs.

To convey your message clearly and keep your readers engaged, use concrete and
specific words that show what you mean.
See Detail and Specificity.

7. Cut the clutter.

When revising your work, eliminate unnecessary words.
See Practice in Cutting the Clutter.

8. Read aloud when you revise.

When revising, you may hear problems (of tone, emphasis, word choice, and syntax) that
you can't see. So listen up!
See The Advantages of Reading Aloud.

9. Actively edit and proofread.

It's easy to overlook errors when merely looking over your work. So be on the lookout for
common trouble spots when studying your final draft.
See Revision Checklist and Editing Checklist.

10. Use a dictionary.

When proofreading, don't trust your spellchecker: it can tell you only if a word is a word,
not if it's the right word.
11. owadays it is very trendy to focus primarily on communicative skills and
neglecting writing as a method of learning an English language. Though it is essential to
make yourself understood in speech, writing as such is at least as important as the ability
to speak.
12. The more written exercises you solve, the more youll be able to see correspondences of
English, not to mention the fact that nowadays written English is one of the main tools
of workplace communication (e.g. emails or chat) sometimes even if youre sitting next
to the person you work with. If you are looking for formal and informal email phrases
you can start using right now, you should definitely check this list.

13. It is quite embarrassing to make spelling or other type of mistakes on your own language
so it would be the same in your official emails wouldnt it?

14.
15. So what to do to improve your English writing skills?
16. 1. It might sound a bit childish but dont forget to take notes during classes and do
all your homework! People seem to have forgotten to write down what the teacher says
and the lack of time results in lack of homework. It is very demanding to study something
while at the same time youre working, but learning a language always requires a lot of
effort.
17. Online graduate programs in education provide a great way to help balance your study
and work time, all the while you are enhancing your language skills.
18. 2. Translate! Translating tasks are not very popular nowadays, though can be useful for
those you enjoy it.
19. 3. Start correspondence with your foreign friends. This-provided lasts long enoughhas always been and will be a quite useful way of improving your English written
language.
20. 4. Search interactive websites that provide online practice and correction! Like
Quizlet, UsingEnglish or Grammar Check.
21. 5. Utilize social media! There are a great number of online platforms where you can
share, chat and comment and all that in English! How to Learn English in a new way!
22. 6. Improve your English writing skills by blogging. Check out this post: 7 Real Ways
Blogging Can Make You A Better Teacher And Learner.
23. Can you add any writing exercises that you enjoy? Where and when do you use written
English?

10 Tips to Improve Your Fiction Writing Skills

This post was contributed by Kelly Kilpatrick, who writes on the subject of distance learning
universities. She invites your feedback at kellykilpatrick24 at gmail dot com.

Writing fiction, whether short or long, can be a very trying experience indeed. So many writers
of fiction have different processes for achieving their writing goals that its hard to sift through
what works and what doesnt.
Writing is a process that requires skill, determination, adaptability, and plenty of time. Here are
some suggestions for improving your fiction writing skills, gleaned from trial and error over
time.

1. Start With a Seed

Some great fiction books are simply a product of asking the question, What if? Starting a
new work of fiction requires just a small seed to get you going. Beginning without too much
baggage can really help get the ball rolling.
1. Let the Story Tell Itself
Think of yourself as a medium, or a vehicle, for a story that wants to be told. You may have
some idea about where things are going, but dont create too many constraints for yourself. The
story will unfold if you are ready to work hard on keeping up with what it has to say.
1. Use Realistic Characters and Dialogue
This is accomplished through many different approaches. As a writer, you must learn to hone
your powers of observation and watch people and how they interact. Research can come in a
variety of forms, from reading other authors to watching movies as well. Keen observation skills
and personal experience will help guide you through this aspect of fiction writing.
1. Write What You Know
This is a well-known mantra for fiction writers, yet many fail to adhere to this simple principle of
fiction writing. When you write about things you know and experiences youve had, the writing
is easier to read and comes across as more authentic.
1. Close the Door
When youre ready to get down to business, find a place where you can go to tune the rest of the
world out. If you are planning on writing a long work of fiction, you will essentially be living
in the story. Be prepared to shut yourself in as you work on bringing your tale to life.
1. Keep Pushing Forward
Dont get caught up in the past; keep writing each day without taking time to go back and
reread. The time for reading what you have written will come, and thats when you can fix any

