Some Writing Tips!

Focus on what’s important.

Be concise. This one is pretty straightforward. Think: efficacy, efficiency, and effectiveness. To keep your audience’s undivided attention, present only the most critical content in the shortest form possible. Keep out unnecessary details, repetitive phrases, and clichés. Refrain from going off on a tangent about unrelated topics. Do not write as if you were a thesaurus--sometimes, the simplest word can be the best word. Stay focused!

Example:

In his poetry, he often rambles in length on one topic and is not afraid to ask existential questions.

Correction:

In his poetry, he often rambles on about one topic and is not afraid to ask existential questions.

“Rambles” implies talking in length about one topic. Take out “in length.”

Verb choice can make or break your writing.

Ah, verbs--the words that move your sentences and move your readers. The verbs you choose can make or break your writing, so choose wisely. Try to write in the active voice so that you can “show” instead of “tell.” Stay away from variations of the “to be” verb (i.e. am, is, are, being, were, etc.) to keep your writing engaging.

Example:

This family deals more with everyday, personal struggles rather than dramatic, world-changing problems--a typical stereotype associated with the “white” experience of the American Dream.

Correction:

This family faces everyday, personal struggles rather than dramatic, world-changing problems--a typical stereotype associated with the “white” experience of the American Dream.

“Faces” is a more concise and effective verb in this sentence.

A sentence closer should be the “cherry on top.”

Writing isn’t always a free-for-all. Sometimes, parts of sentences work better in specific positions of a sentence. Try to end sentences with phrases that matter or are the most important. Dependent clauses and nonessential clauses don’t make good sentence closers--try to end with something pithy, instead.

Example:

Michael Luo, the New York Times’ Metro editor, published an open letter to a woman who told him and his family to “go back to China,” breaking the silence on the topic of racism toward Asian Americans.

Correction:

Michael Luo, the New York Times’ Metro editor, broke the silence on the topic of racism toward Asian Americans by publishing an open letter to a woman who told his family to “go back to China.”

Ending the sentence with “go back to China” is far more impacting and memorable than “breaking the silence on the topic of racism toward Asian Americans.”

Know your basic grammar rules -- be cautious when using pronouns!

Pronouns need to have clear antecedents and should agree with their antecedents in number and gender. When used incorrectly, pronouns make your writing confusing and hard to follow. In a sentence with more than one subject, use pronouns cautiously!

Example:

Many Caucasians do not see Asian Americans as “true” Americans because they do not physically resemble Caucasians.

Correction:

Many Caucasians do not see Asian Americans as “true” Americans because Asians do not physically resemble Caucasians.

Previously, it was not clear that “they” referred to Asians.

Three Important Tips to Write Better: Concision, Diction, and Proofreading.

Writing is a hard task even for professional writers. Simply grouping a few words together, connecting those sentences, and creating a paragraph is a piece of cake. However, writing a well organized piece that clearly conveys your idea is difficult. Improving one’s writing skills is a long-term process, but these tips will help you to quickly enhance your writing.

1. Be Concise!

Writing concisely can be challenging because you want to be as specific as possible so that you won’t confuse your readers. Yes! You do have to provide enough information for them to follow your idea. However, too much detail in a sentence that is redundant or repetitive can make it worse. Too much detail will not only confuse your readers even further but will also bore them. So try to find phrases that can capture your points most briefly, eliminating any unnecessary additional information.

     2. Diction!

In order to write concisely, you have to pay close attention to your diction as well. Diction is word choice. It is crucial because it helps determine your tone and writing style. Three elements that you have to keep in mind when choosing a word is its purpose, accuracy, and precision.

Before you start choosing the word, ask yourself a question: What are you trying to say? Then choose a word that best suits the purpose of your writing. Try to select an accurate word with the fewest syllables. Using unnecessarily long word another way to easily confuse and bore your readers.

Once you’ve chosen a word, think about its precision. One way to check its precision is to consider the connotation of the word. Connotation is the nuance or a feeling that a particular word has in addition to its original meaning. The connotation of a word should suit the tone of your writing.

    

3. Proofread.

You can never produce a high quality piece of writing unless you proofread what you’ve written. Check if the writing is consistent with your point. See if the flow of the writing smoothly leads to your strong and convincing argument without causing any confusion. This is another part where you should check your repetitiveness because, again, too much detail can make the writing digress digress the writing from your point. Trivial mistakes like grammatical errors can also distract the readers. If possible, proofread your writing more than once to avoid any mishaps that will prevent the writing from effectively communicating your thesis.

