1. NACCQ 2007 Research Workshop: Writing it Right! Clare Atkins School of Business & Computer Technology Nelson Marlborough Institute of Technology Research is performed in order to be used, and used by somebody else.
9. Making an impact or Going Fishing….. Your work needs to have baited hooks! Things that will entice the reader to read on. There are some obvious hooks to bait…..
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15. Improving your style Style is very individual but here are some useful tips…
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19. Improving your structure There are three stages to scholarly authorship. The first is finding something to say; the second is arranging it; the third expressing it (inventio, dispositio and elocutio). …writing is not just having something to say and saying it. There is a middle phase.. “
25. Activity 1 Free-Writing The purpose of free-writing is to loosen you up and warm you up for some serious writing. What you write is much less important than the fact that you are writing. Back Pick up a pen/pencil and a pad of paper When I say “Go” - Write for 5 minutes about your topic without stopping ….If you can’t think of what to write, just write “blah blah blah” until you think of words related to your topic. You don’t have to write sentences, or correct grammar or correct spelling – JUST WRITE! GO! STOP!
26. Activity 2 - Knowing what to say Nutshelling Nutshelling is a technique for trying to explain a complicated idea in as brief a way as possible. It requires you to create ONE sentence which begins, “In a nutshell……” Lets try it! “ In a nutshell the main problem with my writing is……………………………………………………………………………..”
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28. Activity 3 Editing “ Writing is largely re-writing. All scholarly prose improves with revision” The purpose of editing is to sharpen up and clarify your writing. Often you can cut your word count considerably. You should concentrate on making your writing easy to follow and interesting to read. Back Take 5 mins to revise this paragraph…. “ Objective considerations of contemporary phenomena compel the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account.” ( original )
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30. Activity 4 Titles - Back My favourite so far: Assessment of the quality of copulation partners in the monogamous bearded tit
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32. Activity 6 – Problem statement This is a form of ‘nutshelling’ – the one sentence summary. Imagine you have spent half an hour explaining your work to an audience. What is the one thing you really want them to remember in 48 hours time? Write that one thing as one sentence… Back NOW! Read that sentence out to the group, followed by your title. Do they match? Spend a few minutes, revising your title and your ‘one sentence’. Could your one sentence stand as the problem statement?
33. Activity 7 – Grammar and Punctuation What, if anything, is wrong with these ? The design of a web-page can effect it’s marketing potential. Frodo killed the orc with a sword I am very adaptable, will eat anything and am very fond of children. Woman without her man is nothing. Back The design of a web-page can a ffect i ts marketing potential. The design can a ffect its e ffectiveness With his sword, Frodo killed the orc (or did the orc have the sword?) I am very adaptable and will eat anything. I am also very fond of children. I am very adaptable. I will eat anything. I am very fond of children. Woman without her man, is nothing OR Woman: without her, man is nothing.
34. Original - George Orwell Back “ I am going to translate a passage of good English into modern English of the worst sort. Here is a well-known verse from Ecclesiastes: I returned and saw under the sun that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all. Here it is in modern English: Objective considerations of contemporary phenomena compel the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account.” George Orwell , Politics and the English Language (1946) in Shooting an Elephant (1950) quoted in Watson (1989).
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