Writing | Writer's Pad

Writing: The Importance of Second Opinions

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You are – in your most humble opinion – brilliant. Your writing reflects a superior collection of thoughts and theories, the academic wonders that are certain to be recognized by all. You are daring with your dissections of history and philosophy, able to conjure intrigue from dull statistics. Your papers are experiences, not mere pages. Words are your carefully chosen allies, meant to sway others and prove genius.

That genius means little, however, when it’s revealed that you left a substantial amount of grammatical errors and spelling mistakes in your work. This was an unfortunate and avoidable consequence.

Your inspiration cannot be denied; but it can be tamed. Your papers are praised for their inventiveness but their grades still reflect the all too easy flaws – a confusion of words, improper substitutions and poorly constructed contractions. Your cleverness cannot be questioned. Your basic language skills, however, can.

And this is why it becomes so vital for you to seek the aid of others. Don’t assume your research will compensate for weak writing. You can’t rely on a perfect theory to make readers forget the imperfect presentation. You must instead find an editor – an individual who can decipher your meanings and shape them accurately. You can go to 411.ca and search for the kind of service that you need to make your life easier.

You worry, though, that this will be impossible: your papers are complex affairs, able to be understood only by those who are as familiar with the topics as you are. This is rarely a concern, however. Unless your research is filled to technical explanations, there should be no difficulty in pointing out the problems. Language is the purpose, not what it is trying to prove.

Academia is not meant to be solitary. Just as you rely on others to for theories and experimentations, you must also rely on them to offer advice. Your work cannot suffer from improper writing. It must instead be edited. Look to those who will not simply praise your ideas but will instead make them fully logical.

Filed Under: Academic writing, Writing Tagged With: Arts, Education, Language, Linguistics, Social Sciences, Word, Writers Resources, Writing

Hooking Your Reader From Start to Finish

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The term academic writing may conjure up thoughts of serious sentences and dull essays. Writing an essay doesn’t need to be thought of as dull an uninteresting. By hooking your reader, you draw them into your work. Here are a few ways to engage you readers.

Selecting a topic that you are passionate about will help sharpen your voice as a writer. Your voice is a reader’s window into who you are. By developing your voice as a writer, you draw readers in, making them feel a sense of camaraderie with you through your words. Developing your voice as a writer comes with routine. A good way to hone your voice is by finding and applying writing exercises designed to increase your skill. The more you write, the better you get, and the sharper your voice becomes.

Finding a topic to write about may seem like a Herculean task. Topics seem endless. Whenever an idea strikes you, it’s a good idea to write it down. Brainstorm a subject that interests you and select the topics that are appealing and contain enough information to fuel your work.

Start your essay with an opening that will immediately grab their attention. Whether you are writing on the subject of primate behavior, the effects of music in the workplace, or math philosophy, an intriguing beginning will help readers invest themselves to move on further. The first few lines should grab the reader’s attention. If they feel you are invested in the topic, and it is worth knowing about, they will read on.

Filed Under: Writing Tagged With: Academic writing, Essay, Writer

How to Become a Better Writer

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Most of us understand the importance of writing well. It can affect our jobs and careers, as well as how other people perceive us. Good writing reflects a positive light on those who are able to communicate well in written form.

So how do you go about becoming a better writer? Here are a few basic tips that can help you improve your writing skills.

Take a class. There are many opportunities to take writing classes of any level. You can start with a basic writing class or even a creative writing class. Check out your local area offerings by using a search engine, such as Canada 411. In addition, many universities and colleges offer classes on a not-for-credit basis as adult or continuing education classes.

Join a writing group. Do some research or ask your friends if they know of any local writing groups. These groups are a great way to get feedback and input about your writing. You can often find groups that focus on a specific type of writing such as fiction, non-fiction, movie scripts and so on.

Read as much as you can. Find well written books on topics that you like. Examine the writing and language in those books or publications. Become more critical of what you are reading. Examine sentence structure and word usage to see if you could make improvements.

Use reference materials while you are writing. Use a dictionary, a thesaurus, and other such materials when you write.

Finally, just write. Write as much as you can every day, and soon you’ll see your writing improve.

Filed Under: Academic writing, Writing Tagged With: Canada, Writing, Writing circle

Content Writing ? Is It A Viable Career Option? Why Not?

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Every recession sees a large number of individuals being fired. These individuals move into unconventional professions like copyrighting and content writing for websites. Once the economy improves, most individuals revert back to their original profession.