Helpful Websites:

New York Times Writing Tips

https://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/20/writing-rules-advice-from-the-new-york-times-on-writing-well/?_r=0

Pull Those Weeds: Tips for Concise Writing on YouTube 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0NI0ucC_-4

Five Mistakes Writers Make and How to Fix Them

We’ve all been there: you’ve spent days slaving over an essay. You’ve poured your blood, sweat and tears into it, and you’re more than impressed by the final product. You print out what you would call your magnum opus and happily hand it to your teacher as you gear up for the rave reviews you know is coming. About a week later, your teacher hands the essays back, and you excitedly wait for yours. When you get it back, you quickly flip the paper around and your eyes flit around the page, looking for that A+ you know you deserve. But joy quickly turns to sorrow as you find, in its place, a B. As disappointment sets in, you become more and more angry and think, What the hell did I do wrong? Unfortunately, there are those mistakes every writer makes that detracts from the piece overall. That’s why I’ve made a list of key elements that, if executed correctly, can take your writing from drab to fab.

Be specific. When you’re in a rush to finish an essay, words like very, good, and even wonderful seem like easy ways to boost your writing and get some quick points. However, these words are often weak and don’t convey any real meaning. Instead, look for words that are specific to the tone, mood and style of your writing to have a clearer and more powerful essay, or delete any weak adverbs all together.

Set up quotations more effectively. Do you ever find the perfect quotation for an essay, but end up writing “As evidenced in” to introduce it or straight up just dropping it into the middle of your writing? Setting up quotations badly, aka “quote- bombing” is a sure- fire way to make your writing much less fluid and as a result less compelling overall.

Be crisp; say what’s core. We’ve all been there: you have to write a five page paper but you only have one night left, so rather than having real analysis you fill half of it with summary. While this was great for an elementary school book report, as you grow older your readers are oftentimes less than impressed with your ability to regurgitate facts while having no original ideas. That's why concision is key and will be appreciated more in the long run. So after your first draft, go back and see where you can cut down any fluff to make your ideas stand out and your writing easier to understand.

Check your tone. Keep your audience in mind as you write, and let it dictate your writing style. A college essay should never sound like a Tumblr blog post or a text to your mom. That’s where formal academic language, formal language, and informal language come into play. It's important to know the nuances between each writing language as this will allow you to adjust your writing style to suit your audience. By speaking in the audience’s “language”, your piece will be more powerful and effective overall.

Proofread! Once you’re done writing something, it’s very easy to call it finished, send it of or publish it, then close down your computer and go to bed. However, this allows the tiniest mistakes to go unnoticed. From grammar to sentence structure to improper citations, these blunders can all contribute to a less than stellar piece of writing. Therefore, a careful proofread-- such as sending it to a friend for a once- over or reading it out loud-- can go a long way.

If you take these tips into consideration, there is no doubt in my mind that you will be a wonderful writer. But like anything that people become "good" at, writing takes lots of practice and patience. So keep writing-- whether that be formal or informal-- and check out the resources below for more tips and tricks.

Grammar Girl

How to Write Better: 7 Instant Fixes

Video: 5 Tips to Improve Your Writing

How To Write Better website

I created a website, How To Write Better, based on my own mistakes as a writer: not taking enough time to plan, doing things without a reason, and not always being concise.

*I hope the link works; the website is still in trial mode seeing as I didn't buy a domain.

Concision: No Decision

People are impatient. When writing, it is important to get the main idea across clearly with the least amount of words possible, as to not lose the attention of the reader.  A common misconception is that larger words with an abstract structure make writing sound more intelligent; however, that is completely incorrect.  By changing a word’s part of speech, it changes the form and usage of the surrounding words as well.  This change can lead to a convoluted sentence structure with the main parts--like the subject and the verb--difficult to find.  There are many ways to write in a clean, concise fashion, but two key elements to pay attention to are verb tense and word choice.

It is best to keep all the verbs as they are.  Creating zombie nouns will make it very difficult to understand who is doing what in the sentence, as the subject and the object are now switched. Zombie nouns are the product of nominalization, which is the transformation of some part of speech into a noun.  These words lend themselves to changing a sentence from the active voice to the passive voice.  The passive voice can be difficult to understand simply because the “who” in the sentence is disguised.  In Lexi Takashima’s piece “Social Constructs In Charge,” she used the passive voice when she wrote “The notion of the white race being superior to all others was self-proclaimed and required some type of justification.” It is now unclear who made the proclamation that the white race is superior, because “the notion” that was once the object is now the subject.  It would have been more effective to write, “Society itself has accepted the notion of superiority of the white race, and therefore it required some type of justification.” The sentence is now, shorter, in the active voice, and contains a clear subject, object, and verb.  

