writing skills in research

• Visit the University of Nebraska–Lincoln
• Apply to the University of Nebraska–Lincoln
• Give to the University of Nebraska–Lincoln

Search Form

Fundamental writing skills for researchers, part 1 introduction and snapshot of writing (6:31).

Everyone is capable of being a good writer, even without any innate skill. A snapshot of research writing is given, from presenting a research question in context of current knowledge to interpreting your findings. In other words, moving from general to specific, then specific to general. It's important to be a careful and intentional writer. It's not about writing, it's about readability. Focusing on your readers and their needs helps make your message clear.

Part 2 Making Meaning Clear (6:31)

"Going-to-the-Caribbean writing" is boring, dense, and generally not reader-friendly because it lacks transitions, logic, and concern for reader understanding. An example of "Caribbean writing," along with a more reader-friendly revision, is provided. Good writing clearly communicates meaning to readers by always keeping their needs in mind.

Part 3 Writing Myths (4:20)

The impulse to impress readers with complex sentences and pretentious words is regrettably common in research writing. Writing to impress seeks validation for the writer rather than comprehension for the reader. Revision is always needed because ideas don’t flow logically from the writer's mind to the page.

Part 4 How Readers Read and Respond (7:19)

There are several levels of a reader's response to a piece of writing. The writer is responsible for the reader’s experience in everything from visual appeal and organization to readability and tone. The purpose of research writing is to convey your data and interpretations of that data while convincing your reader that your perspective is valid. Critique your writing by continually keeping your reader in mind.

Part 5 Helping Your Audience Interpret Your Meaning (11:58)

Your role as writer is to make sense—to make your meaning clear to the reader. Use punctuation, grammar, and other language conventions as road signs to help your reader interpret your writing. Basic vocabulary and simple sentence construction is sufficient, even for winning the Nobel Prize in Literature. But your audience may vary, and that takes very careful planning on your part.

Part 6 Giving Structure to Your Writing (6:24)

Paragraphs, topic sentences, and transitions provide the structure of your writing. Mastering these building blocks is the key to being able to clearly communicate your thinking to your reader. The topic sentence is the king or queen of the sentence and each line of the paragraph should support or elaborate upon that main thought. Transitions are used to help the reader move from one thought to the next, whether within a sentence, from sentence to sentence, or from paragraph to paragraph.

Part 7 Writing as a Logical Process (10:07)

Writing is a logical process, and a sentence is like a mathematical formula. Using levels of generality allows you to move from general to specific levels of detail. Sometimes you'll need to use more words to make your meaning clear to the reader. A piece of writing is not clear simply because it is brief.

Download the Logical Puzzles Handout

Part 8 Making Meaning Clear (9:13)

Logic doesn't flow naturally from mind to paper. You are responsible for writing a clear topic sentence and supporting it in a logical way. Transitions point out to the reader the logical connections between ideas, and order is important. Outlining will help you write effectively and more efficiently.

Part 9 Outlining (8:12)

Planning your writing will save you a great deal of time. Again, levels of generality come into play here, as does the structure of a paragraph. But don't focus on the skeleton of an outline, emphasize the content as you coordinate and subordinate your ideas. When you create an outline, step back and analyze it critically. You need to impose logic on your writing, then crystallize your logic by making specific connections.

Part 10 Headings, Figures, Rhythm, and Length (4:15)

Headings and subheadings used consistently help your reader see the structure of your writing. Tables, figures, and charts are powerful aids to making your meaning clear. But don't just present them to your reader; interpret their significance. Finally, you’ll also improve readability by varying the length and construction of your sentences.

Want to create or adapt books like this? Learn more about how Pressbooks supports open publishing practices.

11.1 The Purpose of Research Writing

Learning objectives.

• Identify reasons to research writing projects.
• Outline the steps of the research writing process.

Why was the Great Wall of China built? What have scientists learned about the possibility of life on Mars? What roles did women play in the American Revolution? How does the human brain create, store, and retrieve memories? Who invented the game of football, and how has it changed over the years?

You may know the answers to these questions off the top of your head. If you are like most people, however, you find answers to tough questions like these by searching the Internet, visiting the library, or asking others for information. To put it simply, you perform research.

Whether you are a scientist, an artist, a paralegal, or a parent, you probably perform research in your everyday life. When your boss, your instructor, or a family member asks you a question that you do not know the answer to, you locate relevant information, analyze your findings, and share your results. Locating, analyzing, and sharing information are key steps in the research process, and in this chapter, you will learn more about each step. By developing your research writing skills, you will prepare yourself to answer any question no matter how challenging.

Reasons for Research

When you perform research, you are essentially trying to solve a mystery—you want to know how something works or why something happened. In other words, you want to answer a question that you (and other people) have about the world. This is one of the most basic reasons for performing research.

But the research process does not end when you have solved your mystery. Imagine what would happen if a detective collected enough evidence to solve a criminal case, but she never shared her solution with the authorities. Presenting what you have learned from research can be just as important as performing the research. Research results can be presented in a variety of ways, but one of the most popular—and effective—presentation forms is the research paper . A research paper presents an original thesis, or purpose statement, about a topic and develops that thesis with information gathered from a variety of sources.

If you are curious about the possibility of life on Mars, for example, you might choose to research the topic. What will you do, though, when your research is complete? You will need a way to put your thoughts together in a logical, coherent manner. You may want to use the facts you have learned to create a narrative or to support an argument. And you may want to show the results of your research to your friends, your teachers, or even the editors of magazines and journals. Writing a research paper is an ideal way to organize thoughts, craft narratives or make arguments based on research, and share your newfound knowledge with the world.

Write a paragraph about a time when you used research in your everyday life. Did you look for the cheapest way to travel from Houston to Denver? Did you search for a way to remove gum from the bottom of your shoe? In your paragraph, explain what you wanted to research, how you performed the research, and what you learned as a result.

Research Writing and the Academic Paper

No matter what field of study you are interested in, you will most likely be asked to write a research paper during your academic career. For example, a student in an art history course might write a research paper about an artist’s work. Similarly, a student in a psychology course might write a research paper about current findings in childhood development.

Having to write a research paper may feel intimidating at first. After all, researching and writing a long paper requires a lot of time, effort, and organization. However, writing a research paper can also be a great opportunity to explore a topic that is particularly interesting to you. The research process allows you to gain expertise on a topic of your choice, and the writing process helps you remember what you have learned and understand it on a deeper level.

Research Writing at Work

Knowing how to write a good research paper is a valuable skill that will serve you well throughout your career. Whether you are developing a new product, studying the best way to perform a procedure, or learning about challenges and opportunities in your field of employment, you will use research techniques to guide your exploration. You may even need to create a written report of your findings. And because effective communication is essential to any company, employers seek to hire people who can write clearly and professionally.

Writing at Work

Take a few minutes to think about each of the following careers. How might each of these professionals use researching and research writing skills on the job?

• Medical laboratory technician
• Small business owner
• Information technology professional
• Freelance magazine writer

A medical laboratory technician or information technology professional might do research to learn about the latest technological developments in either of these fields. A small business owner might conduct research to learn about the latest trends in his or her industry. A freelance magazine writer may need to research a given topic to write an informed, up-to-date article.

Think about the job of your dreams. How might you use research writing skills to perform that job? Create a list of ways in which strong researching, organizing, writing, and critical thinking skills could help you succeed at your dream job. How might these skills help you obtain that job?

Steps of the Research Writing Process

How does a research paper grow from a folder of brainstormed notes to a polished final draft? No two projects are identical, but most projects follow a series of six basic steps.

These are the steps in the research writing process:

• Choose a topic.
• Plan and schedule time to research and write.
• Conduct research.
• Organize research and ideas.
• Draft your paper.
• Revise and edit your paper.

Each of these steps will be discussed in more detail later in this chapter. For now, though, we will take a brief look at what each step involves.

Step 1: Choosing a Topic

As you may recall from Chapter 8 “The Writing Process: How Do I Begin?” , to narrow the focus of your topic, you may try freewriting exercises, such as brainstorming. You may also need to ask a specific research question —a broad, open-ended question that will guide your research—as well as propose a possible answer, or a working thesis . You may use your research question and your working thesis to create a research proposal . In a research proposal, you present your main research question, any related subquestions you plan to explore, and your working thesis.

Step 2: Planning and Scheduling

Before you start researching your topic, take time to plan your researching and writing schedule. Research projects can take days, weeks, or even months to complete. Creating a schedule is a good way to ensure that you do not end up being overwhelmed by all the work you have to do as the deadline approaches.

During this step of the process, it is also a good idea to plan the resources and organizational tools you will use to keep yourself on track throughout the project. Flowcharts, calendars, and checklists can all help you stick to your schedule. See Chapter 11 “Writing from Research: What Will I Learn?” , Section 11.2 “Steps in Developing a Research Proposal” for an example of a research schedule.

Step 3: Conducting Research

When going about your research, you will likely use a variety of sources—anything from books and periodicals to video presentations and in-person interviews.

Your sources will include both primary sources and secondary sources . Primary sources provide firsthand information or raw data. For example, surveys, in-person interviews, and historical documents are primary sources. Secondary sources, such as biographies, literary reviews, or magazine articles, include some analysis or interpretation of the information presented. As you conduct research, you will take detailed, careful notes about your discoveries. You will also evaluate the reliability of each source you find.

Step 4: Organizing Research and the Writer’s Ideas

When your research is complete, you will organize your findings and decide which sources to cite in your paper. You will also have an opportunity to evaluate the evidence you have collected and determine whether it supports your thesis, or the focus of your paper. You may decide to adjust your thesis or conduct additional research to ensure that your thesis is well supported.

Remember, your working thesis is not set in stone. You can and should change your working thesis throughout the research writing process if the evidence you find does not support your original thesis. Never try to force evidence to fit your argument. For example, your working thesis is “Mars cannot support life-forms.” Yet, a week into researching your topic, you find an article in the New York Times detailing new findings of bacteria under the Martian surface. Instead of trying to argue that bacteria are not life forms, you might instead alter your thesis to “Mars cannot support complex life-forms.”

Step 5: Drafting Your Paper

Now you are ready to combine your research findings with your critical analysis of the results in a rough draft. You will incorporate source materials into your paper and discuss each source thoughtfully in relation to your thesis or purpose statement.

When you cite your reference sources, it is important to pay close attention to standard conventions for citing sources in order to avoid plagiarism , or the practice of using someone else’s words without acknowledging the source. Later in this chapter, you will learn how to incorporate sources in your paper and avoid some of the most common pitfalls of attributing information.

Step 6: Revising and Editing Your Paper

In the final step of the research writing process, you will revise and polish your paper. You might reorganize your paper’s structure or revise for unity and cohesion, ensuring that each element in your paper flows into the next logically and naturally. You will also make sure that your paper uses an appropriate and consistent tone.

Once you feel confident in the strength of your writing, you will edit your paper for proper spelling, grammar, punctuation, mechanics, and formatting. When you complete this final step, you will have transformed a simple idea or question into a thoroughly researched and well-written paper you can be proud of!

Review the steps of the research writing process. Then answer the questions on your own sheet of paper.

• In which steps of the research writing process are you allowed to change your thesis?
• In step 2, which types of information should you include in your project schedule?
• What might happen if you eliminated step 4 from the research writing process?

Key Takeaways

• People undertake research projects throughout their academic and professional careers in order to answer specific questions, share their findings with others, increase their understanding of challenging topics, and strengthen their researching, writing, and analytical skills.
• The research writing process generally comprises six steps: choosing a topic, scheduling and planning time for research and writing, conducting research, organizing research and ideas, drafting a paper, and revising and editing the paper.

Writing for Success Copyright © 2015 by University of Minnesota is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License , except where otherwise noted.

• USC Libraries
• Research Guides

Organizing Your Social Sciences Research Paper

• Academic Writing Style
• Purpose of Guide
• Design Flaws to Avoid
• Independent and Dependent Variables
• Glossary of Research Terms
• Reading Research Effectively
• Narrowing a Topic Idea
• Broadening a Topic Idea
• Extending the Timeliness of a Topic Idea
• Applying Critical Thinking
• Choosing a Title
• Making an Outline
• Paragraph Development
• Research Process Video Series
• Executive Summary
• The C.A.R.S. Model
• Background Information
• The Research Problem/Question
• Theoretical Framework
• Citation Tracking
• Content Alert Services
• Evaluating Sources
• Primary Sources
• Secondary Sources
• Tiertiary Sources
• Scholarly vs. Popular Publications
• Qualitative Methods
• Quantitative Methods
• Insiderness
• Using Non-Textual Elements
• Limitations of the Study
• Common Grammar Mistakes
• Writing Concisely
• Avoiding Plagiarism
• Footnotes or Endnotes?
• Further Readings
• Generative AI and Writing
• USC Libraries Tutorials and Other Guides
• Bibliography

Academic writing refers to a style of expression that researchers use to define the intellectual boundaries of their disciplines and specific areas of expertise. Characteristics of academic writing include a formal tone, use of the third-person rather than first-person perspective (usually), a clear focus on the research problem under investigation, and precise word choice. Like specialist languages adopted in other professions, such as, law or medicine, academic writing is designed to convey agreed meaning about complex ideas or concepts within a community of scholarly experts and practitioners.

Academic Writing. Writing Center. Colorado Technical College; Hartley, James. Academic Writing and Publishing: A Practical Guide . New York: Routledge, 2008; Ezza, El-Sadig Y. and Touria Drid. T eaching Academic Writing as a Discipline-Specific Skill in Higher Education . Hershey, PA: IGI Global, 2020.

Importance of Good Academic Writing

The accepted form of academic writing in the social sciences can vary considerable depending on the methodological framework and the intended audience. However, most college-level research papers require careful attention to the following stylistic elements:

I.  The Big Picture Unlike creative or journalistic writing, the overall structure of academic writing is formal and logical. It must be cohesive and possess a logically organized flow of ideas; this means that the various parts are connected to form a unified whole. There should be narrative links between sentences and paragraphs so that the reader is able to follow your argument. The introduction should include a description of how the rest of the paper is organized and all sources are properly cited throughout the paper.

II.  Tone The overall tone refers to the attitude conveyed in a piece of writing. Throughout your paper, it is important that you present the arguments of others fairly and with an appropriate narrative tone. When presenting a position or argument that you disagree with, describe this argument accurately and without loaded or biased language. In academic writing, the author is expected to investigate the research problem from an authoritative point of view. You should, therefore, state the strengths of your arguments confidently, using language that is neutral, not confrontational or dismissive.

