Happy New Year!

So, celebratory blog post: yadda yadda blah blah eat some black-eyed peas.

Okay, writing.

One of the things that I do a lot of is read other people's writing.  Some of it's for pure enjoyment (I just re-read Lumley's Necroscope, which was enjoyable, if weirder than I remember it being), but a lot of it is because reading other people's writing is part of what I get paid to do.  Read, comment, help them improve.  I'm guessing that the volume of reading papers that I do contributes to my reticence to join online writing groups.  Or, you know, at least gives me another excuse not to do so.

One of the things I struggle with is teaching people writing skills.  This is because of my deeply-held belief that the only thing that teaches you how to write is a combination of reading and writing.  I can read a paper, find a comma that's misplaced, and spend a paragraph explaining mechanically why the comma doesn't need to be there, but I have no way to know if the information I'm conveying is being absorbed.  I can't not-comment on things (even if a paragraph on a comma is a touch of overkill), so I end up erring on the side of too much information, and if I were to ask the students, probably too many writing assignments.

It's the only way to improve, though.  I've never come across anything that prepares people to write scientific discourse, or client communication, better than actually writing those things and having someone point out what works and what doesn't.  It probably goes back to the way my dad used to review all my papers back in high school, so I suppose there are worse things for me to do to the folks I'm training. :)

Comments

[Betsy Grape]

[this is good]

Oh, the joys of having work marked ;) I love writing, it's a keen hobby of mine. I must be very hypocritical as I am constantly correcting other people's grammar, yet my own leaves a lot to desire!

Happy New Year!

Betsy xo