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Diction plays a huge role in creating fluid writing.  Redundancy can drag out sentences and alter its tone, which is why knowing the meaning and connotation of the applied word is essential.  Writers often use words to modify other words that have a similar meaning because he/she believes that more descriptive words means better writing: wrong.  Good writing is short and to the point with an easy-to-follow plot.  It is not writing that uses the greatest number of words with zombie nouns and adverbs all with the same meaning. In addition, it is important to find the point of the sentence that is being stressed the most, and then make sure that other words and phrases are not taking away from that point. In “Illusions Around the Choate Bubble,” Takashima wrote, “therefore, Choate has carefully manufactured its illusions and uses them as a disguise rather than as a blindfold.” The modification of “manufactured” is unnecessary in context because the main point in the sentence is not how Choate manufactured the illusions, but the mere fact that it did it at all.  The tone changes to stress the event itself when rewritten as “therefore, Choate has manufactured its illusions with the sole purpose of using them as a disguise rather than a blindfold.”  The modification is now expressing the importance of why Choate did something rather than the how, which was her intention.  

Readers are human, and they are no exception to the inherent gene of impatience.  Concision will allow a writer to connect with his/her audience throughout the entire piece.  By following only a few steps, one can transform their writing into an engaging work of art in no time.

For a more detailed description of nominalization and its downfalls, listen here.  

Writing Enhancer

Elliot Sawyer-Kaplan

1/23/17

This is a short writing guide from me to you. I have incorporated advice based on some mistakes I’ve made this Fall. Here are a few Keys to think about while you’re writing.

1. A Key to good writing is proofreading your work. Scientific discoveries have shown that the best way to proofread your writing is to take a 10 minute break, print out a hard copy, and correct it with a pen. Another Key is to read the Writer’s Guide and Writer’s Tips before proofreading your work. This will help you locate sections of your writing that need to be rephrased or rewritten, and it will help you be more conscious of your writing style and choices.

2. Remember the Dash!

“The dash is a handy device, informal and essentially playful, telling you that you're about to take off on a different tack but still in some way connected with the present course — only you have to remember that the dash is there, and either put a second dash at the end of the notion to let the reader know that he's back on course, or else end the sentence, as here, with a period.”

__ Lewis Thomas

Ex: I am a romantic. Spontaneous decisions excite me, and I encourage my friends to take risks, because the best moments in life are often unplanned.

“Sc: instead of a comma and dependent clause here starting with "because," try this sentence with a dash. The dash will give your statement a "dash" of emphasis and emotion. So: "Spontaneous decisions excite me, and I encourage my friends to take risks--the best moments in life are often unplanned."” - Mr. Arcand

3. You write to explain, discuss, or argue a topic. Your writings should matter to you, and it needs a “So What? Moment.” You need to demonstrate why the topic is important and relevant.

4. Citing Sources is a crucial Key to excellent writing. After plagiarizing, you may find yourself inside the School’s County Jail. To avoid plagiarizing other human’s works, cite early and often.

Sentence that needs citation: Skyglow, the illumination of the night sky in populated areas, affects approximately 80% of the world.

“Ea: cite sources” - Mr. Arcand

5. One of the most important parts of writing is having a clear and concise topic sentence. Topic Sentences are previews for what you will be discussing in the following paragraph. They should make a strong statement about the topic you are arguing about.

Example of a strong topic sentence: Benjamin Franklin is a Romantic.

“This is an effective, direct topic sentence” - Mr. Arcand

Example of a poor topic sentence: Ben Franklin may be a Romantic, but there could be other things showing that he might not be.

This sentence lacks consciousness, cohesion, and effectiveness.

Light pollution has destroyed some aspects of nature's beauty. Two hundred years ago, the night sky looked like a midnight quilt with thousands of tiny Christmas lights scattered underneath.

“Can you rewrite this topic sentence to be slightly more powerful, without being hyperbolic? You do an outstanding job of making "beauty" the main focus of your piece, while incorporating the disruption to animal life.” - Mr. Arcand

6. Furthermore, you must use textual evidence in your paragraph that supports the topic sentence. You should use at least two forms of textual evidence in each body paragraph. Without textual evidence, your argument is weak. Additionally, the content in your body paragraph should directly relate to your topic sentence. If it doesn’t, then readers are left confused and unconvinced. It would be as if you tried to park your boat in a cement parking lot, or if you showed up to a basketball game and saw Spock, The Grinch, Yoda, and the Joker.