III.  Diction Diction refers to the choice of words you use. Awareness of the words you use is important because words that have almost the same denotation [dictionary definition] can have very different connotations [implied meanings]. This is particularly true in academic writing because words and terminology can evolve a nuanced meaning that describes a particular idea, concept, or phenomenon derived from the epistemological culture of that discipline [e.g., the concept of rational choice in political science]. Therefore, use concrete words [not general] that convey a specific meaning. If this cannot be done without confusing the reader, then you need to explain what you mean within the context of how that word or phrase is used within a discipline.

IV.  Language The investigation of research problems in the social sciences is often complex and multi- dimensional . Therefore, it is important that you use unambiguous language. Well-structured paragraphs and clear topic sentences enable a reader to follow your line of thinking without difficulty. Your language should be concise, formal, and express precisely what you want it to mean. Do not use vague expressions that are not specific or precise enough for the reader to derive exact meaning ["they," "we," "people," "the organization," etc.], abbreviations like 'i.e.'  ["in other words"], 'e.g.' ["for example"], or 'a.k.a.' ["also known as"], and the use of unspecific determinate words ["super," "very," "incredible," "huge," etc.].

V.  Punctuation Scholars rely on precise words and language to establish the narrative tone of their work and, therefore, punctuation marks are used very deliberately. For example, exclamation points are rarely used to express a heightened tone because it can come across as unsophisticated or over-excited. Dashes should be limited to the insertion of an explanatory comment in a sentence, while hyphens should be limited to connecting prefixes to words [e.g., multi-disciplinary] or when forming compound phrases [e.g., commander-in-chief]. Finally, understand that semi-colons represent a pause that is longer than a comma, but shorter than a period in a sentence. In general, there are four grammatical uses of semi-colons: when a second clause expands or explains the first clause; to describe a sequence of actions or different aspects of the same topic; placed before clauses which begin with "nevertheless", "therefore", "even so," and "for instance”; and, to mark off a series of phrases or clauses which contain commas. If you are not confident about when to use semi-colons [and most of the time, they are not required for proper punctuation], rewrite using shorter sentences or revise the paragraph.

VI.  Academic Conventions Among the most important rules and principles of academic engagement of a writing is citing sources in the body of your paper and providing a list of references as either footnotes or endnotes. The academic convention of citing sources facilitates processes of intellectual discovery, critical thinking, and applying a deliberate method of navigating through the scholarly landscape by tracking how cited works are propagated by scholars over time . Aside from citing sources, other academic conventions to follow include the appropriate use of headings and subheadings, properly spelling out acronyms when first used in the text, avoiding slang or colloquial language, avoiding emotive language or unsupported declarative statements, avoiding contractions [e.g., isn't], and using first person and second person pronouns only when necessary.

VII.  Evidence-Based Reasoning Assignments often ask you to express your own point of view about the research problem. However, what is valued in academic writing is that statements are based on evidence-based reasoning. This refers to possessing a clear understanding of the pertinent body of knowledge and academic debates that exist within, and often external to, your discipline concerning the topic. You need to support your arguments with evidence from scholarly [i.e., academic or peer-reviewed] sources. It should be an objective stance presented as a logical argument; the quality of the evidence you cite will determine the strength of your argument. The objective is to convince the reader of the validity of your thoughts through a well-documented, coherent, and logically structured piece of writing. This is particularly important when proposing solutions to problems or delineating recommended courses of action.

VIII.  Thesis-Driven Academic writing is “thesis-driven,” meaning that the starting point is a particular perspective, idea, or position applied to the chosen topic of investigation, such as, establishing, proving, or disproving solutions to the questions applied to investigating the research problem. Note that a problem statement without the research questions does not qualify as academic writing because simply identifying the research problem does not establish for the reader how you will contribute to solving the problem, what aspects you believe are most critical, or suggest a method for gathering information or data to better understand the problem.

IX.  Complexity and Higher-Order Thinking Academic writing addresses complex issues that require higher-order thinking skills applied to understanding the research problem [e.g., critical, reflective, logical, and creative thinking as opposed to, for example, descriptive or prescriptive thinking]. Higher-order thinking skills include cognitive processes that are used to comprehend, solve problems, and express concepts or that describe abstract ideas that cannot be easily acted out, pointed to, or shown with images. Think of your writing this way: One of the most important attributes of a good teacher is the ability to explain complexity in a way that is understandable and relatable to the topic being presented during class. This is also one of the main functions of academic writing--examining and explaining the significance of complex ideas as clearly as possible.  As a writer, you must adopt the role of a good teacher by summarizing complex information into a well-organized synthesis of ideas, concepts, and recommendations that contribute to a better understanding of the research problem.

Academic Writing. Writing Center. Colorado Technical College; Hartley, James. Academic Writing and Publishing: A Practical Guide . New York: Routledge, 2008; Murray, Rowena  and Sarah Moore. The Handbook of Academic Writing: A Fresh Approach . New York: Open University Press, 2006; Johnson, Roy. Improve Your Writing Skills . Manchester, UK: Clifton Press, 1995; Nygaard, Lynn P. Writing for Scholars: A Practical Guide to Making Sense and Being Heard . Second edition. Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications, 2015; Silvia, Paul J. How to Write a Lot: A Practical Guide to Productive Academic Writing . Washington, DC: American Psychological Association, 2007; Style, Diction, Tone, and Voice. Writing Center, Wheaton College; Sword, Helen. Stylish Academic Writing . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012.

Strategies for...

Understanding Academic Writing and Its Jargon

The very definition of research jargon is language specific to a particular community of practitioner-researchers . Therefore, in modern university life, jargon represents the specific language and meaning assigned to words and phrases specific to a discipline or area of study. For example, the idea of being rational may hold the same general meaning in both political science and psychology, but its application to understanding and explaining phenomena within the research domain of a each discipline may have subtle differences based upon how scholars in that discipline apply the concept to the theories and practice of their work.

Given this, it is important that specialist terminology [i.e., jargon] must be used accurately and applied under the appropriate conditions . Subject-specific dictionaries are the best places to confirm the meaning of terms within the context of a specific discipline. These can be found by either searching in the USC Libraries catalog by entering the disciplinary and the word dictionary [e.g., sociology and dictionary] or using a database such as Credo Reference [a curated collection of subject encyclopedias, dictionaries, handbooks, guides from highly regarded publishers] . It is appropriate for you to use specialist language within your field of study, but you should avoid using such language when writing for non-academic or general audiences.

Problems with Opaque Writing

A common criticism of scholars is that they can utilize needlessly complex syntax or overly expansive vocabulary that is impenetrable or not well-defined. When writing, avoid problems associated with opaque writing by keeping in mind the following:

1.   Excessive use of specialized terminology . Yes, it is appropriate for you to use specialist language and a formal style of expression in academic writing, but it does not mean using "big words" just for the sake of doing so. Overuse of complex or obscure words or writing complicated sentence constructions gives readers the impression that your paper is more about style than substance; it leads the reader to question if you really know what you are talking about. Focus on creating clear, concise, and elegant prose that minimizes reliance on specialized terminology.

2.   Inappropriate use of specialized terminology . Because you are dealing with concepts, research, and data within your discipline, you need to use the technical language appropriate to that area of study. However, nothing will undermine the validity of your study quicker than the inappropriate application of a term or concept. Avoid using terms whose meaning you are unsure of--do not just guess or assume! Consult the meaning of terms in specialized, discipline-specific dictionaries by searching the USC Libraries catalog or the Credo Reference database [see above].

Additional Problems to Avoid

In addition to understanding the use of specialized language, there are other aspects of academic writing in the social sciences that you should be aware of. These problems include:

• Personal nouns . Excessive use of personal nouns [e.g., I, me, you, us] may lead the reader to believe the study was overly subjective. These words can be interpreted as being used only to avoid presenting empirical evidence about the research problem. Limit the use of personal nouns to descriptions of things you actually did [e.g., "I interviewed ten teachers about classroom management techniques..."]. Note that personal nouns are generally found in the discussion section of a paper because this is where you as the author/researcher interpret and describe your work.
• Directives . Avoid directives that demand the reader to "do this" or "do that." Directives should be framed as evidence-based recommendations or goals leading to specific outcomes. Note that an exception to this can be found in various forms of action research that involve evidence-based advocacy for social justice or transformative change. Within this area of the social sciences, authors may offer directives for action in a declarative tone of urgency.
• Informal, conversational tone using slang and idioms . Academic writing relies on excellent grammar and precise word structure. Your narrative should not include regional dialects or slang terms because they can be open to interpretation. Your writing should be direct and concise using standard English.
• Wordiness. Focus on being concise, straightforward, and developing a narrative that does not have confusing language . By doing so, you  help eliminate the possibility of the reader misinterpreting the design and purpose of your study.
• Vague expressions (e.g., "they," "we," "people," "the company," "that area," etc.). Being concise in your writing also includes avoiding vague references to persons, places, or things. While proofreading your paper, be sure to look for and edit any vague or imprecise statements that lack context or specificity.
• Numbered lists and bulleted items . The use of bulleted items or lists should be used only if the narrative dictates a need for clarity. For example, it is fine to state, "The four main problems with hedge funds are:" and then list them as 1, 2, 3, 4. However, in academic writing, this must then be followed by detailed explanation and analysis of each item. Given this, the question you should ask yourself while proofreading is: why begin with a list in the first place rather than just starting with systematic analysis of each item arranged in separate paragraphs? Also, be careful using numbers because they can imply a ranked order of priority or importance. If none exists, use bullets and avoid checkmarks or other symbols.
• Descriptive writing . Describing a research problem is an important means of contextualizing a study. In fact, some description or background information may be needed because you can not assume the reader knows the key aspects of the topic. However, the content of your paper should focus on methodology, the analysis and interpretation of findings, and their implications as they apply to the research problem rather than background information and descriptions of tangential issues.
• Personal experience. Drawing upon personal experience [e.g., traveling abroad; caring for someone with Alzheimer's disease] can be an effective way of introducing the research problem or engaging your readers in understanding its significance. Use personal experience only as an example, though, because academic writing relies on evidence-based research. To do otherwise is simply story-telling.

NOTE:   Rules concerning excellent grammar and precise word structure do not apply when quoting someone.  A quote should be inserted in the text of your paper exactly as it was stated. If the quote is especially vague or hard to understand, consider paraphrasing it or using a different quote to convey the same meaning. Consider inserting the term "sic" in brackets after the quoted text to indicate that the quotation has been transcribed exactly as found in the original source, but the source had grammar, spelling, or other errors. The adverb sic informs the reader that the errors are not yours.

Academic Writing. The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University; Academic Writing Style. First-Year Seminar Handbook. Mercer University; Bem, Daryl J. Writing the Empirical Journal Article. Cornell University; College Writing. The Writing Center. University of North Carolina; Murray, Rowena  and Sarah Moore. The Handbook of Academic Writing: A Fresh Approach . New York: Open University Press, 2006; Johnson, Eileen S. “Action Research.” In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Education . Edited by George W. Noblit and Joseph R. Neikirk. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2020); Oppenheimer, Daniel M. "Consequences of Erudite Vernacular Utilized Irrespective of Necessity: Problems with Using Long Words Needlessly." Applied Cognitive Psychology 20 (2006): 139-156; Ezza, El-Sadig Y. and Touria Drid. T eaching Academic Writing as a Discipline-Specific Skill in Higher Education . Hershey, PA: IGI Global, 2020; Pernawan, Ari. Common Flaws in Students' Research Proposals. English Education Department. Yogyakarta State University; Style. College Writing. The Writing Center. University of North Carolina; Invention: Five Qualities of Good Writing. The Reading/Writing Center. Hunter College; Sword, Helen. Stylish Academic Writing . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012; What Is an Academic Paper? Institute for Writing Rhetoric. Dartmouth College.

Structure and Writing Style

I. Improving Academic Writing

To improve your academic writing skills, you should focus your efforts on three key areas: 1.   Clear Writing . The act of thinking about precedes the process of writing about. Good writers spend sufficient time distilling information and reviewing major points from the literature they have reviewed before creating their work. Writing detailed outlines can help you clearly organize your thoughts. Effective academic writing begins with solid planning, so manage your time carefully. 2.  Excellent Grammar . Needless to say, English grammar can be difficult and complex; even the best scholars take many years before they have a command of the major points of good grammar. Take the time to learn the major and minor points of good grammar. Spend time practicing writing and seek detailed feedback from professors. Take advantage of the Writing Center on campus if you need help. Proper punctuation and good proofreading skills can significantly improve academic writing [see sub-tab for proofreading you paper ].

Refer to these three basic resources to help your grammar and writing skills:

• A good writing reference book, such as, Strunk and White’s book, The Elements of Style or the St. Martin's Handbook ;
• A college-level dictionary, such as, Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary ;
• The latest edition of Roget's Thesaurus in Dictionary Form .

3.  Consistent Stylistic Approach . Whether your professor expresses a preference to use MLA, APA or the Chicago Manual of Style or not, choose one style manual and stick to it. Each of these style manuals provide rules on how to write out numbers, references, citations, footnotes, and lists. Consistent adherence to a style of writing helps with the narrative flow of your paper and improves its readability. Note that some disciplines require a particular style [e.g., education uses APA] so as you write more papers within your major, your familiarity with it will improve.

II. Evaluating Quality of Writing

A useful approach for evaluating the quality of your academic writing is to consider the following issues from the perspective of the reader. While proofreading your final draft, critically assess the following elements in your writing.

• It is shaped around one clear research problem, and it explains what that problem is from the outset.
• Your paper tells the reader why the problem is important and why people should know about it.
• You have accurately and thoroughly informed the reader what has already been published about this problem or others related to it and noted important gaps in the research.
• You have provided evidence to support your argument that the reader finds convincing.
• The paper includes a description of how and why particular evidence was collected and analyzed, and why specific theoretical arguments or concepts were used.
• The paper is made up of paragraphs, each containing only one controlling idea.
• You indicate how each section of the paper addresses the research problem.
• You have considered counter-arguments or counter-examples where they are relevant.
• Arguments, evidence, and their significance have been presented in the conclusion.
• Limitations of your research have been explained as evidence of the potential need for further study.
• The narrative flows in a clear, accurate, and well-organized way.