One reason why they do so is that content writing and other such activities are not considered the real careers. Can any individual rely on such a profession to earn a livelihood for an entire life? Some people find that the world of content writing is far too dynamic for their liking.

There is always the fear of losing jobs when the search engines make a new update. On the other hand, nobody is going to stop using steel or iron tomorrow, right? Well, zero complications and instability in the job is something that we all desire. However, we all know that change is an essential part of our lives. To hide from it is not going to work.

Content writing may have changed in the past few years but that does not mean it is no longer a viable career option. People used to write for newspapers. Then they started writing for magazines. Then they started diversifying into advertising and print media agencies. Internet just happens to be one medium where content writers can participate. A person who is recognized as a financial expert on the internet can easily secure opportunities in the print world as well. The transition may not be easy but it is not impossible either.

To expect that one will have a steady job throughout his or her life without any special efforts is foolishness. If one works hard, writing is a viable career option.

Filed Under: Writing Tagged With: Career, content, Web search engine

Writing Tips: Ways to Brainstorm for Topics

Whether you are writing a news article, piece of fiction or short story you will need to have a topic and an idea of where you wish to take your writing. Brainstorming is a great way to come up with a number of topics and directions that you can take that topic. Here is a look at some of the ways people brainstorm for their writing topics.

Random Listing. Random listing can work when trying to narrow down or find a topic. To brainstorm by random listing you just grab a piece of paper and start writing down any idea that comes to mind. If an idea comes to your mind you just write it down as a possible topic. It might be hard to not think about the topics that you are writing down but when listing all you want to do is get as many ideas down as possible and then you can sort through them later.

Cluster Brainstorming. Cluster brainstorming is ideal for when you have a topic and want to expand on that topic for a paper or school project. To cluster brainstorm you start with a small topic such as cats and place it in a bubble in the center. You will then branch ideas off of cats such as food, shelter, vet care, toys and other topics. You continue to branch off of each idea until you have multiple ways that you can take the topic you started out with.

Each brainstorming style is unique and can really help to narrow down the topic that you wish to write on or to figure out a direction to take a specific topic.

Filed Under: General, Writing Tagged With: Brainstorm, Knowledge Management, Writing

Tips for Taking Good Notes During an Interview for a News Article

When writing a news story you might get a chance to interview an important person for your news article. Interviews are a great way to add insight into the topic that you are writing about or give the article a personal touch. However, an interview cannot be properly used by the writer if they did not take good notes during the interview. Notes that are taken during the interview are important to the writer because it allows them to have what was exactly said by the interviewee and allows the writer to present accurate facts and quotes.

Here are some tips that will help you take good notes while conducting an interview for a news article.

Learn Short Hand. Try to learn some type of short hand before the interview. You will want to be taking notes while the person is speaking but you will not have the time to write everything out in long hand. Short hand gives you a chance to capture everything without having to write it out by hand.

Write Small. The smaller that you write the more you can fit into one notebook page. Turning the pages of a notebook can take up time and allow you to miss out on important parts of the interview.

Always Ask for Clarification. If you missed something while taking a note ask the interviewee to repeat the answer. A great way to do this is to fault yourself and remind them that you want to accurately quote them in the article.

Ask Technical Questions to Stall. If you are still writing out notes you can always ask a technical question that you know the answer to so that you have time to finish your notes up.

Filed Under: Academic writing, Writing Tagged With: Interview, Writer, Writing

Writing Tips: How to Create a Soft News Piece

Newspapers and local websites love to feature stories that appeal to the emotions of the viewers and readers. These articles are generally known as soft news articles. Soft news articles are less strict with the structure of the article and allow the writer to show a little bit of creativity with the writing style. If you are starting out in the news writing industry there are a few guidelines that you should follow when writing and creating a soft news article. Here is a look at those guidelines.

Plan An Approach. Due to the fact that there are multiple ways that you can present a soft news topic it is important that you know exactly how you are going to approach the topic. You should know how you want to showcase your topic and what information you want readers to get from your article. This will help you when you are researching and writing the article.

Importance of Research. Just because the soft news articles appeal to the human emotions it does not mean that they can be factually incorrect. If you are writing a soft news piece you need to make sure that you conduct all the research that you would with a hard news piece. Make sure that all your facts are correct and that you gather as much information as possible on your topic.