Although, at Duke basketball games, anything is possible.

7. Be concise and clear, no one wants to have to investigate a sentence like a Law and Order Episode to comprehend its meaning.

8. Keep it simple. Only use words that you are familiar with. Do not put the entire thesaurus into your writing; no one wants to read with a dictionary next to them.

Ex 1: He utilized fear to inspire people to follow God’s word.

Don't "utilize" a three syllable word when you can "use" a one syllable word that means the same thing. - Mr. Arcand

Ex 2: The indomitable smell toted back redolence of execrable days.

9. Do not contradict yourself (this one is self explanatory).

Ex: In Sherman Alexie's, Flight, there is no right, wrong, good, or bad, only the evils of revenge that consume humans.

“Bs: I don't know if you can write that there isn't any "bad" and then write that there is "evil."” - Mr. A

10. Punctuation Matters! Punctuation is one of the most important elements of grammar. Always look for misplaced modifiers and superfluous commas.

Ex: In Sherman Alexie's, Flight, there is no right, wrong, good, or bad, only the evils of revenge that consume humans.

That comma should be removed because it is unnecessarily breaking up a phrase.

My two drawings above demonstrate another reason why punctuation is crucial. In the first drawing, cats and dogs are raining down from the sky, while in the following drawing, a person is telling her cats and dogs that rain is falling from the sky. One comma easily alters the meaning of this sentence.

11. More Punctuation!

Light pollution has destroyed the beauty of outer space, and has harmful environmental consequences for humans.

"“Cu,” this comma should also be removed because the whole sentence is only one independent clause, so it is not breaking up two independent clauses like the comma in this very sentence is doing." - Mr. Arcand

Ex: Justice manipulates Zits to shoot up a bank, and after Zits does it, he is taken back in time, and placed in the body of a white FBI agent.

“Vc: this sounds as if someone is taking him” - Mr. Arcand

12. Punctuation must go inside the quotation marks. This is a Key grammar rule. If you put the punctuation outside the quotation marks, you are wrong.

Ex: Twirling the shark toothed knife, the Joker said “Why so serious”?

Correction: “Why so serious?”

Better Writing: A process of Trial and Error

Throughout my writing career at Choate Rosemary hall, I have experiences successes as well as failures. Writing is a process, and despite what many may say, I think everyone can become a great writer. There are those who have, “the gift,” as I like to call it, but there are just as many others who developed their writing skills. Remember, anybody who writes is a writer. As far as I go, I like to think I have that writing gift but I would be fooling nobody but myself. I have, however, made a variety of edits to my writing that I feel have definitely helped my writing develop. Over my Choate writing career I have always looked for ways to improve my writing and have stumbled upon some amazing ideas through successes and failures. So here it goes, my top 4 writing tips to help improve your writing.

Tip #1: A persuasive Title. The title is the most important part of a good essay/story etc. Anyone who is walking around a bookstore would agree with me in saying when they come across a book with a persuasive title they will at least open it up. What keeps them reading is what's on the inside and is completely up to you; the title is just a kickstart. The title should be something creative that also lets the reader know what to expect. It shouldn't be something that you should overthink, for me, it usually comes as I am writing the piece or even after writing my piece. I like to proofread and look over the recurring themes in my writing that may help contribute to my title. As the famous saying goes, “Keep it short and sweet.”

Tip #2:  Read your writing back to yourself. This is a tip that has helped me tremendously with my writing this year. It's easy for people to appreciate their writing after it's been completed but it's not until you read it back to yourself that you will see problems that aren't there while your writing. For me, it was recognizing the pace of my writing. You will get a sense of how words should fit together and how they work together in the entire piece. It's sort of the same as listening to music. When you hear an off beat or note it's easy to identify but even easier to fix. You may also be able to decipher things in your sentences that shouldn't be there. While you're writing you don’t really think about how it will sound rather how it looks and feels. Reading out loud  makes it much easier to identify unnecessary words and will help make sure you don't sound like an idiot in your writing.