Boscoloa, Pietro, Barbara Arféb, and Mara Quarisaa. “Improving the Quality of Students' Academic Writing: An Intervention Study.” Studies in Higher Education 32 (August 2007): 419-438; Academic Writing. The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University; Academic Writing Style. First-Year Seminar Handbook. Mercer University; Bem, Daryl J. Writing the Empirical Journal Article. Cornell University; Candlin, Christopher. Academic Writing Step-By-Step: A Research-based Approach . Bristol, CT: Equinox Publishing Ltd., 2016; College Writing. The Writing Center. University of North Carolina; Style . College Writing. The Writing Center. University of North Carolina; Invention: Five Qualities of Good Writing. The Reading/Writing Center. Hunter College; Sword, Helen. Stylish Academic Writing . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012; What Is an Academic Paper? Institute for Writing Rhetoric. Dartmouth College.

Writing Tip

Considering the Passive Voice in Academic Writing

In the English language, we are able to construct sentences in the following way: 1.  "The policies of Congress caused the economic crisis." 2.  "The economic crisis was caused by the policies of Congress."

The decision about which sentence to use is governed by whether you want to focus on “Congress” and what they did, or on “the economic crisis” and what caused it. This choice in focus is achieved with the use of either the active or the passive voice. When you want your readers to focus on the "doer" of an action, you can make the "doer"' the subject of the sentence and use the active form of the verb. When you want readers to focus on the person, place, or thing affected by the action, or the action itself, you can make the effect or the action the subject of the sentence by using the passive form of the verb.

Often in academic writing, scholars don't want to focus on who is doing an action, but on who is receiving or experiencing the consequences of that action. The passive voice is useful in academic writing because it allows writers to highlight the most important participants or events within sentences by placing them at the beginning of the sentence.

Use the passive voice when:

• You want to focus on the person, place, or thing affected by the action, or the action itself;
• It is not important who or what did the action;
• You want to be impersonal or more formal.

Form the passive voice by:

• Turning the object of the active sentence into the subject of the passive sentence.
• Changing the verb to a passive form by adding the appropriate form of the verb "to be" and the past participle of the main verb.

NOTE: Consult with your professor about using the passive voice before submitting your research paper. Some strongly discourage its use!

Active and Passive Voice. The Writing Lab and The OWL. Purdue University; Diefenbach, Paul. Future of Digital Media Syllabus. Drexel University; Passive Voice. The Writing Center. University of North Carolina.  

• << Previous: 2. Preparing to Write
• Next: Applying Critical Thinking >>
• Last Updated: May 22, 2024 12:03 PM
• URL: https://libguides.usc.edu/writingguide

Writing skills

No matter how novel your research, or how much time you’ve invested in your work, you still need to pay attention to some basic writing rules if you want to get published.

Our writing skills modules contain some helpful advice so you can ensure poor use of language or sloppy article structure doesn’t let you down.

You will discover the 10 most common mistakes researchers make in their manuscripts, from ambiguity and inconsistency to incorrect referencing. And then, of course, there’s the ethics issue of plagiarism….

We also look at the topic of manuscript language in detail, and offer some advice on where you can find support to improve it.

What you will learn

• Information on common writing mistakes
• Advice on how to avoid those errors
• A guide to correct manuscript language

Modules in Writing skills

How to prepare a proposal for a review article

Writing a persuasive cover letter for your manuscript

How to turn your thesis into an article

5 Diseases ailing research – and how to cure them

Using proper manuscript language

10 tips for writing a truly terrible journal article

• Academic Skills
• Graduate research services
• Graduate research

Developing writing skills for graduate research

Adopting authoring mindsets and strategies.

This resource introduces approaches to starting, sustaining and strengthening your thesis writing. It includes activities to help you apply tips and reflect on your own learning. It should take you 15-20 minutes to read and complete. Check out the further resources at the bottom of each section and references on the last page for more information on this topic.

Writing a graduate research thesis to a publishable standard requires you to adopt the identity of an author and expert in your field and seek ways to maximise your readership. Developing these ‘authoring’ skills involves heightening your awareness of the processes of doctoral writing and establishing a productive writing routine.

Write to think

Writing shapes and refines your thinking. A sort of gym for the intellect.

Writing deepens insight into ideas and information, reveals gaps and creates opportunities to refine expression. Writing down your ideas regularly helps you to not only record them for later use but also process them into new knowledge, freeing up mental space for further thinking.

Write-to-think tips:

• Try free writing : write continuously on a topic, with as few pauses as possible, without worrying about writing structure or syntax. Give your free writing a time limit, such as 10 minutes at a time, to help you focus on the task of idea generation.
• Use a writing plan but treat it flexibly. You may need to go back and adjust it as your ideas develop through writing.
• Write frequently: dedicating specific , regular timeframes to writing can help you avoid procrastination.
• Choose a thesis or article in your field which you consider a good model.
• Remove all the substantive content – language that is specific to the topic – until only the language that frames the content remains.
• You’ll end up with a ‘skeleton’ you can expand with your own ideas.
• In a later stage, you can modify the language of this skeleton, but using a template of framing language is not plagiarism.

'Skeleton sentence' example:

"Accumulating research on … [my topic] in recent years has indicated a growing need to … [my research problem]. For example, many studies have shown … [my synthesis]. This suggests that … [my interpretation]. This issue needs to be addressed using … [my new approach] because … [my reason]. In this paper, I aim to … [my focus/contribution]"

Shape your writing as you go

It is important to accept ‘good enough’ writing in the early stages, because it is likely that you will need to polish your work as your research progresses in any case.

Just do the best you can early on, knowing that you are writing mostly for yourself and possibly your supervisor, and you will probably revise the writing later to make it suitable for an external examiner.

When revising, note how much your knowledge and understanding has grown in the intervening months or years. Such growth is often assisted by your earlier writing as a first step in the clarification process.

Have the courage to let go of earlier ideas and snippets of writing that no longer have a place in your thesis. If you are hesitant to delete material, create a document for these snippets in case you want to revisit them later.

Write for your reader

A text is a kind of journey that the reader takes, with you as their guide. When refining your writing, anticipate and work to meet your readers’ needs so that they receive the message you intended in the simplest way possible within your field.

• Think about the widest possible readership to help you shape your writing so that it appeals to as many scholars as it can.
• Set the right expectations and deliver upon them. For example, only criticise what you will properly discuss through your work. Be consistent and don’t oversell.
• Create short-cuts for your readers, for example, by using informative headings, because they will be looking for them.
• Which terms and concepts can you be confident that your reader will know?
• Which ones may require explanation? These might be very new, or not widely used beyond a few ‘schools of thought’. They may come from another discipline or have different uses in different but related fields. In any of these cases, state the meaning you are referring to.
• Direct the reader as to where the text will lead and what will be presented along the way. This often appears in chapter or section introductions.
• Summarise the main points established at the end of a section or chapter.
• Signal forward , for example, ‘This problem will be discussed in detail in Chapter 2’, and remind readers, for example, ‘as was presented in chapter 3, section 3.1’
• Indicate your stance , for example, expressions such as “this promising study shows” or “one minor consideration is...” help your reader understand the relative importance of an idea.
• Use cohesive devices, such as ‘first’, ‘second’ and ‘third’, to signpost and link elements.

Study examination criteria and model theses

First and foremost, a thesis needs to meet examination criteria. Explore the UoM examination criteria and then find an example thesis in your field.

• How does the thesis address each of the criteria?
• How can you use these criteria to guide your writing?

How do examiners read a thesis?

Academic Phrasebank for language to frame content

Use the side menu to go the next section: Writing complex information clearly , where we look at ways to enhance the clarity of your writing.

Writing complex information clearly

Academic writing usually delivers a lot of new content in limited space, which may create difficulties for your reader in following your ideas. This page introduces some strategies for word choice and sentence organisation to help you create clear and cohesive writing.

Keep it simple

The presentation below introduces examples and strategies you can use to simplify your own writing.

Click on 'next' at the bottom of the slide to work through the activity.

*If content below does not display, please refresh your browser

Examine sample sentences

This activity will provide practice and feedback on your understanding of principles of clear research writing.

Read the sentence, and then select the reason it lacks clarity from the options below it.

Move through the activity by clicking on the 'next' arrow (bottom right).

Developing clarity and focus

Use the side menu to go the next section: Developing authorial voice and narrative , where we examine a writing structure that helps progress a thesis argument.

Developing an authorial voice and narrative

In research writing, an author’s voice is an instrument that weaves all ideas, including background information and your own research, into a unified argument.

Authorial voice is created:

• At a micro level: by using language that shows your involvement and evaluation, such as when you decide whether to write ‘Smith (2017) demonstrates that …’ or ‘assumes that …’ (reporting verbs show your attitude to the source).

Narrative is closely related to voice as another instrument for developing your research argument. If your voice expresses your creative and critical thinking, your narrative paces the progression of the argument through all thesis elements, from the research problem through to your methods, results and discussion.

Narrative can be seen most clearly in the structural and content alignment of introductory and concluding messages on the levels of the whole thesis, individual chapters, sections and paragraphs.

Use a U-shaped writing structure

Argument through voice and narrative can be shown through a U-shaped writing structure. Watch the following video to see the movement of ideas at the paragraph level.

Extrapolate the U-shaped structure

In a model thesis or your own thesis:

• Can you notice a similar progression from the general to the specific back to the general, not only at the paragraph level but also at the section, chapter and thesis level?
• Is the thesis argument being developed in small steps at a lower level and in broader strokes at a higher one?
• Put together the introduction and conclusion to each of the thesis chapters in one document. Do they make a smooth narrative?
• Is there enough rationale and progression of the thesis argument?
• Does the language help show these?

Incorporating sources

Connecting chapters/chapter introductions

Writing more than one thing at the same time

Use the side menu to go the next section: Demonstrating originality and strength of claim, where we look at an originality checklist and the language for stating your original contribution.

Demonstrating originality and strength of claim

In highlighting your original contribution, the language you use in your thesis should convey your critical awareness and use of disciplinary conventions and terminology, even when you aim to deviate from these.

Originality checklist

There are many ways in which a thesis can be original. Consult the originality checklist below. What box(es) does your thesis tick?

• You do empirical work that has not been done before
• You synthesise things that have not been put together before
• You make a new interpretation of someone else’s material/ideas
• You do something in a country that has only previously been done elsewhere
• You take an existing technique and apply it to a new area
• You work across disciplines, using different methodologies
• You look at topics that people in your discipline have not looked at
• You test existing knowledge in an original way
• You add to knowledge in a way that has not been done before (e.g., a new theory/framework/model/solution)
• You write down a new piece of information for the first time
• You give a good exposition of someone else’s idea
• You continue an original piece of work.

(Adapted from Murray, 2017, p. 69)

Strength of claim

When expressing your claim:

• Use language that conveys your confidence about your research and its importance as appropriate to the strength of your evidence
• Use a balanced tone to state both the contributions and limitations of others’ research and your own
• Avoid absolute terms, for example, ‘perfect’ or ‘prove’, unless your evidence is absolute.

Explore an example

In thesis writing, well-chosen verbs and adjectives can help send a strong message about the original contribution of the work.

In the following activity, you will analyse excerpts from an example thesis to better understand how to do this.

• Read excerpt 1 and excerpt 2, below.
• Remember: verbs are often actions (e.g. write, explore, fulfill ) while adjectives are  descriptive (e.g. important, difficult, broken )

The example statement above, with its well-selected verbs and adjectives, establishes the implications/significance of the research.

It shows the writer’s disciplinary expertise by connecting the research to the field, using its language and exceeding its current knowledge.

This statement also shows the originality of the thesis, at least in two ways:

• synthesising things that have not been put together before
• adding to knowledge in a way that has not been done before

(Murray, 2017)

Write your statement of original contribution

Use the following prompts to help you reflect on your expertise and contribution in your field. Give yourself 5-10 minutes to free-write, then review your statement to fit your thesis.

What’s your original contribution in a phrase? (Think about the title of your thesis)

"My work is/will be original in the sense that…"

If you treat writing not as an isolated task, but a tool to help you learn and integrate your readings and research into a cohesive whole, you have the best chance of producing a quality thesis.

Write to think through ideas, test and connect them, increase the precision of your expression, and find your writer’s voice and originality.

For more information and support in your writing, Explore: Academic Skills Graduate Research services

Developing originality

Mewburn, I. (2019, February 13). The uneven U. The Thesis Whisperer . https://thesiswhisperer.com/2019/02/13/the-uneven-u/

Mody, F. (2018). Doctors down under: European medical migrants in Victoria (Australia) , 1930-60 [PhD thesis, University of Melbourne]. http://hdl.handle.net/11343/221550

Murray, R. (2017). How to write a thesis . Open University Press. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/unimelb/reader.action?docID=6212212

Raamsdonk, J. (2018). Mechanisms underlying longevity: A genetic switch model of aging. Experimental Gerontology, 107 , 136–139. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.exger.2017.08.005

Southern aurora. (2023). Our Tasmania . http://www.ourtasmania.com.au/southern-aurora.html

Thomson, P., & Kamler, B. (2013). Writing for peer reviewed journals: Strategies for getting published . Routledge. https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/unimelb/reader.action?docID=1092713

Whittle, I., Midgley, S., Georges, H., Pringle, A.-M., & Taylor, R. (2005). Patient perceptions of ‘“awake”’ brain tumour surgery. Acta Neurochir (Wien), 147 , 275–277. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00701-004-0445-7

Essential Rules for Academic Writing: A Beginner’s Guide

Unlock the key rules for academic writing: from structure to citations. Master scholarly communication with expert insights.

Mastering the art of academic writing is a fundamental skill that empowers students and researchers to express their ideas, convey complex concepts, and contribute meaningfully to their respective fields. However, for beginners venturing into the realm of scholarly writing, navigating the intricacies of this formal discourse can be a daunting task.

“Essential Rules for Academic Writing: A Beginner’s Guide” serves as a beacon of guidance, illuminating the path for aspiring scholars as they embark on their academic journey. This comprehensive article offers invaluable insights into the fundamental principles and key rules that underpin successful academic writing, providing a strong foundation for those new to the craft.

What Is Academic Writing?

Academic writing refers to a formal style of writing that is prevalent in academic settings such as universities, research institutions, and scholarly publications. It is a mode of communication used by students, researchers, and scholars to convey their ideas, present research findings, and engage in intellectual discourse within their respective fields of study.

