Write It Write!

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Write It Write!

• Karl M. Kapp,Ed.D
• Assistant Director

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Determine Job Requirements

• Know the Requirements. What is the
• Format
• Page length
• Style
• General organization

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Research

• Gain more knowledge on subject
• Collect thoughts
• Expand others ideas
• Write from a point of knowledge

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Outline Material

• Written game plan of document
• Arranges random thoughts
• Reveals patterns
• Sequences ideas

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Write to Your Reader

• What do they want or need to know?
• Message needs to be useful and worthwhile
• What could they be thinking?

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Write What You Mean

• Words should clearly reflect your thoughts
• Build an argument.
• Based on these facts, we are proposing
• Make a statement and back it up with details.

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Convey the Right Impression

• Make statements as strong as the facts will allow
• Be cordial, courteous, friendly in tone
• Write with confidence

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Avoid

• The following
• Very
• In order to (To)
• True facts (Facts
• Ahead of schedule (Early)
• Wide Variety (Variety)

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Reviews

• Have someone else review the work
• Review the work yourselves
• Rewrite material as needed
• Reviewers will not catch everything

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Principles of Clear Writing

• Keep sentences short
• For easy reading, sentences should vary in
  structure and length but, on the average, be
  short
• Prefer the simple to the complex
• Many complex terms are unnecessary. Avoid complex
  sentences.

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Principles of Clear Writing

• Avoid unneeded words
• Nothing weakens writing so much as extra words.
  Be critical of words and make every word
  definitely carry its own weight.
• Put Action into Your Verbs
• The heaviness of much business writing results
  from overworking the passive verbs. Prose can
  usually be kept impersonal and remain in the
  active tense.

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Passive vs Active Voice

• The hamburger was eaten by the Burger King.
• The Burger King ate the hamburger.

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Passive vs. Active

• The proposal was written yesterday.
• Yesterday I wrote the proposal.

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Principles of Clear Writing

• Use Terms Your Reader Can Picture
• Abstract terms make writing dull and foggy.
• Write the way you talk (for the most part)
• Use the term We
• Write to Express, not Impress
• Have good transitions

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Principles of Clear Writing

• Each paragraph should contain one idea, topic or
  concept.
• Lead the reader from point to point.

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Ordering Information

• Chronological
• Beginning
• Middle
• End
• Sequential
• First
• Second
• Third

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Ordering Information

• Descriptive
• Left
• Right
• Middle

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Good Writing is Re-Writing