Tip #3: The hook! If you are or have ever been an english student in high school, you should know how important it is to have a good hook. The hook is what makes the reader want to keep reading. It is typically the first sentence of a essay or book and helps set up the rest of story. Here are some of my favorite hooks from famous authors: “True! – nervous – very, very nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?” —Edgar Allan Poe, The Tell-Tale Heart. "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair." - Charles Dickens-A Tale of Two Cities. There no way you can sit there reading this and tell me you wouldn't want to keep reading after hearing those two opening lines! Of course not everyone is as good a writer as Poe and Dickens but it's not hard to engage a reader in your writing. Whether you choose to start off with a famous quote or even a question it's important to make sure the reader is engaged. Of course nobody reading your writing will ever understand how much time it took you to think of a title..nobody.

Tip #4: Be concise. As i've learned a lot this year through trial and error, being concise makes your writing sound clearer and more professional. When you reread your writing, (see tip #2) you will often notice the usage of unnecessary word in your writing that does more harm than good. Words such as: very, a lot, great. I now know that these words don’t really have any effect on the writing rather are there to fill an empty void. Take some of my old work for example: “Rip Van Winkle Song reference: I must say, the first time I listened to, “I could be dreaming” by Belle & Sebastian I couldn't find a real connection with Rip Van Winkle. This second time I played through however, there were words that were being spoken by the girl. Upon further research these words are a direct quotation from the short story, “Rip Van Winkle” Despite the reference I saw a connection between Rip Van Winkle and dreams…”  This was the beginning of a reflection I wrote in my fall journal way back in October. Right off the bat I notice how boring the writing sounds. There no words that provoke any additional thought, the writing is very robotic. I notice problems with my quotation punctuation, these problems could have been easily fixed if I would have proofread my writing as well as read it out loud to myself. However, it’s nearly impossible to improve your writing without experiencing mistakes.

Well, there you have it; my top 4 writing tips to help you become a better writer. Remember.. Anyone who writes is a writer, even if you think you can't!

Five Reasons Buzzfeed Will Elevate You to a Godlike State of Mind

To improve my writing, I’ve been reading a lot of Buzzfeed lately--and, I have to say, wtf. The insight I’ve received in the 467 articles, 1,628 quizzes, and 11,401 rehashed Tumblr posts I’ve seen on the site has been incomparable. I can honestly say that I’ll never be the same again.

To honor my mentors at the Big Buzz, here’s the only gift I can give: five tips on how to improve your own writing, presented in the style of the masters.

1. Put clickbait in your titles. And by “clickbait,” I mean anything pertinent to your topic that will make readers want to look at it. When completing a project on bear hibernation patterns, for instance, try to stray away from calling it “Bears Hibernate in the Winter.” Instead, name it something that will make potential readers go “Wait, what?” They’ll be obligated to read your entire piece to find the answer. Build intrigue; make them want more.
   
   
   
   
   
2. Treat transitions like comedy. In David Sedaris's "I Almost Saw This Girl Get Killed" there’s a scene where Sedaris describes a book he had in his childhood about arts and crafts--and then he uses it to talk about wrestling angry bulls (I'm not kidding). For more formal works, transitions mean having clear points of connection between all sub-theses of your main argument; for informal assignments, it means finding small details to unify one part of your story to the next. Everything in the world is somehow connected; the best writers are able to find and demonstrate these links in an effective and engaging way. To try to spot these connections, here's another Sedaris piece:
   
   
   
   
3. Stop turning verbs into nouns. This is called “nominalization,” and it’s guaranteed to annoy any English teachers and/or Buzzfeed contributors who read your work. Sentences like “I was surprised at his acceptance of the prize” aren’t just verbose; they’re completely unnecessary. “I was surprised he accepted the prize” expresses the same idea in fewer words.
   
   
   
   
4. Save vagueblogging for your disenfranchised 2 a.m. Twitter posts when you think no one else is awake. In writing, it’s best to be as specific as possible, especially when arguing a thesis. Think of this in terms of stories. When your little brother stumbles into the house on Halloween and says someone stole his candy, he doesn’t just say, “Hey, look, someone stole my candy.” Instead, he’ll go into where he was, how he felt, what the thief looked like, how fast he ran home. Any narrative--whether it’s a formal academic essay or a personal experience--depends on specific and targeted details to support the main point.
   
   
   
5. As my mom always used to say when I’d ask her if I could leave our family parties early: “Watch your tone, Kristen!” Since 99% of the world isn’t named Kristen, you can ignore that last part. But tone--the attitude and personality of the writer as it’s portrayed throughout the piece--can have a huge impact over whether or not someone is willing to accept your argument. As a rule of thumb, it’s best not to be overly aggressive in academics. You can think someone’s an asshat. Just don’t write that.

   
   

   
   

   
   

   External media via here, here, and here.