Related article: 11 Best Grammar Checker Tools For Academic Writing

Unlike other forms of writing, academic writing adheres to specific conventions and standards that prioritize clarity, precision, objectivity, and critical thinking. It is characterized by a rigorous approach to presenting arguments, supporting claims with evidence, and adhering to the principles of logic and reasoning.

Academic writing encompasses a wide range of genres, including essays, research papers, literature reviews, theses, dissertations, conference papers, and journal articles. Regardless of the specific genre, academic writing typically follows a structured format, includes proper citation and referencing, and adheres to established academic style guides such as APA (American Psychological Association) or MLA (Modern Language Association).

Types Of Academic Writing

Here’s a table summarizing the different types of academic writing, along with their definitions, purposes and typical structures:

Also read: Words To Use In Essays: Amplifying Your Academic Writing

General Rules For Academic Writing

Here are some general rules for academic writing: by adhering to these general guidelines, you can enhance the clarity, effectiveness, and professionalism of your academic writing, ensuring that your ideas are communicated with precision and impact.

Clarity and Precision

Academic writing demands clarity and precision in the expression of ideas. Use clear and concise language to communicate your thoughts effectively. Avoid ambiguous or vague statements, and strive for a logical flow of ideas within your writing.

Audience Awareness

Consider your intended audience when writing academically. Be aware of their background knowledge and familiarity with the topic. Adapt your writing style and level of technicality accordingly, ensuring that your content is accessible and understandable to your readers.

Use Formal Language

Academic writing requires a formal tone and language. Avoid colloquialisms, slang, and overly informal expressions. Instead, employ a vocabulary appropriate to the academic context, using specialized terms when necessary.

Structure and Organization

Structure your writing in a logical and coherent manner. Use clear headings, subheadings, and paragraphs to guide the reader through your work. Ensure that your ideas are well-organized and presented in a cohesive manner, with each paragraph or section contributing to the overall argument or discussion.

Evidence-Based Reasoning

Support your arguments and claims with credible evidence. Reference authoritative sources and cite them appropriately to establish the foundation for your ideas. Use empirical data, scholarly research, and reputable references to strengthen the validity and reliability of your work.

Critical Thinking

Academic writing encourages critical thinking and analysis. Engage with the existing literature, identify strengths and weaknesses in the arguments, and develop your own well-reasoned perspective. Challenge assumptions, evaluate alternative viewpoints, and provide well-supported arguments.

Proper Referencing and Citation

Maintain academic integrity by properly referencing and citing all sources used in your writing. Follow the specific citation style required by your academic institution or field, such as APA , MLA , or Chicago style . Accurate referencing gives credit to the original authors, allows readers to verify your sources, and demonstrates your commitment to scholarly integrity.

Revision and Proofreading

Academic writing involves a process of revision and proofreading. Review your work for clarity, coherence, grammar, and spelling errors. Ensure that your writing is free from typographical mistakes and inconsistencies. Seek feedback from peers, instructors, or writing centers to enhance the quality of your work.

Also read: What Is Proofreading And How To Harness Its Benefits?

How To Improve The Academic Writing

To enhance your academic writing skills, it is crucial to engage in regular practice and give careful consideration to various aspects. Here are some essential focal points to pay attention to in order to improve your academic writing:

Punctuation

• Proper use of commas, periods, question marks, and exclamation marks to enhance clarity and meaning in sentences.
• Effective use of semicolons and colons to join related independent clauses and introduce lists or explanations.
• Understanding the role of dashes and hyphens to indicate interruptions or join words in compound adjectives.

Capitalization

• Capitalize proper nouns, including names of people, places, institutions, and specific titles or terms.
• Follow capitalization rules for titles, capitalizing the first and last words, as well as major words within the title.
• Ensure consistency in capitalization within headings and subheadings.

Grammar and Sentence Structure

• Ensure subject-verb agreement, ensuring that the subject and verb agree in number and person.
• Use proper tenses and maintain consistency in verb tense usage within a paragraph or section.
• Write clear and unambiguous sentences, avoiding run-on sentences, fragments, or unclear pronoun references.

Academic Conventions

• Apply appropriate formatting and font style as per the guidelines of the specific academic institution or style guide.
• Use headings and subheadings correctly, following a consistent hierarchy and formatting style.
• Use abbreviations appropriately and consistently, following the accepted conventions in the field.
• Adhere to specific guidelines for tables, figures, and graphs, including proper numbering, labeling, and citation.

Infographic Templates Made By Scientists

Mind the Graph revolutionizes scientific communication by offering scientists a user-friendly platform with scientifically-themed infographic templates. Publication-ready exporting ensures seamless integration into scientific papers and presentations. Mind the Graph empowers scientists to make their research more accessible and engaging through visually appealing infographics. Start your free trial now!

Subscribe to our newsletter

Exclusive high quality content about effective visual communication in science.

Unlock Your Creativity

Create infographics, presentations and other scientifically-accurate designs without hassle — absolutely free for 7 days!

About Jessica Abbadia

Jessica Abbadia is a lawyer that has been working in Digital Marketing since 2020, improving organic performance for apps and websites in various regions through ASO and SEO. Currently developing scientific and intellectual knowledge for the community's benefit. Jessica is an animal rights activist who enjoys reading and drinking strong coffee.

Content tags

Skills and Strategies for Effective Writing

• First Online: 03 April 2024

Cite this chapter

• Jacqueline S. Stephen   ORCID: orcid.org/0000-0001-8949-5895 2  

Part of the book series: Springer Texts in Education ((SPTE))

77 Accesses

In addition to study skills, study habits, research, and reading, today’s students need to be able to effectively engage in the process of writing. This chapter explains the significance of effective writing skills on academic performance. There are many different types of academic writing assignments that college and university students are expected to actively participate in to complete various course requirements. Hence, this chapter will explain the most common types of college-level writing assignments. Additionally, there are several different styles of formatting that a student will encounter while engaging in the writing process. This chapter discusses the purpose of writing and formatting styles and provides some information on common styles of formatting. College and universities often provide access to resources to support students with writing assignments or to develop skills and strategies associated with effective writing. Thus, this chapter introduces students to the writing process, including the different types of academic writing tasks students can expect to complete through their courses, and explains the key differences in widely used styles of formatting. Furthermore, this chapter explains the importance of grammar, spelling, punctuation, and mechanics to college-level writing assignments. Technology is one of the tools that students enrolled in online courses will use to produce written assignments. Accordingly, this chapter discusses some advantages and challenges associated with the use of technology for writing assignments, including the use of available tools to avoid plagiarism. Finally, this chapter provides strategies and tips for students on how to improve and develop their writing skills to produce various types of college-level writing assignments.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

• Available as PDF
• Read on any device
• Instant download
• Own it forever
• Available as EPUB and PDF
• Compact, lightweight edition
• Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
• Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Basham, S. L., Radcliff, V. P., & Bryson, S. L. (2022). How to write an annotated bibliography. Journal of Criminal Justice Education, 14 , 1–9.

Google Scholar  

Carter, M. J., & Harper, H. (2013). Student writing: Strategies to reverse ongoing decline. Academic Questions, 26 (3), 285–295. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12129-013-9377-0

Article   Google Scholar  

Finley, A. (2021). How college contributes “to” workforce success: Employer views on what matters most. Association of American Colleges and Universities . https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED616977.pdf

Glynn, A., Hallsten-Erickson, K., & Swing, A. J. (2019). You, writing!: A guide to college composition .

Kim, M., & Dolan, M. (2015). “Excuse me, but what is a research paper?”: Embedded librarian program and information literacy skills of community college students. Community and Junior College Libraries, 21 (1–2), 53–70.

Kim, M. K., & McCarthy, K. S. (2021). Improving summary writing through formative feedback in a technology-enhanced learning environment. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 37 (3), 684–704.

Lunsford, A., Ruszkiewicz, J., & Walters, K. (2019). Everything’s an argument . Bedford/Saint Martin’s.

Myhill, D. (2021). Teaching the process of writing. In A Practical Guide to Teaching English in the Secondary School (pp. 52–60). Routledge.

Paul, J., & Barari, M. (2022). Meta-analysis and traditional systematic literature reviews—What, why, when, where, and how? Psychology and Marketing, 39 (6), 1099–1115.

Payne, A. R. (2012). Development of the academic writing motivation questionnaire [Master’s thesis, University of Georgia]. University of Georgia Digital Archive. https://getd.libs.uga.edu/pdfs/payne_ashley_r_201212_ma.pdf

Rios, J. A., Ling, G., Pugh, R., Becker, D., & Bacall, A. (2020). Identifying critical 21st-century skills for workplace success: A content analysis of job advertisements. Educational Researcher, 49 (2), 80–89.

Rolfe, G., Freshwater, D., Jasper, M. (2001). Critical reflection in nursing and the helping professions: A user’s guide . Palgrave Macmillan.

Rovai, A. P. (2003). In search of higher persistence rates in distance education online programs. The Internet and Higher Education, 6 (1), 1–16.

Shields, M. (2010). Essay writing: A student’s guide . Sage.

Stephen, J. S. (2022). Persistence of nontraditional undergraduate online students: Towards a contemporary conceptual framework. Journal of Adult and Continuing Education, 29 , 438–463. https://doi.org/10.1177/14779714221142908

Swanson, J. L., & Fouad, N. A. (2014). Career theory and practice: Learning through case studies . Sage publications.

Teng, M. F., & Yue, M. (2022). Metacognitive writing strategies, critical thinking skills, and academic writing performance: A structural equation modeling approach. Metacognition and Learning, 18 , 1–24.

Tinto, V. (2012). Completing college: Rethinking institutional action . University of Chicago Press.

Tshabangu, I., & Madondo, S. M. (2022). Research report writing: Proposals, dissertations, and academic writing. In Research anthology on doctoral student professional development (pp. 454–476). IGI Global.

Villarroel, V., Boud, D., Bloxham, S., Bruna, D., & Bruna, C. (2020). Using principles of authentic assessment to redesign written examinations and tests. Innovations in Education and Teaching International, 57 (1), 38–49.

Warburton, N. (2020). The basics of essay writing . Routledge.

Book   Google Scholar  

Download references

Author information

Authors and affiliations.

Mercer University, Atlanta, GA, USA

Jacqueline S. Stephen

You can also search for this author in PubMed   Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jacqueline S. Stephen .

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2024 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this chapter

Stephen, J.S. (2024). Skills and Strategies for Effective Writing. In: Academic Success in Online Programs. Springer Texts in Education. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-54439-2_9

Download citation

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-54439-2_9

Published : 03 April 2024

Publisher Name : Springer, Cham

Print ISBN : 978-3-031-54438-5

Online ISBN : 978-3-031-54439-2

eBook Packages : Education Education (R0)

Share this chapter

Anyone you share the following link with will be able to read this content:

Sorry, a shareable link is not currently available for this article.

Provided by the Springer Nature SharedIt content-sharing initiative

• Publish with us

Policies and ethics

• Find a journal
• Track your research

An official website of the United States government

The .gov means it’s official. Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

The site is secure. The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

• Publications
• Account settings

Preview improvements coming to the PMC website in October 2024. Learn More or Try it out now .

• Advanced Search
• Journal List
• Front Public Health

Writing Skills Development for Graduate Studies and Career Readiness in Science and Aging Fields: A Case Study Approach

Associated data.

The datasets presented in this article are not readily available because the qualitative data generated for this article are unable to be sufficiently de-identified. Requests to access the datasets should be directed to ude.cs.liame@15sa .

Increasing the number of racially and ethnically underrepresented students who pursue scientific graduate studies in programs focusing on science and aging offers an opportunity to increase the number of aging specialists while simultaneously promoting diversity in the research labor market and supporting new ideas. This case study aims to better understand how students participating in an academic preparatory program experience a writing class contextualized within (1) students' writing background and (2) students' future ambitions related to science and aging. The individually-tailored writing class was taught as a critical component of a comprehensive educational program that targets underrepresented racial and ethnic minority undergraduate students who are interested in pursuing scientific graduate studies in fields related to aging. The researchers conducted semi-structured qualitative interviews with students ( n = 4) enrolled in the 24-month fellowship training program, which included participation in the writing course during the summer prior to their senior year of undergraduate education. All participants were young adult college students who identified as Black or African American and female. Using thematic coding, statements about professional writing skills were divided into four primary themes: (1) prior experiences, (2) class experiences, (3) future goals and ambitions, and (4) structural considerations. These themes suggest potential implications for effective interventions aimed to advance the writing skills and academic and career readiness of racially and ethnically diverse students entering fields of science and aging.

Introduction

According to United States (US) census projections, the US population is both “graying and browning;” that is, rapidly becoming older and more racially and ethnically diverse ( 1 , 2 ). From 2000 to 2030, the number of older adults in the US is expected to increase from 35 million to over 72 million ( 3 ). By 2050, the population of Black older adults is projected to triple, while the population of Latinx older adults is expected to increase 11-fold ( 4 ). With older adults projected to comprise ~20% of the US population in the future, and new advancements in health and technology, there is a growing need for researchers, advanced practitioners and advanced degree-holders specializing in aging. In addition to the need for aging specialists in general, there is a need for more racial and ethnic diversity in aging specialization.

Increasing the number of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) students who pursue scientific graduate studies in programs focusing on science and aging offers an opportunity to increase the number of aging specialists while simultaneously promoting new ideas and new perspectives. However, these opportunities are challenged by a poor fit between undergraduate student writing skills and expectations for graduate school entry. This mismatch is exacerbated by longstanding disparities in the public education system that contribute to racially and ethnically diverse students' underexposure to advanced-level writing curricula and to the undervaluation of different writing styles. Thus, exposure to a curriculum that provides such students with individually-tailored writing skills development can impact their readiness for graduate programs in science and aging and better prepare them for entry into a rapidly developing job market.

This case study aimed to better understand how students within an academic preparatory program experience a writing class building on (1) students' prior writing experiences and (2) students' future ambitions related to science and aging. The personalized writing class was taught as a critical component of a comprehensive educational program that targets racially and ethnically diverse undergraduate students who are interested in pursuing scientific graduate studies in fields related to aging. Study findings suggest potential implications for effective interventions aimed to advance the writing skills and academic and career readiness of racially and ethnically diverse students entering fields of science and aging.

Background and Rationale

Importance of undergraduate writing skills development.

