Blog Archives
Choose Your Words Wisely
Writing E.M. Forster said, “How do I know what I think until I see what I say?” It almost sounds like a riddle, but it actually makes perfect sense. Writers usually write a rough draft with simple, easy words. As they go back to edit and revise that’s when the imagination comes to life and they realize the material could use more descriptive words to tell the story. It’s this process that helps the writer ‘see’ what ...
Continue readingUsing Basic Journalism Structure to Write Great Articles
Writing How can we be sure we’ve conveyed our message to the reader if we don’t follow basic journalistic guidelines? Basic journalism and English class taught us that the majority of things we read or write will have a basic structure to it. Blogging and writing for the internet often side step from this structure. The material can still be informative but not as powerful as it should be. It often leaves the reader feeling like ...
Continue readingTips to Get Out Of or Avoid a Writer’s Rut
Writing Recently in my own blog I’ve covered the topic of writers block a few times. Sometimes we don’t suffer writer’s block, but writer’s rut. Today I want to give some tips on breaking out of a writers rut. Generally speaking, most web writers write content and it can be fun and adventurous because we learn new things, but sometimes it can start to feel more like work than we want it to. Even topics we love can become ...
Continue readingDeveloping a Strategy for Writing: The Process
Writing Do you have a strategy you use for writing? Do you plan out all the details; i.e. an outline, or do you simply sit down and start writing? Whether you have a strategy or not there’s still a process that writing goes through. Developing a strategy can help improve your productivity, improve your writing and editing skills, and keep your work load on an even keel. The stages which writing go through are: Planning, prewriting, drafting, ...
Continue readingThe Four Types of Sentences and Their Purpose
Writing I wanted to title this post, “I declare and exclaim, its imperative you interrogate my sentence”, but thought I’d stick to something a little more proper sounding. Writing tips often include suggestions to write better sentences, combine short sentences, or construct good sentences. That’s all well and good but what about the sentences themselves? Do we need to know the basic function of a sentence? Knowing the ...
Continue readingGive your writing a natural flow by combining sentences
Writing Often in writing we’re told to write short sentences. The idea is good, but short, choppy sentence structure is not always the best way to convey an idea to the reader. The rhythm of short sentences can be tiresome to the reader and it can obscure the relation between ideas. We want our words to flow naturally so the reader isn’t distracted. Reading should flow with a good rhythm just like music. Varying the length and ...
Continue readingCut it Out: The Importance of Writing Tight
Writing Do you write tight or flounder along? The basic rule to good writing is to write tight. Since blogging has come of age, many people have written with redundancy and empty expressions to make their posts longer. Word count, all too often, has taken precedence over good writing skills. The majority of readers on the internet are looking for information and they want this information in as few words as possible. If your blog post is too ...
Continue reading