Create a Voice for the Article. One of the ways that soft news articles stand out is the voice that the article has. Try to create some human emotion behind the article without appearing to be biased. This can come across in the setting, voice or characters that you use in your article.

Answer All Questions. A soft news piece still needs to answer all the journalistic questions. It needs to answer the who, what, where, why, when and how. Make sure that your article answers all these questions when writing it out.

Filed Under: Academic writing, Writing Tagged With: Article (publishing), News style, Research

Ways to End A News Article

Whether you a writing a hard news article or a soft news article, you must at some point finally end the article. Many journalists and news story writers often have a hard time figuring out exactly how to end their article. Do you just stop writing when you think you’re done? Do you create a conclusion as if it were a regular school report? Here is a look at how you should end a news article.

Summary of Facts. One of the popular ways to end a news article is to create a summary of the facts that are presented. While you don’t have to write every fact in the article in the summary you will want to re-write all the information that you want the article to answer. A great example of this is a story on a crime that the police are looking to resolve, you can wrap it up by talking about what the police are looking for and will do in the future.

Eye to the Future. Another great way to end a news article is through the eye on the future approach. This can be talking about what will happen in the future and what possible events the news article might lead to. Articles can end with any solutions that might come from the topic of the article or what people are doing to work to a solution.

Light-Hearted Ending. A light-hearted ending is a great way to end a soft news piece. Writers can end their article talking about a story that is related to the topic, a cute quote or a small amusing reference that is related to the topic. This type of ending will help the piece appeal to the reader’s emotional side and create a great soft news piece.

Filed Under: Academic writing, Writing Tagged With: Article (publishing), Arts, FAQs Help and Tutorials, Mailing Lists, Soft media

Tips for Writing News Article Content in APA Style

One of the most common styles of writing for news writing is the American Psychological Association format, or the APA format. Almost all news articles are written using the APA style. This common style of writing makes it easier for editors to present a newspaper that has consistency even though it was written by various writers. Here is a guideline on how to make sure that your article follows the APA style format for the content that is written.

Create a Hook. All APA style news articles have some type of hook or lead. This is usually one or two sentences that will automatically grab any reader into the story that is written. Hooks need to be intriguing and force the reader to want to read the rest of the article.

Answer All Questions. The content of an APA style news article must answer all the questions that a reader might have. These questions include the whos, whats, wheres, whens, whys and hows of the topic. While you don’t need to go into great detail you need to give the reader enough information that they know what you are talking about and feel comfortable with the topic at hand.

Remain Objective. Almost all news articles that are written in APA style require that the writer remain objective on the topic that is being presented. It is important to think of the writer as a vessel for information and all that you are doing is writing it down and presenting it to the readers.

Write to the Audience. APA style articles require that a writer write in an active voice. This will allow the readers to feel as if they are a part of the article and not left out. You will also want to try to avoid slang words or jargon as it can be confusing to the readers and you want to appeal to a wide audience base.

Filed Under: Academic writing, Writing Tagged With: APA style, Articles, Psychology, Writers Resources, Writing

News Writing Information: Various Types of Leads

When it comes to writing a news story one of the most important parts of the article is the lead. With a wonderful lead to a news story you can pull in thousands of readers and even readers who would not normally read the story. On the reserve side with a bad lead you can push readers away or not attract their attention. Here is a look at what a lead to a news story is and the different types of leads that can be used for a number of news stories.

A lead in a news story involves the first few sentences of the story. A lead can involve anything from catchy phrases, quotes from well known figures in the area or even asking the reader a question. A lead is meant to stand out and grab the reader’s attention so that they are enticed to read the rest of the article.

There are two types of leads a news writer can use. There is a soft lead and a hard lead. A soft lead is something that is fluffy and creative. Soft leads can range from having a quote from a book, movie or celebrity, a catchy phrase or even asking the reader a question. A hard lead is more concrete with what it presents the reader. Hard leads usually present important facts to the reader in one to two sentences. A reader can generally walk away from a hard lead knowing the important parts of the news story after just reading one sentence.

The type of lead that is used when writing a news story depends on the story that is being presented and where the article is going. Usually pieces that are known as interest stories or fluffy pieces use a soft lead, while those that are meant to present cold hard facts will use a hard lead.

Filed Under: Academic writing, Writing Tagged With: Dog Bites Man, Lead, News style, Online Writing, Writers Resources