The need for quality writing skills in science-related fields, including aging, is becoming more crucial than ever before. Recently, there has been newfound attention on the importance of early writing skills development for students at the undergraduate level, particularly across science disciplines, as students who can demonstrate strong written communication skills are considered qualified candidates for graduate programs ( 5 ). While STEM candidates on the job market are required to have professional writing skills, science and technology high school and college students have been found to more likely experience difficulties with written communication ( 6 ). A study by Jang ( 6 ) found that 50% of college students in science and technology fields lacked basic levels of reading and writing. Jang ( 6 ) suggests that education programs in STEM fields can better prepare students for the changing job market by creating “a continuous cycle where students practice communicating in learning contexts and get frequent professional feedback from peers and educators using a peer and self-assessment for writing, speaking and collaboration” (p. 297).

For graduate programs in science, the significance of quality writing skills is clear: successful researchers, advanced practitioners and advanced degree-holders must be able to effectively communicate information with other researchers and practitioners as well as the general public ( 7 ). Scientific writing is also essential for scholarly activities such as publishing peer-reviewed journal articles, submitting abstracts for conference presentations, and completing grant proposals. These activities, in turn, prepare students to be competitive on the job market, empowering productive professionals and leaders in their fields. While there is strong expectation and need for students pursuing graduate programs in science and aging to be excellent writers, many students have not acquired sufficient skills to be able to write effectively in their respective fields by the end of their undergraduate studies. Consequently, the lack of writing skills might diminish the likelihood of the candidate's acceptance into their graduate school of choice. Even if accepted, students may feel less prepared for the “writing demands and other requirements of graduate education and professional careers” [( 5 ), p. 1].

Many reasons exist for the lack of writing preparedness among undergraduate students. With pressing demands to cover course content and large grading loads, instructors rarely have time to teach writing skills or provide students with substantial feedback on papers to help improve their writing ( 5 , 7 ). Because it is presumed that students learn basic writing skills during high school including knowledge of punctuation, grammar, sentence structure, and citations, some instructors may neglect to focus class time on writing development ( 8 ). However, for many racially and ethnically diverse students, the lack of writing preparedness is far more salient and complex.

Disparities in Writing Skills Development

An overwhelming number of racially and ethnically diverse students graduate from high school unprepared for the writing demands and rigors of college education ( 9 ). Research suggests that African American students in particular are less likely to be academically prepared for college, with those from economically distressed communities being the least ready for college-level curricula ( 9 , 10 ). The tremendous disparity in preparation for racially and ethnically diverse students, especially African American students, is often “centered on the deficiencies of students, families, and communities,” with little attention to institutional and social factors, including structural racism, exclusion, and poverty that influence college readiness ( 9 ). School factors such as poor access to college preparatory courses, funding, quality teachers, and supportive school counselors also impact students' preparedness for college ( 9 ).

There are discrepancies in the ways in which writing instruction is taught and measured across diverse student populations. According to Green ( 11 ), African American students are taught “to edit out, not edit, their Black English usage rhetorically to inform or enhance their academic writing” (p. 154). Unfortunately, racially and ethnically diverse students who struggle with “editing” out their unique linguistic differences in written assignments may face poor evaluations from teachers who operate from a Westernized perspective of writing that prioritizes dominant ideas about what constitutes “good” academic and professional writing ( 11 ). Despite perceptions of academic and professional writing skills as being racially and culturally biased ( 12 ), these perceptions remain the benchmarks by which many students are evaluated for admission into graduate school ( 13 ) and thereby deemed successful within graduate programs ( 8 ). Thus, there is need to equip racially and ethnically diverse students with the knowledge and skills to meet and exceed these standards, as well as to empower them to recognize unique cultural and linguistic differences in their writing.

Bridging the Gap—The Significance of Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs)

HBCUs are unique sites for academic and professional achievement and cultural pride that have been significantly shaped by racism, discrimination, and social exclusion ( 11 ). HBCUs are shown to have welcoming and nurturing campus settings that provide opportunities for racially and ethnically diverse students, especially African American students, to excel academically ( 14 – 16 ). HBCUs already exist to enhance the academic and professional trajectory of racially and ethnically diverse students ( 15 ), while taking into account their cultural and linguistic differences ( 11 ). As such, HBCUs are uniquely positioned to help bridge the gap in writing skills development and preparation for this student population. Importantly, HBCUs can serve as a unique pathway to increase the number of qualified racially and ethnically diverse students who pursue scientific graduate studies in programs focusing on science and aging. Thus, there is need to implement effective programs in collaboration with HBCUs to enhance the writing skills of students and help develop their readiness both for matriculating into graduate programs in science and aging, as well as to achieve success in the growing job market of STEM and aging.

Description

This section provides a brief description of the overall research education training program as well as the writing course component, and how they both aim to prepare students for graduate studies and career readiness in science and aging fields. Beginning in 2015, a flagship research university in a southeastern US state established an NIA-funded undergraduate research training program “to increase the number of qualified racially and ethnically diverse students who pursue scientific graduate studies in programs focusing on science and aging.” Based in a predominately white institution (PWI), this program to advance diversity in aging research collaborates with five HBCUs in the same state. HBCUs are ideal partners because they have a large number of undergraduate students who identify as Black or African American and who are majoring in medical, science, technology, engineering or mathematics (MSTEM) fields, and “who, through exposure to a research education program focusing on aging research, might choose to enter scientific careers committed to addressing complex biological, biomedical, behavior and clinical challenges that accompany aging.” Students who participate in the project gain mentored research experience by working in a research laboratory of a faculty member from the PWI research institution, along with co-mentoring from a faculty member from their HBCU, and attend didactic classes on the biology and social aspects of aging and experiential workshops led by faculty members at HBCUs and at the PWI research institution. Participating students (fellows) live on campus in student housing at the PWI research university for close proximity to their labs and classes during the summer research program. As part of their summer experience, fellows prepare a poster which they present at the end of the summer at the PWI's Annual Summer Research Conference. Fellows are encouraged to further disseminate their research through poster presentations at conferences after the summer workshops, with financial support from the program to attend professional meetings.

In the first few years of the program (2016–2018) the program offered formal coursework related to the biology and social aspects of aging, research in aging, and professional development. A number of our students needed specific writing skills development. Additionally, in 2018 fellows completing their second summer of research training, which takes place prior to their senior year of college, requested additional time and support to prepare personal statements for graduate and medical school applications. In response, program staff introduced the writing skills course in summer 2019 as a core component of the comprehensive institutional research education program. This writing skills course aims to prepare emerging aging researchers to write more effectively for individuals, groups, organizations, communities and colleagues and to improve writing skills needed for graduate program admissions, scholarship applications and other opportunities.

We hoped that students who actively participated in the course would improve their writing skills and be better prepared for advanced studies in STEM fields related to aging. Specific aims of the course are for students to: (1) increase their confidence related to professional writing; (2) organize written documents clearly and effectively; (3) substantiate arguments using appropriate evidence; (4) develop a clear, concise writing style; (5) produce effective academic, research and e-communication documents; and (6) adhere to strong ethical values related to writing and written communication.

The writing skills course is delivered through lectures and discussion. The primary method of instruction is interactive, with hands-on writing activities both in and out of class, coupled with critical feedback and review from classmates and the course instructor. The course instructor is a White female doctoral student who has experience teaching graduate-level writing students at the PWI research institution. At the conclusion of this course students will have completed two five-paragraph essays related to an aging topic of interest and one personal statement. These high-quality products can be adapted for graduate or medical school applications, fellowship or scholarship applications, and many other opportunities for professional advancement.

This qualitative research study analyzed the individual experiences and perceptions of a small number of students participating in a professional writing course contextualized within (1) their participation in a comprehensive advancing diversity in aging research intervention program, (2) their prior educational and professional writing experiences, and (3) their future educational/professional ambitions. This focus is consistent with that promoted by Smith et al. ( 17 ) and Yin ( 18 ). Data were collected through semi-structured phone interviews from senior fellows ( n = 4) who participated in the writing course during the second summer of the 2-year program. Similar to Ory et al. ( 19 ), the authors believe that the case study approach we have taken can contribute importantly to the development of other evidence-based programs and practices ( 17 , 19 , 20 ). Although n = 4 is a small sample size, the number of participants is appropriate for community case studies ( 18 , 21 – 23 ). All study procedures were approved by the University of South Carolina Institutional Review Board.

Researchers developed a codebook using inductive thematic analysis and iteratively analyzed each transcript, revising the codebook until no new themes emerged. Transcript data were coded by the first and second authors using a process of first-cycle, second-cycle axial coding ( 24 ). Analyses were conducted in NVivo-12 and theme prevalence was determined using a conceptual cluster matrix table ( 25 , 26 ). As the experts of their experiences, students can provide valuable information about their educational and professional experiences in an effort to improve their writing skills and academic and career readiness.

All participants were young adult college students who identified as Black or African American and female. Statements about professional writing skills were divided into four primary themes: (1) prior writing preparedness, (2) current writing preparedness, (3) writing goals and ambitions, and (4) structural considerations.

Prior Experiences

Statements under the theme of “prior writing preparedness” describe situations that took place prior to participating in the summer writing class, such as high school and college coursework. Some students felt equipped to engage in graduate-level academic writing because they were well-prepared by high school and college classes. One student described doing well in high school with minimal effort but experienced a more rigorous writing environment with more critical feedback at her undergraduate institution:

“ For me, I feel like high school was super easy. I was in all the hardest classes, you didn't have to study for anything. So I got into college and I'm getting my paper slashed up. I had to study hard. Because now I always study like real hard, so I think I definitely got humbled freshman year, learning that this is like the big leagues now. It's not the same. Going from school to school, I think it's natural.”

Another student also stated that her undergraduate institution prepared her well for college-level writing, but not for doctoral-level writing skills toward which she is working. Although the summer writing class was similar to writing classes she had taken at her undergraduate institution and she experienced some overlap in instruction, she still found the course useful:

“ I'm not one to say that I'm a strong writer. So all writing for me is crucial. So anytime that I can practice my writing skills and actually have someone read it, and actually give me feedback on what I need to work on, is great. So I do not mind the repetitiveness because my writing is not PhD-level, for example. It's like a college-level, which is where I was but I want it to be PhD level, so I didn't mind the repetition.”

Other students felt that their high school and college learning experiences did not prepare them to engage in graduate-level academic writing skills. For example, one student described how her college English composition course was a positive experience but that the class was not completely focused on writing:

“ We wrote papers but it was only like, two and… we also did a lot more presentations, for example we had to create a poster or something like that for my English Comp as a grade instead of actually writing a paper.”

Another student had a similar experience:

“ I learned a lot in [the professional development classes] because honestly even though I took English my first year of college, I think I learned more in my writing class over the summer than in my first year at college… my English class here wasn't a terrible class, I just felt like it wasn't as useful as the writing class I had last summer.”

One student described how her experiences in an underfunded, racially-separated public education system influenced her writing skills training and the opportunities she was exposed to as a high school student:

“ I know particularly in my community… a lot of the Black schools didn't have the same things as the white schools. The white schools were private schools, people would pay to send their white kids to these private schools just so they wouldn't have to intermingle with the Black people in the community. Within the white schools they have a lot of money from the county that they receive, it goes to the white schools first and then it was like the leftovers, even though there was more of us than them…. So our books are old and half the time the computers don't work. It's just really frustrating and I feel like if I would have went to a private school I probably would have had a better chance. Even in high school I didn't have teachers that look like me. They were from different programs because our county couldn't really afford to pay teachers so we would get these mediocre teachers who are usually white or another race…. I feel like if I went to a different school I probably would have had a better chance. More exposure to different opportunities and stuff like that.”

Current Writing Preparedness

Statements under the theme of “current writing preparedness” reflected what happened during the summer writing class, such as the writing projects they completed, their feelings about writing, and their skills related to writing. Students revealed specific skills they learned through the summer writing course including writing clearer, writing stronger, engaging in scholarly debate, seeking and incorporating critical feedback, and improved confidence.

One student described how completing assignments allowed her to craft a scholarly argument, engage meaningfully with feedback and write clearly and concisely using simple language:

“ We had, I believe it was two essays and a personal statement. I believe. Both of them were persuasive variety, trying to prove a point and the personal statement was totally up to us. We had deadlines that we had to meet. Our writing teacher gave us really great feedback. She'd tells what we could have done better, what we done wrong, what we done right, what we need to include as far as content, grammar, punctuation, all of that stuff. We learned different types of writing and how to approach them and how to recognize those different types of writing. We also learned how to breakdown articles… and not to sound where we were trying to sound overly smart, but just enough so that the reader could understand what we're trying to say.”

Every student mentioned the benefit of engaging with feedback from the instructor and/or their peers during the summer writing course. The following is a story about how the course impacted a student's perspective about critical feedback and writing skill confidence:

One student described feeling nervous to send an advisor her paper. This student felt “ a little- not uncomfortable-but just nervous, I just knew that paper was going to get sliced up, which it did. But that's just how it goes. But I wasn't uncomfortable, just nervous that someone was going to read my paper and analyze what I did and if I did it right and stuff like that.” But after the summer writing course she felt more comfortable opening herself up to feedback: “ It made my nerves go away, because now I understand, okay, the paper is not going to come out perfect the first time you write it. So it made me stronger, because now I write what I can, or write what I think is best or whatever, and then I just send it off with no regrets. And if it comes back and it has questions or feedback or if she sliced it up, then I just read the feedback, or even with [the writing course instructor] reading my personal statement, when people give me feedback, it makes me think, ‘Okay, maybe that did sound weird, or that did sound awkward. I should have changed this around.' So now I'm more open to it, and not so afraid. I think before I was like, ‘Oh, I don't want them to think I can't write.' Everybody has a hard time writing, especially when it comes to, like, scientific writing….So I feel like that's the hardest thing for me now, to [receive] criticism, when I'm just like, okay, I'm here, it's for me.”

When asked if she felt comfortable sharing her writing with other people, one student responded:

“ At first, I wasn't. But now I'm more open to share it with other people because I feel like I'm better at receiving feedback and how to incorporate in writing teams now, rather than how I was before.”

Because the class was very small, fellows received individualized writing skills coaching with specific deadlines for submissions and resubmissions. One student described the class size as follows:

“ I think it was because of the class size and how productive it was. I guess when we have deadlines we're adamant about meeting those deadlines over the summer… we were actually writing things that we needed. It had [tips] to make our writing better.”

