How to improve your research habits for better writing
Great writing tips for newbies, session 8
This is the eighth part of an ongoing session of writing tips that I post regularly to this blog. For those of you who are keeping up with these postings, thanks. In session seven I finished a discussion on how to write content that will get noticed. I went over 13 sound ways to improve your writing content. In this session, we are going to discuss ways to improve your research habits for better writing. Now that we have a good understanding of how to write better content, it’s necessary to have some good research habits to go along with the great writing you’ll be doing. So, let’s get started!
Session 8
Good research habits are an essential part of any writing project. It pays to have your resources, citation, and facts conveniently stored in one place. Not only will this help you organize your writing, but it will also provide you with a backup catalog of any of these resources for your material in case you need to reference it or in case it’s called for by an editor or someone wishing to publish your work.
Most everyone uses MS Word today for their writing, Times New Roman, 12 pt font. If you like something else, then, by all means, go with what you know. When I start a writing project I like to keep the links, resources, and URL’s I find that interest me in one place, on a word document. I will label and save this document on my desktop then work from it to start my research.
Once I start finding material on the web I then do one of two things, if it is a PDF I save it to a folder labeled for the writing project, if it is a webpage I keep a separate bookmark folder so I can bring them up on screen quickly. Then I use several different programs that can be found for free on the internet to perform my research, write my material, write my citations correctly, and get a good review of my written work. We are going to discuss each of these in quick detail. They will help you so much with your writing if you use them as intended.
- The Purdue Owl, my one-stop for any questions I have pertaining to writing. These guys are the experts, and their material is always up-to-date.
- JSTOR, a great place to find reputable sources for your writing. You have to join the site, but you get a certain amount of free resources each month when you do.
- Mendeley, this is a great site for keeping your PDF research in one very organized place. You can enter as much info as you like for your files, view them onscreen in any order you like, highlight the important facts you find, and so much more. This site has saved me a lot of time over the years.
- Citefast, this site lets you enter an ISBN book number, URL, and other author information to produce a properly formatted citation in either APA, MLA, or Chicago style for anything from a webpage to an online video.
- PaperRater, I use this site to give me a review of academic papers like essays, journal articles, and reports. It also checks for any plagiarism issues.
- Grammarly, use this site to keep your writing free of any grammar mistakes.
- The Hemingway App, use this site to keep your writing readable.
I use each of the above sites for my own research and writing projects. I do not, however, endorse them in any way. If you find something that works better for you use that.
The steps I perform for research and writing are simple;
- I do the leg-work and perform the research using JSTOR or another reputable research site for academic stuff, and the web for common material. (when using the web for any research you must do the fact-checking yourself, always use current material, nothing outdated)
- Then I save the best material that I find somewhere convenient; I keep my PDF’s in an accessible online program like Mendeley.
- Now I write, if necessary I refer to the Purdue Owl writing site for any help or issues I come across that are writing based.
- After writing, I check my facts and citations. I check facts myself using Internet resources, citations are done with Citefast.
- If everything is good so far I run my written work through PaperRater if it’s an academic piece, if it’s for the web I run it through the Hemingway App.
- Once I get everything edited I run the material through the Hemingway App. This gives you a good idea of how readable your work is.
After all the steps above are taken I take a break from the project for a bit before doing a good proofread of the material.
This lets me get a fresh perspective of the subject and think about where I can tighten the writing up if possible. If all is well I publish the work in the appropriate place for it online or submit it to the correct dropbox for approval.
It’s important to note that each of these suggestions and steps can be used for any type of writing project, web content writing, blog writing, academic papers, product reviews, essays, journal articles, etc.
Thanks for taking time out of your day to review the information presented here in session 8.
If you missed session 7 feel free to review it at your own leisure. I hope this article was of some help to those seeking to become better writers. Session 9 will be posted soon.
As always- find what works best for you in everything that you do, including writing. Always write what you feel and never let others sway your opinions or ideas.
Write something GREAT today!
