08-14-2007, 12:20 PM
Hi all,
Just passed Technical Writing with a 67. I put in about 3-4 hours of study.
I'll post this in the Specific Feedback section, but thought I'd put it here too for folks that are currently working on it.
Do NOT bother getting the Rudman's Q&A DSST for this exam. In my opinion, it was terrible. It is very dated--had some stuff on how to write a telegram, for instance.
It didn't seem geared to the current version of the test at all....kept asking question about copyediting symbols, HTML vs. SGML, bluelines, galley proofs, etc, trade libel.......and none of this was on the test.
Also, there are no explanations for any of the answers--just an answer key. That's frustrating. AND for a book is supposed to be about writing clearly, it's awful--it's very hodge-podge. There is no index, so you have to flip-flip-flip whenever you want something. There is also very little up-front topic-related info (and what there is is buried in the back of the book). The typical REA book spends about 1/2 or 2/3 of the book covering the topic--this book spent about 10 pages and gave the barest of overviews, none of which were really helpful to me.
So, if you feel nervous and want to buy a book, buy a book that is specifically geared to how to do Technical Writing. The Rudman guide won't help you much.
Also, here is a FABULOUS website that I used primarily to do my studying. This covered the stuff I really needed to know:
Online Technical Writing: Online Textbook--Contents
Read through all of it and you should be in good shape.
The test itself is quite easy. I'd say about 20% of it was grammar related--fixing sentences, tweaking punctuation, etc. If you didn't have any trouble with English Comp, you won't have trouble with this.
Other than that, as the DSST outline indicates, most of it was simply knowing the difference between different kinds of reports, what the various sections are and what they cover, what the typical formats are, etc. So you'll want to know about abstracts, findings, conclusions, where the recommendations go in different kinds of reports, etc.
Know what the different kinds of graphics are--flow charts, pie charts, line graphs, bar charts, etc., and which kind are appropriate for which types of data.
Alos, know what functional analysis and causal analysis are.
You can definitely do this one--and it's an easy one if you're pressed for time and don't have a lot of time to study.
Just passed Technical Writing with a 67. I put in about 3-4 hours of study.
I'll post this in the Specific Feedback section, but thought I'd put it here too for folks that are currently working on it.
Do NOT bother getting the Rudman's Q&A DSST for this exam. In my opinion, it was terrible. It is very dated--had some stuff on how to write a telegram, for instance.
It didn't seem geared to the current version of the test at all....kept asking question about copyediting symbols, HTML vs. SGML, bluelines, galley proofs, etc, trade libel.......and none of this was on the test. Also, there are no explanations for any of the answers--just an answer key. That's frustrating. AND for a book is supposed to be about writing clearly, it's awful--it's very hodge-podge. There is no index, so you have to flip-flip-flip whenever you want something. There is also very little up-front topic-related info (and what there is is buried in the back of the book). The typical REA book spends about 1/2 or 2/3 of the book covering the topic--this book spent about 10 pages and gave the barest of overviews, none of which were really helpful to me.
So, if you feel nervous and want to buy a book, buy a book that is specifically geared to how to do Technical Writing. The Rudman guide won't help you much.
Also, here is a FABULOUS website that I used primarily to do my studying. This covered the stuff I really needed to know:
Online Technical Writing: Online Textbook--Contents
Read through all of it and you should be in good shape.
The test itself is quite easy. I'd say about 20% of it was grammar related--fixing sentences, tweaking punctuation, etc. If you didn't have any trouble with English Comp, you won't have trouble with this.
Other than that, as the DSST outline indicates, most of it was simply knowing the difference between different kinds of reports, what the various sections are and what they cover, what the typical formats are, etc. So you'll want to know about abstracts, findings, conclusions, where the recommendations go in different kinds of reports, etc.
Know what the different kinds of graphics are--flow charts, pie charts, line graphs, bar charts, etc., and which kind are appropriate for which types of data.
Alos, know what functional analysis and causal analysis are.
You can definitely do this one--and it's an easy one if you're pressed for time and don't have a lot of time to study.
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