Writing Goals and Ambitions

Statements under the theme of “writing goals and ambitions” include students' descriptions of writing-related future goals and ambitions and ways in which writing will help them achieve those goals. Because completing a personal statement was one course requirement, this empowered students to meet the short-term goal of applying to graduate school programs. Two different students described the personal statement requirement as follows:

“ I like how they incorporated the writing class because as a rising senior at the time, I know that I needed to complete my graduate school application and just different things that gave an extra push to start off the academic year with.” “ If it wasn't for [the writing class and the professional development class] I wouldn't even have applied early to my programs because by me actually doing my personal statement and taking the GRE when I actually got to school in August I didn't feel overwhelmed like some of my other classmates. So, I was already steps ahead, more steps ahead than the others. So that was really good, I would say my senior year with the program, it was very beneficial.”

Other students described ways in which the skills they learned in the writing skills course would support a variety of academic, research and professional long-term goals:

“ I'm going to need to write personal statements. I'm going to have to do dissertations, I'm going to have to write grants one day. I'm going to have to do all of these different things and [if] I don't know how to do professional writing. I'm not going to be able to do any of those.” “ I'm really trying to help [mentor] with this so I can get a publication before going into grad school,” she described how she used writing skills to write the literature review for the manuscript she is writing with her mentor. She also described how the writing skills will be useful in graduate school : “I have to be able to write a whole dissertation, with [research area]- it's just so big it has a lot of writing.” “ Writing is everything that a [healthcare provider] does. So, in class you learn document, document, document, which means you have to effectively, efficiently and in the most simplest way, write exactly what's wrong with an issue or a problem, something you've seen. You have to write down everything. If you don't know how to write it and get your point across in one or two sentences, then somebody else isn't going to have time to read a paragraph worth of things. So something that I learned in class that actually translates to what I'm doing now is getting your point across quickly, and then later you can elaborate on that point. But don't take seven sentences to say you walked down the street.”

Structural Considerations

Statements under the theme of “structural considerations” describe structural factors that influence their experience in the STEM scholars program both societally (e.g., at systematic levels) and personally. Most of the students mentioned that being an HBCU student at a PWI was a culture shock given their cultural upbringing and previous educational experiences.

The following is a story about how the campus environment and social norms of a PWI impacted a student's experience in the summer program:

“ When I got to [PWI-redacted] it was very different, it was very different. Because in [HBCU-redacted] everyone was really friendly, everybody is speaking even when they don't know each other. And you know [PWI-redacted] it was just very different, the atmosphere, when people walk, they just don't say, “Excuse me.” They just bump into you, they're not friendly. So, that was a shocker to me. I would speak and they would just look at me like I'm crazy.”

The student also discussed feeling conflicted about attending a PWI for graduate school given her previous summer experience.

“ So now that I'm actually going to PWI for grad school, I don't know what to expect. I can code switch but I just feel like it's going to be very different because I'm a very friendly person.”

Another student shared her experience of being an HBCU student at a PWI and feeling the pressure to not appear as a “stereotype” about her racial group while on campus.

“ Well, it was a culture shock for me. Only because I came from an all-black elementary, an all-black middle and high and I came through an HBCU, so everyone that I've ever known has looked like me. Then when I got on [PWI-redacted] campus and I saw all of the Caucasian people, I was a little shocked because it was like I didn't want to seem like a stereotype. Because what I was comfortable with doing, I didn't want to make other people uncomfortable with how I look and that was never a concern for me and over the summer it became one. The second summer it got easier because I already knew what to expect, but walking around on campus, it was a shock.” However, the student felt the summer program and campus experience at a PWI exposed her to the realities of graduate education and the job market as a minority. “ I feel like it's kind of prepared me for it because I know that as you go higher in the rank, unfortunately there's not going to be a lot of people... I'm not going to see a lot of people that look like me and that within itself is intimidating. I feel like this experience that I had over the past two summers at [PWI-redacted] will help me get more comfortable with the idea that it's okay and that I am now part of the minority again, when, my entire life I felt like the majority.”

All of the students mentioned that the underrepresentation of racially and ethnically diverse professionals and leaders in their respective fields influenced their decision to pursue graduate studies and careers in science and aging. One student described how the lack of African American (AA) female doctors in health care settings motivated her to pursue a graduate degree in public health.

“ I guess that it's just not diversity in science and in public health period. And that just makes me go harder with this public health degree because when I actually talked to the people this summer with my research, they feel better if they see people that they look like. And that thought would lead to when I go to doctors, I preferably want to see an African American woman doctor but it's almost where we just lack it.”

All students described the importance of feeling comfortable. One student described how diversity in science and aging related fields can help increase patients' level comfort and the quality of service they receive.

“ And if you're talking to someone that looks like you, then I feel like you'll always feel a little more comfortable. And if there's no diversity, then they're not being given the opportunity or fair chance. Then it's like you're never going to get to see a difference, or even know if that would make a difference.”

Another student described a similar perspective:

“ I feel like it would make people more comfortable to want to go into health care. I feel most comfortable if I actually see someone that looks like me because it's like a connection there; I feel like they will be very relatable.”

For students who felt well-prepared by previous writing education experiences, the writing to advance diversity in aging research course elevated their writing skills to the next level: supporting advancement from competitive undergraduate-level writers, to competitive graduate-level writers. For students who described feeling under-prepared by the writing instruction they received in high school and college, this course provided instruction on basic skills including grammar and sentence structure, as well as more advanced professional writing skills. This case study suggests that the success of the writing course was due to the individualized instruction method, which relied heavily on instructor feedback and iterative coaching to improve student skills.

Through writing classes, students gained experience completing specific assignments and editing those assignments based on feedback and peer review. These assignments allowed students to gain the skills necessary to engage meaningfully with critical feedback, participate in a scholarly debate with peers and mentors, and write more clearly and concisely. Students also gained more confidence in their ability to write. This confidence, coupled with increased writing skills and willingness to engage in critical feedback, will support students as they apply to, and begin graduate school programs.

Students reported that participating in the advancing diversity for aging research writing class supported both their short-term and long-term goals. Because completing a personal statement for graduate school was a core course requirement, students were able to begin their senior year at their undergraduate institution more prepared to begin applying for higher education programs. Gaining writing skills, gaining confidence, and gaining willingness to engage with critical feedback will support a variety of long-term goals including collaborating on publishable academic manuscripts, securing scholarships, fellowships and grants, writing graduate or doctoral level theses, and successfully engaging in a variety of research and professional activities.

Finally, students reported that the lack of racially and ethnically diverse professionals in their fields significantly influenced their decision to pursue graduate studies and careers in science and aging. With demographics in the US shifting rapidly—becoming older and more racially and ethnically diverse (i.e., “graying and browning”) ( 1 , 2 )—students underscore the need for more representation of racially and ethnically diverse professionals in science and aging specializations. Increasing diversity in science and aging related fields yields opportunities to challenge longstanding disparities impacting diverse populations and promote innovative solutions for equitable, culturally responsive services.

Limitations

Though this study provides important insights into the experiences of Black undergraduate students in a PWI-based academic preparatory program, it does not include the experience of other underrepresented minority groups. Future research is needed to understand and examine how the experiences of the students in the sample compare to students from various racial and ethnic minority groups enrolled in academic preparatory programs.

Conclusions and Implications

Individually tailored professional writing instruction offers a unique opportunity to prepare racially and ethnically diverse students for successful entry into graduate school and a distinguished advanced academic trajectory. For students attending HBCUs who plan to apply to graduate-level programs at PWIs, professional writing instruction may bridge gaps for both students who feel prepared and for students who feel unprepared. For students who already feel prepared for advanced graduate study, this course provides an opportunity to review and sharpen basic skills, reinforcing the idea that anyone can become a stronger, clearer writer. The course also provides an opportunity to prepare for writing experiences in a more rigorous, graduate-level learning environment, such as giving and receiving critical feedback and engaging in a written scholarly debate. For students who feel unprepared for advanced graduate study, the course provides remedial instruction on basic skills and responsive, iterative feedback to improve writing confidence as well as writing skills.

Future studies seeking to implement an PWI-based academic preparatory program in partnership with HBCUs and other minority-serving institutions should take in consideration the historical contexts of these institutions, including the cultural experiences they provide to students. In addition, future research on the impact of a personalized writing course for racially and ethnically diverse students is needed to assess the effectiveness and validity of such preparatory course in increasing students' writing development and readiness for graduate school and professional careers in aging and related fields.

Data Availability Statement

Ethics statement.

The studies involving human participants were reviewed and approved by University of South Carolina Institutional Review Board. Written informed consent for participation was not required for this study in accordance with the national legislation and the institutional requirements.

Author Contributions

All authors listed have made a substantial, direct, and intellectual contribution to the work and approved it for publication.

The research reported in this publication was supported by a grant from the U.S. National Institutes of Health: National Institute on Aging (R25AG050484).

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher's Note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

The One Method That Changes Your—and All Students’—Writing

Science-based writing methods can achieve dramatic results..

Posted May 14, 2024 | Reviewed by Abigail Fagan

• Why Education Is Important
• Find a Child Therapist
• A systematic writing framework offers a method for dramatically improving the teaching of writing.
• This method received only limited uptake, despite high-profile research publications and textbooks.
• A focus on writing style might have limited the method's impacts.

I remember spending hours commenting painstakingly on my students’ papers when I was a graduate student teaching in the Expository Writing Program at New York University. My students loved our classes, and they filled my sections and gave me terrific course evaluations. Yet I could see that their writing failed to change significantly over the course of the semester. I ended up feeling as if I should refund their money, haunted by the blunt instruments we had to teach writing.

As I’ve learned from directing five writing programs at three different universities, methods matter. When I reviewed comments on papers from instructors who taught in my programs, I discovered that the quantity and quality of comments on students’ papers made only a slight impact on writing outcomes. For instance, one notoriously lazy instructor took several weeks to return assignments and only used spelling and grammar checkers to automate comments. But his conscientious colleague made dozens of sharp observations about students’ arguments, paragraphs, and sentences. However, Mr. Conscientious’ students improved perhaps only 10% over Mr. Minimalist’s students. Even then, the differences stemmed from basic guidelines Mr. Conscientious insisted his students write to, which included providing context sentences at the outset of their essay introductions.

Educators have also poured resources into teaching writing, with increasing numbers of hours dedicated to teaching writing across primary, secondary, and higher education . Yet studies continue to find writing skills inadequate . In higher education, most universities require at least a year of writing-intensive courses, with many universities also requiring writing across the curriculum or writing in the disciplines to help preserve students’ writing skills. However, writing outcomes have remained mostly unchanged .

While pursuing my doctorate, I dedicated my research to figuring out how writing worked. As a graduate student also teaching part-time, I was an early convert to process writing. I also taught those ancient principles of logos, ethos, and pathos, as well as grammar and punctuation. Nevertheless, these frameworks only created a canvas for students’ writing. What was missing: how writers should handle words, sentence structure, and relationships between sentences.

Yet researchers published the beginnings of a science-based writing method over 30 years ago. George Gopen, Gregory Colomb, and Joseph Williams created a framework for identifying how to maximize the clarity, coherence, and continuity of writing. In particular, Gopen and Swan (1990) created a methodology for making scientific writing readable . This work should have been a revelation to anyone teaching in or directing a writing program. But, weirdly, comparatively few writing programs or faculty embraced this work, despite Williams, Colomb, and Gopen publishing both research and textbooks outlining the method and process.

Peculiarly, this framework—represented by Williams’ Style series of textbooks and Gopen’s reader expectation approach—failed to become standard in writing courses, likely because of two limitations. First, both Gopen and Williams hewed to a relativistic stance on writing methods, noting that rule-flouting often creates a memorable style. This stance created a raft of often-contradictory principles for writing. For example, Williams demonstrated that beginning sentences with There is or There are openings hijacked the clarity of sentences, then argued writers should use There is or There are to shunt important content into sentence emphasis positions, where readers recall content best. Second, these researchers failed to tie this writing framework to the wealth of data in psycholinguistics, cognitive neuroscience , or cognitive psychology on how our reading brains process written English. For instance, textbooks written by these three principal researchers avoid any mention of why emphasis positions exist at the ends of sentences and paragraphs—despite the concept clearly originating in the recency effect. This limitation may stem from the humanities’ long-held antipathy to the idea that writing is a product, rather than a process. Or even that science-based methods can help teachers and programs measure the effectiveness of writing, one reason why university First-Year Writing programs have failed to improve students’ writing in any measurable way.

Nevertheless, when you teach students how our reading brains work, you create a powerful method for rapidly improving their writing—in any course that requires writing and at all levels of education. Students can grasp how writing works as a system and assess the costs and benefits of decisions writers face, even as they choose their first words. This method also works powerfully to help students immediately understand how, for instance, paragraph heads leverage priming effects to shape readers’ understanding of paragraph content.

Using this method, I and my colleagues have helped students use a single writing assignment to secure hundreds of jobs, win millions in grant funding, and advance through the ranks in academia. However, we’ve also used the same method without modifications in elementary and secondary classrooms to bolster students’ writing by as much as three grade levels in a single year.

Perhaps the time has arrived for this well-kept secret to revolutionizing student writing outcomes to begin making inroads into more writing classrooms.

Gopen, G. D. and J. A. Swan (1990). "The Science of Scientific Writing." American Scientist 78(6): 550-558.

Gopen, George. The Sense of Structure: Writing from the Reader’s Perspective . Pearson, 2004.

Gopen, George. Expectations: Teaching Writing from the Reader’s Perspective . Pearson, 2004.

Williams, Joseph. Style: Toward Clarity and Grace . University of Chicago Press, 1995.

Williams, Joseph. Style: Ten Lessons in Clarity and Grace . Harper Collins, 1994.

Williams, Joseph. Style: The Basics of Clarity and Grace . Longman, 2002.

Jane Yellowlees Douglas, Ph.D. , is a consultant on writing and organizations. She is also the author, with Maria B. Grant, MD, of The Biomedical Writer: What You Need to Succeed in Academic Medicine .

• Find a Therapist
• Find a Treatment Center
• Find a Psychiatrist
• Find a Support Group
• Find Online Therapy
• United States
• Brooklyn, NY
• Chicago, IL
• Houston, TX
• Los Angeles, CA
• New York, NY
• Portland, OR
• San Diego, CA
• San Francisco, CA
• Seattle, WA
• Washington, DC
• Asperger's
• Bipolar Disorder
• Chronic Pain
• Eating Disorders
• Passive Aggression
• Personality
• Goal Setting
• Positive Psychology
• Stopping Smoking
• Low Sexual Desire
• Relationships
• Child Development
• Self Tests NEW
• Therapy Center
• Diagnosis Dictionary
• Types of Therapy

At any moment, someone’s aggravating behavior or our own bad luck can set us off on an emotional spiral that threatens to derail our entire day. Here’s how we can face our triggers with less reactivity so that we can get on with our lives.

