08-01-2020, 01:04 PM
I hated writing essays when I had to do them for my Study.com courses but I got by. A year ago I started a blog and that has forced me to improve my writing so much. I'm still not great, but I see a big difference.
Academic writing is different, but maybe these tips will still apply. These are things that have helped me immensely.
1. Grammerly, Prowriting aid, or other spell checkers. Those two are a bit expensive, but I some of the best out there right now. If you're able to invest in them, they have really cool features where you can analyze your writing on an entire document and it goes way beyond spelling. They check for things like style, transitions and overused words. Those have helped me change my habits a lot. Sometimes I get lazy and just go through and apply the changes without really looking at it to see what I did wrong and how I should do it better next time. But the times I've been intentional with the way I use it, it's helped so much. You can also change the settings for different styles of writing like academic, casual, etc.
I have ProwritingAid myself - I chose it because it was cheaper than Grammarly for the whole year when I bought it. But Grammarly has a free version that is worth checking out. I've also heard Writing Coach is popular although I don't know much about that one.
2. Practice structure. My oldest posts had terrible structure. I look back on them and think "How did I ever think it made sense to present this information in that order?" But something that really helped me was using Notion (a free note taking app that is amazing) to organize my headings before I start writing. With Notion, I can drag and drop them around until they're in an order that makes sense. Maybe I should attach a screenshare video so you can see what I mean. Let me know if you'd like me to do that!
Step by step it goes like this -
1. Open a blank page in Notion. Word vomit anything from my research that I might want to add.
2. Open a new page in Notion and copy my outline template into it. Add more body paragraphs if necessary. Here's what that looks like:
- Intro
- Question I'm trying to answer
- Lead in
- B1
- B2
- B3
- Summary
3. Then I start filling in the headings. If I can think of something right away for the intro, I'll write it in but if not I'll move onto the question or the first body paragraph.
Once all of my headings are finished, they might look something like this:
- Intro: Present topic of child raising
- Question - Are children better behaved if they get rewarded?
- Lead in - ...can't think of one yet, leaving blank for now.
- B1 Why children need positive reinforcement
- B2 Are children better behaved when rewarded with material things?
- B3 Social vs. material rewards.
- Summary. - think up later.
(Notice, these heading are themselves a rough draft. I'm just getting my ideas together. In B3, Social is probably not the term for the opposite of material rewards, but I don't know what it is, so it's a place holder. As long as I know what it means, and each point I plan to cover in that paragraph, that's good enough for now.)
4. Next I consider if that's really the best order of the points I want to make. If not, I'll drag and drop until it makes the most sense.
5. Now I make bullet points under each of those headings. I'm not trying to use fancy writing in these bullet points, I just write the way I would say it to a friend. And I keep it super brief. Here's what that might look like:
- B1 Why children need positive reinforcement.
6. After I have bullet points under all of these headings for at least all of the body paragraphs I then go back through and elaborate on them. Once it's all written out like this, you'll see you don't need to add that much to each one to get to around 2k words! I'm always surprised by the word count when I'm done. Here's what this might look like:
-B1 Why children need positive reinforcement.
Research shows positive reinforcement can have a large impact on the way the child mind develops. (One or two more sentences on that bullet point) Children thrive on approval and when they don't get it they are more likely to feel unsafe or uncomfortable in their surroundings. (One or two more sentences.)
- Ect.
Now you're probably over halfway done! I don't do that all in one sitting, but I might do it all in a day or two. But at this point I strongly suggest you wait 1-3 days if at all possible and then come back to it. When you come back you'll be able to look at it much more objectively because it will feel like someone else's writing once you've had that distance from it.
I'm always shocked at how easily I'm able to "fix" a sentence when I come back to it that I was struggling to get sounding right before.
7. Now after waiting a couple days, come back to it and start fixing any sentences you really don't like. Don't be too critical though! I also like to read it out loud to see how it flows and that helps me noticed spelling mistakes too.
And that's about it! I know "make an outline" is kind of old advice, but the trick that helps me the most with writer's block is to break it down smaller and smaller until it isn't scary. I wake up in the morning a few times a week and think "I really don't want to write another article" but then I tell myself - I don't have to write an article I just have to read about the topic. So I set a timer and start researching.
Then I just have to take my notes and write headings. That's not so scary, they don't even have to be well worded. And so on, you get the point. Even when I'm only writing out those bullet points I often just do a few at a time and then take a break.
I hope this was helpful. Sometimes recognizing the discomfort helps me too. I notice how uncomfortable I am but I just talk myself through it and keep going or take a little break.
