Writing Together: session reflection
In this post we are going to outline the help and support that we discussed with students at our recent Writing Together session.
The participants at the session shared the following challenges they were facing with writing and together we discussed some options for how these could be overcome.
- Putting down thoughts and ideas into formal, scientific style of writing
- Starting, knowing what to write using the correct language
Some of the writers present felt out of practice and we discussed ways that would boost confidence. We mentioned freewriting strategies and the importance of drafting and revising writing.
The value there is on keeping words and meaning simple to not overcomplicate language and using the academic phrasebank and a thesaurus when revising drafts can improve writing to appear more ‘academic.’
- Format and style of academic essays
- Critical thinking and structure of essays
There are lots of ways to plan and structure an essay or a paper. A simple approach could be to write a structure using either questions that you aim to answer or using your topic sentences.
To do the above planning effectively it is important that you know what you are going to write about.
- Knowing when to stop reading and start writing
We also talked a little about how frequent writing about anything could improve style as could reading more in your subject area and becoming more familiar with the language of your discipline.
- Pulling information together — literature review
Note-making for a large piece of work can result in you having copious notes but you might find that these are helpful as memos that you can use with your writing.
There was also a short discussion on preparing to write and getting into the right frame of mind. Could classical or instrumental music on Spotify assist with this or the Headspace App that has focus soundtracks to get you in the mood for writing.
Finally there was chat about favoured reference management tools with Mendeley being favoured especially with its note-making tool. Alternative to Mendeley are available
Writing Together aims to give you a dedicated distraction free time to get on with writing. It makes use of the Pomodoro Technique where you focus for bursts of time. Over a couple of hours you can work alongside other staff and students on your own writing and in the breaks share good ideas and practice with your peers.