inconsistencies. Keep writing and worry about the minute details during the revision process.
Dedicating specific amounts of time regularly will help you to get the project finished sooner
rather than later.
1. Put it Away When Youre Finished
When you feel your story has come to a close, put it away. Get it out of your sight and try your
best not to revisit the work while the story is fresh in your mind. Putting some distance between
writing and editing will do you and your story some good.
1. Start a New Project
Get started right away on something new to increase the distance between you and your previous
work. This will help you to come back with a new perspective and keep your productivity level
high in the process.
1. Return to Your Finished Product
After some time has passed, pull out your manuscript and read the piece with a pair of fresh
eyes. Chances are you will find ways to improve upon and revise the story to make it flow more
smoothly.
1. Revise and Edit
Cuts will have to be made and the revision process can be time consuming, but will help out
when youre ready to share your work with another reader for their opinion. Make sure that you
polish your work as much as possible before giving it out to others for their opinions.
Eliminating clutter and proofreading errors will help to get honest feedback without trivial
details getting in the way.
If you have any fiction writing tips to share, feel free to post them in the comments or send them
in as a guest post.
8 Tips to Improve Your English Writing Skills
Strong writing skills in English come from practice and determination. No one is born an
excellent writer. Learning to be an excellent writer in English takes a lot of time and
practice. Anyone can be a good writer if they are determined enough.
Everyone has a different reason why they need to improve their writing. Maybe you need to
improve your writing for work or for your English class at university. Or maybe you want to start
a blog about learning English or you need to respond to emails in English for your business.
Below are 8 Tips to Improve Your English Writing Skills:

1. Keep All of your Writing in One Place

Buy a notebook or journal or start an electronic journal. By keeping your writing all in the same
place, you will be able to see how much you are improving and keep it organized.
2. Practice Writing in English Daily
The importance of writing daily is that you start to create a new habit. Writing every day in
English will soon become natural and something you look forward to. You will not see a
significant improvement if you are not dedicated to becoming a better writer in English. You
cannot create awesome stories and papers if you never try.
3. Pick a Topic and WRITE!
Dont get stuck on figuring out what to write about. You can write about anything. You can write
about what you do, things you hear or see, news, or make up a story. If you do get stuck, use
some of English Tonights writing prompts to help you get started.
4. Write More than One Draft
Draft means a preliminary version of piece of writing. Sometimes, your best writing becomes
better after you take a break and work on a second or third draft. When you revise (or rewrite)
your work you are often able to get your message across more clearly. You make think of things
that you did not think to write in the first draft and you can add it in a later draft.
5. Use Online Resources to Correct your Grammar
Yes, grammar is a pain. You dont need to know everything about English grammar. Use online
resources, such as Grammarly, GrammarCheck or GrammarBook.com to help you answer a
grammar question when it comes up. You could also switch the spell and grammar check on MS
Word, your iPad or Google Doc to check your spelling and grammar in English.
6. Think Outside the Box (or Lines)
Dont write about the same thing every day or you will get bored. Try writing the same story
from different perspectives or different tenses. If you are writing a story about a baby that wont
stop crying; first, it could be the mother telling the story; then from the perspective of the baby.
Or you could write it in present moment. My baby hasnt stopped crying in five days and
then write in the perspective of a pregnant woman that is thinking about having a baby that wont
stop crying. Dont write about topics in the obvious way. Be creative!
7. Have a Friend Edit Your Writing
Have a friend that knows English correct or edit your work. Having another person read your
work helps generate more ideas to better your writing. You could have them edit everything or
just a part that you are stuck on. Often having another set of eyes look at your writing helps find
mistakes that you have overlooked.
8. Find the Best Place for You to Write
You should try writing in different places or at different times of the day. Maybe you have
writers block at night; try getting up 15 minutes earlier and writing in the morning. Maybe you
have trouble writing where there is a lot of noise; try writing in a quiet and comfortable place.
Experiment in finding the right (or write?) environment for you to write.

Writing is a process; the more you work on your writing the better it (and you) will get.
Thank you for reading this post on English Tonight. If you liked this article; try reading: 6 Tips
to Help You Revise Your English Writing.
- See more at: http://english-tonight.com/8-tips-to-improve-english-writingskills/#sthash.L2iLGso4.dpuf

10 ways to improve your writing skillsquickly

It's one thing to say you're a writer. It's another to take writing seriously enough that you strive to
improve your writing skills every day.
Ask any writer whether they read, and the answer will be "yes." However, it takes more than
reading newspapers, magazines, journals, blogs, and books to improve your writing skills. You
must immerse yourself in the world of writing and be 100 percent committed to the craft.
To help you become the best writer you can be, here are 10 techniques to improve your writing
skills.
1. Keep a journal.
Believe it or not, writing in a journal can help you improve your writing skills. It can also help
you discover new story ideas that could be developed into the next best-seller.
When you write in your journal, don't censor your words. Allow them to flow freely.
2. Participate in writing prompts.
Writer's Digest, Creative Copy Challenge, and other writing resources provide writing exercises
and prompts. These are good ways to improve your writing and to test story ideas.
3. Rewrite your blog posts.
If you have a blog, go back a couple of years and find a few blog posts to rewrite and repurpose.
You may be surprised how much your writing has improved over time.
4. Rewrite newspaper and magazine articles.
Choose your favorite newspaper or magazine, and rewrite a couple of the articles. Challenge
yourself to write a stronger headline and copy.
5. Activate Google alerts.