Academic writing is different, but maybe these tips will still apply. These are things that have helped me immensely.
1. Grammerly, Prowriting aid, or other spell checkers. Those two are a bit expensive, but I some of the best out there right now. If you're able to invest in them, they have really cool features where you can analyze your writing on an entire document and it goes way beyond spelling. They check for things like style, transitions and overused words. Those have helped me change my habits a lot. Sometimes I get lazy and just go through and apply the changes without really looking at it to see what I did wrong and how I should do it better next time. But the times I've been intentional with the way I use it, it's helped so much. You can also change the settings for different styles of writing like academic, casual, etc.
I have ProwritingAid myself - I chose it because it was cheaper than Grammarly for the whole year when I bought it. But Grammarly has a free version that is worth checking out. I've also heard Writing Coach is popular although I don't know much about that one.
2. Practice structure. My oldest posts had terrible structure. I look back on them and think "How did I ever think it made sense to present this information in that order?" But something that really helped me was using Notion (a free note taking app that is amazing) to organize my headings before I start writing. With Notion, I can drag and drop them around until they're in an order that makes sense. Maybe I should attach a screenshare video so you can see what I mean. Let me know if you'd like me to do that!
Step by step it goes like this -
1. Open a blank page in Notion. Word vomit anything from my research that I might want to add.
2. Open a new page in Notion and copy my outline template into it. Add more body paragraphs if necessary. Here's what that looks like:
- Intro
- Question I'm trying to answer
- Lead in
- B1
- B2
- B3
- Summary
3. Then I start filling in the headings. If I can think of something right away for the intro, I'll write it in but if not I'll move onto the question or the first body paragraph.
Once all of my headings are finished, they might look something like this:
- Intro: Present topic of child raising
- Question - Are children better behaved if they get rewarded?
- Lead in - ...can't think of one yet, leaving blank for now.
- B1 Why children need positive reinforcement
- B2 Are children better behaved when rewarded with material things?
- B3 Social vs. material rewards.
- Summary. - think up later.
(Notice, these heading are themselves a rough draft. I'm just getting my ideas together. In B3, Social is probably not the term for the opposite of material rewards, but I don't know what it is, so it's a place holder. As long as I know what it means, and each point I plan to cover in that paragraph, that's good enough for now.)
4. Next I consider if that's really the best order of the points I want to make. If not, I'll drag and drop until it makes the most sense.
5. Now I make bullet points under each of those headings. I'm not trying to use fancy writing in these bullet points, I just write the way I would say it to a friend. And I keep it super brief. Here's what that might look like:
- B1 Why children need positive reinforcement.
- Because it helps with their development.
- Because they thrive on approval.
- Because they need to be taught in a healthy way which behaviors to continue.
6. After I have bullet points under all of these headings for at least all of the body paragraphs I then go back through and elaborate on them. Once it's all written out like this, you'll see you don't need to add that much to each one to get to around 2k words! I'm always surprised by the word count when I'm done. Here's what this might look like:
-B1 Why children need positive reinforcement.
Research shows positive reinforcement can have a large impact on the way the child mind develops. (One or two more sentences on that bullet point) Children thrive on approval and when they don't get it they are more likely to feel unsafe or uncomfortable in their surroundings. (One or two more sentences.)
- Ect.
Now you're probably over halfway done! I don't do that all in one sitting, but I might do it all in a day or two. But at this point I strongly suggest you wait 1-3 days if at all possible and then come back to it. When you come back you'll be able to look at it much more objectively because it will feel like someone else's writing once you've had that distance from it.
I'm always shocked at how easily I'm able to "fix" a sentence when I come back to it that I was struggling to get sounding right before.
7. Now after waiting a couple days, come back to it and start fixing any sentences you really don't like. Don't be too critical though! I also like to read it out loud to see how it flows and that helps me noticed spelling mistakes too.
And that's about it! I know "make an outline" is kind of old advice, but the trick that helps me the most with writer's block is to break it down smaller and smaller until it isn't scary. I wake up in the morning a few times a week and think "I really don't want to write another article" but then I tell myself - I don't have to write an article I just have to read about the topic. So I set a timer and start researching.
Then I just have to take my notes and write headings. That's not so scary, they don't even have to be well worded. And so on, you get the point. Even when I'm only writing out those bullet points I often just do a few at a time and then take a break.
I hope this was helpful. Sometimes recognizing the discomfort helps me too. I notice how uncomfortable I am but I just talk myself through it and keep going or take a little break.
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