• Emotional Intelligence
• Gaslighting
• Affective Forecasting
• Neuroscience

• Skip to main content
• Keyboard shortcuts for audio player

Your Health

• Treatments & Tests
• Health Inc.
• Public Health

Why writing by hand beats typing for thinking and learning

Jonathan Lambert

If you're like many digitally savvy Americans, it has likely been a while since you've spent much time writing by hand.

The laborious process of tracing out our thoughts, letter by letter, on the page is becoming a relic of the past in our screen-dominated world, where text messages and thumb-typed grocery lists have replaced handwritten letters and sticky notes. Electronic keyboards offer obvious efficiency benefits that have undoubtedly boosted our productivity — imagine having to write all your emails longhand.

To keep up, many schools are introducing computers as early as preschool, meaning some kids may learn the basics of typing before writing by hand.

But giving up this slower, more tactile way of expressing ourselves may come at a significant cost, according to a growing body of research that's uncovering the surprising cognitive benefits of taking pen to paper, or even stylus to iPad — for both children and adults.

Is this some kind of joke? A school facing shortages starts teaching standup comedy

In kids, studies show that tracing out ABCs, as opposed to typing them, leads to better and longer-lasting recognition and understanding of letters. Writing by hand also improves memory and recall of words, laying down the foundations of literacy and learning. In adults, taking notes by hand during a lecture, instead of typing, can lead to better conceptual understanding of material.

"There's actually some very important things going on during the embodied experience of writing by hand," says Ramesh Balasubramaniam , a neuroscientist at the University of California, Merced. "It has important cognitive benefits."

While those benefits have long been recognized by some (for instance, many authors, including Jennifer Egan and Neil Gaiman , draft their stories by hand to stoke creativity), scientists have only recently started investigating why writing by hand has these effects.

A slew of recent brain imaging research suggests handwriting's power stems from the relative complexity of the process and how it forces different brain systems to work together to reproduce the shapes of letters in our heads onto the page.

Your brain on handwriting

Both handwriting and typing involve moving our hands and fingers to create words on a page. But handwriting, it turns out, requires a lot more fine-tuned coordination between the motor and visual systems. This seems to more deeply engage the brain in ways that support learning.

Shots - Health News

Feeling artsy here's how making art helps your brain.

"Handwriting is probably among the most complex motor skills that the brain is capable of," says Marieke Longcamp , a cognitive neuroscientist at Aix-Marseille Université.

Gripping a pen nimbly enough to write is a complicated task, as it requires your brain to continuously monitor the pressure that each finger exerts on the pen. Then, your motor system has to delicately modify that pressure to re-create each letter of the words in your head on the page.

"Your fingers have to each do something different to produce a recognizable letter," says Sophia Vinci-Booher , an educational neuroscientist at Vanderbilt University. Adding to the complexity, your visual system must continuously process that letter as it's formed. With each stroke, your brain compares the unfolding script with mental models of the letters and words, making adjustments to fingers in real time to create the letters' shapes, says Vinci-Booher.

That's not true for typing.

To type "tap" your fingers don't have to trace out the form of the letters — they just make three relatively simple and uniform movements. In comparison, it takes a lot more brainpower, as well as cross-talk between brain areas, to write than type.

Recent brain imaging studies bolster this idea. A study published in January found that when students write by hand, brain areas involved in motor and visual information processing " sync up " with areas crucial to memory formation, firing at frequencies associated with learning.

"We don't see that [synchronized activity] in typewriting at all," says Audrey van der Meer , a psychologist and study co-author at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. She suggests that writing by hand is a neurobiologically richer process and that this richness may confer some cognitive benefits.

Other experts agree. "There seems to be something fundamental about engaging your body to produce these shapes," says Robert Wiley , a cognitive psychologist at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro. "It lets you make associations between your body and what you're seeing and hearing," he says, which might give the mind more footholds for accessing a given concept or idea.

Those extra footholds are especially important for learning in kids, but they may give adults a leg up too. Wiley and others worry that ditching handwriting for typing could have serious consequences for how we all learn and think.

What might be lost as handwriting wanes

The clearest consequence of screens and keyboards replacing pen and paper might be on kids' ability to learn the building blocks of literacy — letters.

"Letter recognition in early childhood is actually one of the best predictors of later reading and math attainment," says Vinci-Booher. Her work suggests the process of learning to write letters by hand is crucial for learning to read them.

"When kids write letters, they're just messy," she says. As kids practice writing "A," each iteration is different, and that variability helps solidify their conceptual understanding of the letter.

Research suggests kids learn to recognize letters better when seeing variable handwritten examples, compared with uniform typed examples.

This helps develop areas of the brain used during reading in older children and adults, Vinci-Booher found.

"This could be one of the ways that early experiences actually translate to long-term life outcomes," she says. "These visually demanding, fine motor actions bake in neural communication patterns that are really important for learning later on."

Ditching handwriting instruction could mean that those skills don't get developed as well, which could impair kids' ability to learn down the road.

"If young children are not receiving any handwriting training, which is very good brain stimulation, then their brains simply won't reach their full potential," says van der Meer. "It's scary to think of the potential consequences."

Many states are trying to avoid these risks by mandating cursive instruction. This year, California started requiring elementary school students to learn cursive , and similar bills are moving through state legislatures in several states, including Indiana, Kentucky, South Carolina and Wisconsin. (So far, evidence suggests that it's the writing by hand that matters, not whether it's print or cursive.)

Slowing down and processing information

For adults, one of the main benefits of writing by hand is that it simply forces us to slow down.

During a meeting or lecture, it's possible to type what you're hearing verbatim. But often, "you're not actually processing that information — you're just typing in the blind," says van der Meer. "If you take notes by hand, you can't write everything down," she says.

The relative slowness of the medium forces you to process the information, writing key words or phrases and using drawing or arrows to work through ideas, she says. "You make the information your own," she says, which helps it stick in the brain.

Such connections and integration are still possible when typing, but they need to be made more intentionally. And sometimes, efficiency wins out. "When you're writing a long essay, it's obviously much more practical to use a keyboard," says van der Meer.

Still, given our long history of using our hands to mark meaning in the world, some scientists worry about the more diffuse consequences of offloading our thinking to computers.

"We're foisting a lot of our knowledge, extending our cognition, to other devices, so it's only natural that we've started using these other agents to do our writing for us," says Balasubramaniam.

It's possible that this might free up our minds to do other kinds of hard thinking, he says. Or we might be sacrificing a fundamental process that's crucial for the kinds of immersive cognitive experiences that enable us to learn and think at our full potential.

Balasubramaniam stresses, however, that we don't have to ditch digital tools to harness the power of handwriting. So far, research suggests that scribbling with a stylus on a screen activates the same brain pathways as etching ink on paper. It's the movement that counts, he says, not its final form.

Jonathan Lambert is a Washington, D.C.-based freelance journalist who covers science, health and policy.

• handwriting

How Does Writing Fit Into the ‘Science of Reading’?

• Share article

In one sense, the national conversation about what it will take to make sure all children become strong readers has been wildly successful: States are passing legislation supporting evidence-based teaching approaches , and school districts are rushing to supply training. Publishers are under pressure to drop older materials . And for the first time in years, an instructional issue—reading—is headlining education media coverage.

In the middle of all that, though, the focus on the “science of reading” has elided its twin component in literacy instruction: writing.

Writing is intrinsically important for all students to learn—after all, it is the primary way beyond speech that humans communicate. But more than that, research suggests that teaching students to write in an integrated fashion with reading is not only efficient, it’s effective.

Yet writing is often underplayed in the elementary grades. Too often, it is separated from schools’ reading block. Writing is not assessed as frequently as reading, and principals, worried about reading-exam scores, direct teachers to focus on one often at the expense of the other. Finally, beyond the English/language arts block, kids often aren’t asked to do much writing in early grades.

“Sometimes, in an early-literacy classroom, you’ll hear a teacher say, ‘It’s time to pick up your pencils,’” said Wiley Blevins, an author and literacy consultant who provides training in schools. “But your pencils should be in your hand almost the entire morning.”

Strikingly, many of the critiques that reading researchers have made against the “balanced literacy” approach that has held sway in schools for decades could equally apply to writing instruction: Foundational writing skills—like phonics and language structure—have not generally been taught systematically or explicitly.

And like the “find the main idea” strategies commonly taught in reading comprehension, writing instruction has tended to focus on content-neutral tasks, rather than deepening students’ connections to the content they learn.

Education Week wants to bring more attention to these connections in the stories that make up this special collection . But first, we want to delve deeper into the case for including writing in every step of the elementary curriculum.

Why has writing been missing from the reading conversation?

Much like the body of knowledge on how children learn to read words, it is also settled science that reading and writing draw on shared knowledge, even though they have traditionally been segmented in instruction.

“The body of research is substantial in both number of studies and quality of studies. There’s no question that reading and writing share a lot of real estate, they depend on a lot of the same knowledge and skills,” said Timothy Shanahan, an emeritus professor of education at the University of Illinois Chicago. “Pick your spot: text structure, vocabulary, sound-symbol relationships, ‘world knowledge.’”

The reasons for the bifurcation in reading and writing are legion. One is that the two fields have typically been studied separately. (Researchers studying writing usually didn’t examine whether a writing intervention, for instance, also aided students’ reading abilities—and vice versa.)

Some scholars also finger the dominance of the federally commissioned National Reading Panel report, which in 2000 outlined key instructional components of learning to read. The review didn’t examine the connection of writing to reading.

Looking even further back yields insights, too. Penmanship and spelling were historically the only parts of writing that were taught, and when writing reappeared in the latter half of the 20th century, it tended to focus on “process writing,” emphasizing personal experience and story generation over other genres. Only when the Common Core State Standards appeared in 2010 did the emphasis shift to writing about nonfiction texts and across subjects—the idea that students should be writing about what they’ve learned.

And finally, teaching writing is hard. Few studies document what preparation teachers receive to teach writing, but in surveys, many teachers say they received little training in their college education courses. That’s probably why only a little over half of teachers, in one 2016 survey, said that they enjoyed teaching writing.

Writing should begin in the early grades

These factors all work against what is probably the most important conclusion from the research over the last few decades: Students in the early-elementary grades need lots of varied opportunities to write.

“Students need support in their writing,” said Dana Robertson, an associate professor of reading and literacy education at the school of education at Virginia Tech who also studies how instructional change takes root in schools. “They need to be taught explicitly the skills and strategies of writing and they need to see the connections of reading, writing, and knowledge development.”

While research supports some fundamental tenets of writing instruction—that it should be structured, for instance, and involve drafting and revising—it hasn’t yet pointed to a specific teaching recipe that works best.

One of the challenges, the researchers note, is that while reading curricula have improved over the years, they still don’t typically provide many supports for students—or teachers, for that matter—for writing. Teachers often have to supplement with additions that don’t always mesh well with their core, grade-level content instruction.

“We have a lot of activities in writing we know are good,” Shanahan said. “We don’t really have a yearlong elementary-school-level curriculum in writing. That just doesn’t exist the way it does in reading.”

Nevertheless, practitioners like Blevins work writing into every reading lesson, even in the earliest grades. And all the components that make up a solid reading program can be enhanced through writing activities.

4 Key Things to Know About How Reading and Writing Interlock

Want a quick summary of what research tells us about the instructional connections between reading and writing?

1. Reading and writing are intimately connected.

Research on the connections began in the early 1980s and has grown more robust with time.

Among the newest and most important additions are three research syntheses conducted by Steve Graham, a professor at the University of Arizona, and his research partners. One of them examined whether writing instruction also led to improvements in students’ reading ability; a second examined the inverse question. Both found significant positive effects for reading and writing.

A third meta-analysis gets one step closer to classroom instruction. Graham and partners examined 47 studies of instructional programs that balanced both reading and writing—no program could feature more than 60 percent of one or the other. The results showed generally positive effects on both reading and writing measures.

2. Writing matters even at the earliest grades, when students are learning to read.

Studies show that the prewriting students do in early education carries meaningful signals about their decoding, spelling, and reading comprehension later on. Reading experts say that students should be supported in writing almost as soon as they begin reading, and evidence suggests that both spelling and handwriting are connected to the ability to connect speech to print and to oral language development.

3. Like reading, writing must be taught explicitly.

Writing is a complex task that demands much of students’ cognitive resources. Researchers generally agree that writing must be explicitly taught—rather than left up to students to “figure out” the rules on their own.

There isn’t as much research about how precisely to do this. One 2019 review, in fact, found significant overlap among the dozen writing programs studied, and concluded that all showed signs of boosting learning. Debates abound about the amount of structure students need and in what sequence, such as whether they need to master sentence construction before moving onto paragraphs and lengthier texts.

But in general, students should be guided on how to construct sentences and paragraphs, and they should have access to models and exemplars, the research suggests. They also need to understand the iterative nature of writing, including how to draft and revise.

A number of different writing frameworks incorporating various degrees of structure and modeling are available, though most of them have not been studied empirically.

4. Writing can help students learn content—and make sense of it.

Much of reading comprehension depends on helping students absorb “world knowledge”—think arts, ancient cultures, literature, and science—so that they can make sense of increasingly sophisticated texts and ideas as their reading improves. Writing can enhance students’ content learning, too, and should be emphasized rather than taking a back seat to the more commonly taught stories and personal reflections.

Graham and colleagues conducted another meta-analysis of nearly 60 studies looking at this idea of “writing to learn” in mathematics, science, and social studies. The studies included a mix of higher-order assignments, like analyses and argumentative writing, and lower-level ones, like summarizing and explaining. The study found that across all three disciplines, writing about the content improved student learning.

If students are doing work on phonemic awareness—the ability to recognize sounds—they shouldn’t merely manipulate sounds orally; they can put them on the page using letters. If students are learning how to decode, they can also encode—record written letters and words while they say the sounds out loud.

And students can write as they begin learning about language structure. When Blevins’ students are mainly working with decodable texts with controlled vocabularies, writing can support their knowledge about how texts and narratives work: how sentences are put together and how they can be pulled apart and reconstructed. Teachers can prompt them in these tasks, asking them to rephrase a sentence as a question, split up two sentences, or combine them.