Setup a Google Alert for writing, writing skills, book writing, and other alerts, and follow the
latest stories. Read what other writers are doing to improve their writing skills.
6. Read beyond what you normally read.
If you have a hankering for fantasy, sci-fi, romance, memoirs, YA, NA, middle grade, self-help,
or whatever tickles your writer's fancy, get out of your comfort zone and read something
different. Stretch your mind, and you'll stretch your writing skills.
7. Comment on your favorite blog posts.
Challenge yourself to write in-depth comments instead of the familiar, "Great post!" or, "Thanks
for sharing this brilliant information." Such vapid comments do not add to the conversation, nor
do they improve your writing skills. Here's a tip: If you want to get noticed by the blog owner
and taken seriously, write a decent comment.
8. Join a writer's group.
Don't be shy about sharing your writing. One of the greatest ways to improve your writing is to
join a writer's group in which you'll receive valuable feedback such as how to strengthen
introductions, how to develop characters, how to write stronger scenes, and more. Please note:
You may have to try out a few groups before you find any that work for you.
9. Attend a writer's conference or workshop.
When I lived in Chandler, Ariz., I was blessed to have found Changing Hands Bookstore in
Tempe. The owners schedule writing workshops throughout the year. Not only did I meet fellow
aspiring authors, I met published authors who would share writing tips and tricks such as the
importance of using an outline, whether you write fiction or nonfiction.
Writer's conferences and workshops are good places to meet editors, literary agents, publishers,
and other writers. You can take a class or two and improve your writing skills in no time, and the
contacts you make are invaluable to your career.
10. Write.
You must write to improve your writing skills. Try to write at least 1,000 words each day or
every other day. When you think you've finished writing, write some more. When you think
you've really finished writing, keep writing.
To improve your writing, you need to write five days a week, 50 weeks per year, if not more.
Writing requires dedication and time. If you're serious about being a published author, you need
to write and write and write.
If you want to improve your writing skills and write a best-seller, start writing at least 1,000
words every day.

Being a skilled writer and published author is not an impossible dream. It's closer to reality than
you might believe.
Amandah Tayler Blackwell is a published author with Nascent Digital Press under the pen name
Celeste Teylar. She's the owner of Savvy-Writer.com, and is a freelance, ghost and creative
writer. A version of this article originally appeared on Nascent Digital Press.

Ten Great Technical Writing Tips

Technical writing is a skill that will not only help you to better understand a software or system
that you are working with, but also will help you to build credibility before others in an
organization, especially as a knowledge expert regarding the topic or areas you are covering in
your documentation. Here are ten tips for improving your technical writing skills, and these may
be applied to not only software, but also to internal processes and procedures that define how a
company operates:
1. Identify your writing goal. Many times when someone is explaining a system or a
software functionality, he or she gets lost in the details of the system and the reader is not
able to assimilate the details with the final goal of the documentation you are writing.
Stay focused, and if you need, include a comment or two reminding the user of their final
goal in reading the documentation.
2. Keep screen shots small. Sometimes, technical writers or support personnel capture a
whole screen when there is only a part of the screen that needs capturing. This will help
the reader to assimilate the button or field you are discussing with the screen.
3. Explain, explain, explain! Many times, technical writers explain an idea without a
tangible example. Examples always help the reader to assimilate the lesson/idea with the
practical use of the software or system. There is nothing more frustrating than reading
text that has seemingly no relevance to the system.
4. Realize that your reader is not an expert. The majority of people reading documentation
will not be system or software experts. That is why they are reading the documentation!
The ones who really know the system will navigate without the written words. So, be
clear in your explanations, taking the reader by the hand as much as possible.
5. Repeat if you must. As you explain a system or software, there may be aspects that must
be re-mentioned for the reader to successfully assimilate the current idea with the idea
base you have been building all along in your write-up.
6. Tables Rock. I especially appreciate a technical writer who can summarize fields or
related processes and procedures in a table. This is a good visual way for the reader to
further understand the document, using relative comparison, in the form of a table.
7. Use sufficient margins in your pages. Do not create a document with narrow margins,
because when it comes time to publish, there could be issues related to creating PDFs or
even web pages (HTML), so use ample margins.
8. Quote & note your sources. Make sure you create a document that reveals sources that
are authorities on the matter and that are recognized in a field.

9. Dont be afraid to ask both technical and non-technical personnel review your work. It is
good to see the perspectives of readers from both the technical and non-technical aspects
of a business.
10. Proofread your work, always! There is nothing more embarrassing than submitting work
that has typos or other obvious grammatical or structural problems. After writing a
document, take a fifteen minute break, then return to the document with a fresh
perspective.