“Young kids are writing these mile-long sentences that become second nature. We set a higher bar, and they are fully capable of doing it. We can demystify a bit some of that complex text if we develop early on how to talk about sentences—how they’re created, how they’re joined,” Blevins said. “There are all these things you can do that are helpful to develop an understanding of how sentences work and to get lots of practice.”

As students progress through the elementary grades, this structured work grows more sophisticated. They need to be taught both sentence and paragraph structure , and they need to learn how different writing purposes and genres—narrative, persuasive, analytical—demand different approaches. Most of all, the research indicates, students need opportunities to write at length often.

Using writing to support students’ exploration of content

Reading is far more than foundational skills, of course. It means introducing students to rich content and the specialized vocabulary in each discipline and then ensuring that they read, discuss, analyze, and write about those ideas. The work to systematically build students’ knowledge begins in the early grades and progresses throughout their K-12 experience.

Here again, available evidence suggests that writing can be a useful tool to help students explore, deepen, and draw connections in this content. With the proper supports, writing can be a method for students to retell and analyze what they’ve learned in discussions of content and literature throughout the school day —in addition to their creative writing.

This “writing to learn” approach need not wait for students to master foundational skills. In the K-2 grades especially, much content is learned through teacher read-alouds and conversation that include more complex vocabulary and ideas than the texts students are capable of reading. But that should not preclude students from writing about this content, experts say.

“We do a read-aloud or a media piece and we write about what we learned. It’s just a part of how you’re responding, or sharing, what you’ve learned across texts; it’s not a separate thing from reading,” Blevins said. “If I am doing read-alouds on a concept—on animal habitats, for example—my decodable texts will be on animals. And students are able to include some of these more sophisticated ideas and language in their writing, because we’ve elevated the conversations around these texts.”

In this set of stories , Education Week examines the connections between elementary-level reading and writing in three areas— encoding , language and text structure , and content-area learning . But there are so many more examples.

Please write us to share yours when you’ve finished.

Want to read more about the research that informed this story? Here’s a bibliography to start you off.

Berninger V. W., Abbott, R. D., Abbott, S. P., Graham S., & Richards T. (2002). Writing and reading: Connections between language by hand and language by eye. J ournal of Learning Disabilities. Special Issue: The Language of Written Language, 35(1), 39–56 Berninger, Virginia, Robert D. Abbott, Janine Jones, Beverly J. Wolf, Laura Gould, Marci Anderson-Younstrom, Shirley Shimada, Kenn Apel. (2006) “Early development of language by hand: composing, reading, listening, and speaking connections; three letter-writing modes; and fast mapping in spelling.” Developmental Neuropsychology, 29(1), pp. 61-92 Cabell, Sonia Q, Laura S. Tortorelli, and Hope K. Gerde (2013). “How Do I Write…? Scaffolding Preschoolers’ Early Writing Skills.” The Reading Teacher, 66(8), pp. 650-659. Gerde, H.K., Bingham, G.E. & Wasik, B.A. (2012). “Writing in Early Childhood Classrooms: Guidance for Best Practices.” Early Childhood Education Journal 40, 351–359 (2012) Gilbert, Jennifer, and Steve Graham. (2010). “Teaching Writing to Elementary Students in Grades 4–6: A National Survey.” The Elementary School Journal 110(44) Graham, Steve, et al. (2017). “Effectiveness of Literacy Programs Balancing Reading and Writing Instruction: A Meta-Analysis.” Reading Research Quarterly, 53(3) pp. 279–304 Graham, Steve, and Michael Hebert. (2011). “Writing to Read: A Meta-Analysis of the Impact of Writing and Writing Instruction on Reading.” Harvard Educational Review (2011) 81(4): 710–744. Graham, Steve. (2020). “The Sciences of Reading and Writing Must Become More Fully Integrated.” Reading Research Quarterly, 55(S1) pp. S35–S44 Graham, Steve, Sharlene A. Kiuhara, and Meade MacKay. (2020).”The Effects of Writing on Learning in Science, Social Studies, and Mathematics: A Meta-Analysis.” Review of Educational Research April 2020, Vol 90, No. 2, pp. 179–226 Shanahan, Timothy. “History of Writing and Reading Connections.” in Shanahan, Timothy. (2016). “Relationships between reading and writing development.” In C. MacArthur, S. Graham, & J. Fitzgerald (Eds.), Handbook of writing research (2nd ed., pp. 194–207). New York, NY: Guilford. Slavin, Robert, Lake, C., Inns, A., Baye, A., Dachet, D., & Haslam, J. (2019). “A quantitative synthesis of research on writing approaches in grades 2 to 12.” London: Education Endowment Foundation. Troia, Gary. (2014). Evidence-based practices for writing instruction (Document No. IC-5). Retrieved from University of Florida, Collaboration for Effective Educator, Development, Accountability, and Reform Center website: http://ceedar.education.ufl.edu/tools/innovation-configuration/ Troia, Gary, and Steve Graham. (2016).“Common Core Writing and Language Standards and Aligned State Assessments: A National Survey of Teacher Beliefs and Attitudes.” Reading and Writing 29(9).

A version of this article appeared in the January 25, 2023 edition of Education Week as How Does Writing Fit Into the ‘Science of Reading’?

Sign Up for EdWeek Update

Edweek top school jobs.

Sign Up & Sign In

More From Forbes

Students aren’t writing well anymore. can ai help.

• Share to Facebook
• Share to Twitter
• Share to Linkedin

A group of students begins an in-class writing test. According to new data analysis, half of U.S. ... [+] eighth graders have difficulty with long-form writing on tests and classwork that involves reading.

Fifty percent. That’s the approximate number of students in eighth grade who struggle with long-form writing on tests and classwork that involves reading.

A colleague of mine, L Burleigh, studying reading data collected in 2022 from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) found that fewer than half of eighth graders write “long answers to questions on tests or assignments that involve reading.”

While people may put a premium on the notion of short and sweet when it comes to writing and reading – doing so at formative ages means that young learners will not build the skills they need to convey and explain ideas and information.

Writing Frequency Matters

Frequency of practice is a common theme cited by both researchers and teachers in assessing causes for declining K-12 student writing skills. Middle and high schoolers simply are not engaging in and practicing writing enough. The reasons for this are myriad but overburdened teachers without the time or support to grade more frequent writing assignments is a significant factor.

In a survey I did with some colleagues a few years ago, a key challenge was workload. More than 70 percent of educators say they are overwhelmed with grading, providing feedback, and other administrative tasks. Additionally, according to our report, educators in low-income schools are almost 20 percent more likely than teachers in other schools to report being overburdened by routine duties like grading essays.

In short, kids are not writing as much as frequency in writing education falls victim to staffing, time, and resource shortages.

Highlighting this point is NAEP reading data for eighth graders collected by L that included the following question to students about their writing habits: “How often have you been asked to write long answers to questions on tests or assignments that involved reading?” The results: Never - 2%; Once - 3%; Two or Three Times - 22%; Four or Five Times - 25%; More than Five Times - 48 percent.

Samuel Alito: Supreme Court Justice’s Biggest Controversies—As Another Contentious Flag Spotted Outside House

Nvidia are splitting 10-for-1 here’s what it means and how to profit, why is chief boden leaving ‘chicago fire’ eamonn walker’s exit explained, using ai to aid writing gains.

There’s lots that can be done to fix this problem: Improved teacher professional development, greater emphasis on writing across the curriculum, etc. For my part, I’m optimistic that AI will be a deep help to students, given recent advances in the technology, and many are exploring new avenues to support students in boosting their long-form writing ability.

For instance, the team at ThinkCirca is working on a formative assessment and feedback tool to enhance student writing. This tool focuses on argumentative essays and identifies key elements within the text as students write. By highlighting these elements, the tool provides real-time assessment and feedback, creating mini-instructional moments that guide students in improving their arguments during the writing process.

Large language models can help, too. Indeed, just asking ChatGPT provides helpful feedback. But for more targeted support, researchers have found that fine-tuning is necessary. For instance, when researchers looked at holistic scoring using ChatGPT (version 4), they found the technology could provide human-level performance.

However, when asking the chatbot to focus on more granular, discourse-level evaluation, ChatGPT began to struggle. More specifically, it had a hard time identifying the distinct elements of argumentative writing (e.g., claim, counterclaim, rebuttal, supporting evidence). Additionally, ChatGPT was a more generous grader than humans when focused on smaller writing segments, like discourse elements, rating them at a higher effectiveness level than a human would.

This finding makes sense because chatbots are usually trained to create text using thousands of example essays. However, chatbots don't see many examples of labeled essay parts during their training compared to tasks like summarizing a text or analyzing the emotion of an essay. So, while ChatGPT is not as reliable for evaluating the structure of an essay due to its lack of training, it is extensively taught on what forms a strong long-form essay and its ability to generate essays is an area of greater concern for educators.

Some worry certain LLM technologies could help students cheat by doing their long-form writing for them, although recent research from Stanford and others indicates this is not occurring as frequently as initially feared. The potential benefit of incorporating technology to help students strengthen their writing skills may far outweigh any risks posed by introducing AI solutions – especially since researchers point out that declines in student writing can be traced to how often students are engaging in long-form writing.

Even as AI carves out its place in improving student writing, staying true to some hallmark tenets is recommended to help young learners build on the writing skills and abilities deemed indispensable in the workforce.

Whether gains on this front are realized through AI or teacher interaction, the ultimate goal is to make the essential communication and job skill of writing something that students can navigate naturally and with confidence that will carry them successfully through college and the workforce.

• Editorial Standards
• Reprints & Permissions

Join The Conversation

One Community. Many Voices. Create a free account to share your thoughts. 

Forbes Community Guidelines

Our community is about connecting people through open and thoughtful conversations. We want our readers to share their views and exchange ideas and facts in a safe space.

In order to do so, please follow the posting rules in our site's  Terms of Service.   We've summarized some of those key rules below. Simply put, keep it civil.

Your post will be rejected if we notice that it seems to contain:

• False or intentionally out-of-context or misleading information
• Insults, profanity, incoherent, obscene or inflammatory language or threats of any kind
• Attacks on the identity of other commenters or the article's author
• Content that otherwise violates our site's  terms.

User accounts will be blocked if we notice or believe that users are engaged in:

• Continuous attempts to re-post comments that have been previously moderated/rejected
• Racist, sexist, homophobic or other discriminatory comments
• Attempts or tactics that put the site security at risk
• Actions that otherwise violate our site's  terms.

So, how can you be a power user?

• Stay on topic and share your insights
• Feel free to be clear and thoughtful to get your point across
• ‘Like’ or ‘Dislike’ to show your point of view.
• Protect your community.
• Use the report tool to alert us when someone breaks the rules.

Thanks for reading our community guidelines. Please read the full list of posting rules found in our site's  Terms of Service.

• Latest Latest
• The West The West
• Sports Sports
• Opinion Opinion
• Magazine Magazine

Why writing by hand beats typing for enhancing memory, learning

Study shows electrical connections in the brain are stronger in multiple areas, including sensory processing and memory.

By Lois M. Collins

At a time when schools are abandoning teaching cursive, and texting and typing overtake penning notes by significant margins, science suggests that writing things down by hand set them in memory better, enhancing learning. And especially for young kids, using fine motor skills to form letters helps learning, spelling accuracy and memory recall.

A new study in Frontiers in Psychology reinforces what other studies have found: Using pen and paper or, as Scientific American puts it, “even a stylus and tablet, is still the best way to learn.” In the study, researchers from Norway examined the brain activity in students as they took notes and found that writing by hand stimulated more electrical activity in the brain across regions that control movement, vision, sensory processing and memory.

“The ongoing substitution of handwriting by typewriting in almost every educational setting may seem somewhat misguided as it could affect the learning process in a negative way,” per the study.

“We show that when writing by hand, brain connectivity patterns are far more elaborate than when typewriting on a keyboard,” said Professor Audrey van der Meer, a brain researcher at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology and co-author of the study, in a news release . “Such widespread brain connectivity is known to be crucial for memory formation and for encoding new information and, therefore, is beneficial for learning.”

It’s the writing by hand, rather than whether it’s actually cursive, that’s believed to be beneficial, the researchers reported. Printing the letters also stimulates the brain, according to van der Meer and her colleague, F.R. van der Weel, also a psychology researcher at the university.

Study mechanics

Thirty-six university students were given electroencephalograms as they were “repeatedly prompted to either write or type a word that appeared on the screen.” By hand, they wrote in cursive using a digital pen on a touchscreen. Typing involved using a single finger to press the keys. The high-density EEGs measured the brain’s electrical activity using 256 sensors sewn in a net and placed over the head, the data recorded for five seconds with each prompt.

The words were chosen at random from the game Pictionary.

When they wrote by hand, the release said, connectivity in different brain regions increased, but that did not happen when they typed. “Our findings suggest that visual movement and information obtained through precisely controlled hand movements when using a pen contribute extensively to the brain’s connectivity patterns that promote learning,” van der Meer said.

She added that “the simple movement of hitting a key with the same finger repeatedly is less stimulating for the brain. “This also explains why children who have learned to write and read on a tablet can have difficulty differentiating between letters that are mirror images of each other, such as ‘b’ and ‘d.’ They literally haven’t felt with their bodies what it feels like to produce those letters,” van der Meer said.

The release noted that cursive writing has been making a comeback in some states this year, after it was dropped.

The researchers point out that technological advances are important, too, and one value should not be dropped entirely to focus on the other. “There is some evidence that students learn more and remember better when taking handwritten lecture notes, while using a computer with a keyboard may be more practical when writing a long text or essay,” van der Meer said.

Keep using that pen

NPR summarizes the benefits of putting pen to paper in this way: “In kids, studies show that tracing out ABCs, as opposed to typing them, leads to better and longer-lasting recognition and understanding of letters. Writing by hand also improves memory and recall of words, laying down the foundations of literacy and learning. In adults, taking notes by hand during a lecture, instead of typing, can lead to better conceptual understanding of material.”

“There’s actually some very important things going on during the embodied experience of writing by hand,” Ramesh Balasubramaniam , a neuroscientist at the University of California, Merced, told NPR. “It has important cognitive benefits.”

Writing by hand is usually a lot slower, but has some real benefits, van der Meer told NPR. If you’re good at typing, you can basically transcribe a conversation, but often you hear the words, rather than learn the information. Writing notes by hand is slower, but improves the processing. “You make the information your own,” she said, using key words and arrows, underlines and other ways to encode the idea so you have the concept.