Essay Writing 2 for Students in the BA in Human Resource Management programme

Lawrence Cleary and Íde O’Sullivan

Writing Consultants

Game Plan—What do we want to accomplish today?

• How do we structure a business report/essays?

• Getting it from my head onto paper in a way that meets with my desires

• Sounding academic and being relevant

• vocabulary

What does the Writing Centre do?

• We help students to establish a framework on which to build a way of approaching any occasion for writing.

• We work on writers, not on writing.

• We look at processes, and ask questions about writing strategies.

A Framework for Writing-strategy Development

• Writing Process– Writer-based Writing

• Prewriting– Assessing the Rhetorical Situation

– Inventing

– Planning

– Gathering information

• Drafting– Getting your ideas down onto paper

– Organising your ideas in a way that allows you to realize your purpose

A Framework for Writing-strategy Development

– Reader-based Writing• Revision

– Global revision: structural/paragraph-external logic/inaccessible)

– Local revision: Editing and proofreading (paragraph-internal logic/sentence-level issues/accessible, but inappropriate or imprecise)

Research and Writing Strategies

• Cognitive—what we think

• Metacognitive—what we do/plan

• Afffective—what we feel

• Social—how we involve others

Assessing the Rhetorical Situation

• Occasion

• Topic

• Audience

• Purpose

• Writer

Drafting and Revising

• At some point during the drafting stage, a writer stops to survey what has been written.

• The writer identifies possible points of departure for the rest of the paper—directions in which the paper might go.

• The writer decides if he or she likes the shape of the paper and the direction it is taking.

• The writer attempts to “re-see”/”re-think” the paper.

Drafting and Revising

• Is the text answering the question set in a way that is acceptable to the intended audiences?

• Is the information being organized so that the readers will be able to follow the logic?

• Is the purpose of the paper clear?• Is there sufficient, relevant support for the

argument being made or justifications for claims made?

• Is the writer appealing to the readers sense of reason and for the credibility of his or her sources?

Revision: Global Issues

• Conceptual/argumentative framework• Logical arrangement of ideas

– Chronological order—such as in processes– Comparison/contrast– Cause/effect– Order of importance/significance– Organization according to size: large to small– Degree to which something is a true or is a factor– etc

• Detection of flaws in the logic• Logical flow of ideas

Revision: Global Issues

• How might the introduction better evoke the interest of your readers? How might the conclusion better leave the reader with the desired response?

• How much knowledge are you assuming on the part of your audience, and how might you present the information more clearly?

• Have you managed to avoid repeating ideas? A successful paper doesn’t repeat ideas, but develops ideas.

• Are sections of the paper choppy? Which sections flow best? Which need work?

• Is it clear how each paragraph supports the initial claim or helps to answer the overriding question?

Editing and Proofreading

• Local Issues:– Paragraphs: are they cohesive and coherent?– Paragraphs: is any information in the paragraph

unnecessary or confusing?– Paragraphs: Is it clear what each paragraph is

about and how one paragraph follows logically from the one before?

– Paragraphs: What decides the limits of the conversation in each paragraph?

Editing and Proofreading

• Local Issues: – Sentence-level problems:

• Is it a sentence? Does it express a complete thought?• Does it express what you thought it expressed?• Do you jumble your sentence structures to reflect a

more lively or less droning rhythm?

– Phrasing and Word Choices:• Grammatical?• Appropriate?—register, etc.

Editing and Proofreading

• Logical and Grammatical Relations– Conjunctions: coordinators, subordinators and adjuncts

• Is the relationship between ideas joined accurate?• Is the relationship between items in parallel?

– Noun-noun substitutes (synonyms) and noun-pronoun substitutes

• Is it clear what ‘they’ refers to?• Are we talking about ‘cats’ in general or ‘those [particular]

cats’?• Do you think that your reader will understand that ‘these’ refers

to a list of events that were discussed three paragraphs ago?

Global Issues

• When drafting, one should pause occasional-ly, to see if anything is developing—to see if the paper is taking any identifiable direction.

• It is at this time that we are looking for some sort of framework on which the paper (the argument) will hang…a point of order.

• Do not worry about tone or grammar, vocabulary or sentence structure, or punctuation.

Methods of Development

• Given that you know that the truth of the proposition is dependent on management’s ability to skilfully match some aspect of their understanding of organizational behaviour to a particular present-day condition and that the value of that understanding is dependent on its ability to inform decisions that help the organisation survive or grow, how does this knowledge help you to develop the paper, your explanation…your ideas?

• Can you diagram the development of ideas in your paper?

Drafting and Revising

• At some point during the drafting stage, a writer stops to survey what has been written.

• The writer identifies possible points of departure for the rest of the paper—directions in which the paper might go.

• The writer decides if he or she likes the shape of the paper and the direction it is taking.

• The writer attempts to “re-see”/”re-think” the paper.

Drafting and Revising

• Is the text answering the question set in a way that is acceptable to the intended audiences?

• Is the information being organized so that the readers will be able to follow the logic?

• Is the purpose of the paper clear?• Is there sufficient, relevant support for the

argument being made or justifications for claims made?

• Is the writer appealing to the readers sense of reason and for the credibility of his or her sources?

Revision: Global Issues

• Conceptual/argumentative framework• Logical arrangement of ideas

– Chronological order—such as in processes– Comparison/contrast– Cause/effect– Order of importance/significance– Organization according to size: large to small– Degree to which something is a true or is a factor– etc

• Detection of flaws in the logic• Logical flow of ideas

Revision: Global Issues

• How might the introduction better evoke the interest of your readers? How might the conclusion better leave the reader with the desired response?

• How much knowledge are you assuming on the part of your audience, and how might you present the information more clearly?

• Have you managed to avoid repeating ideas? A successful paper doesn’t repeat ideas, but develops ideas.

• Are sections of the paper choppy? Which sections flow best? Which need work?

• Is it clear how each paragraph supports the initial claim or helps to answer the overriding question?

Editing and Proofreading

• Local Issues:– Paragraphs: are they cohesive and coherent?– Paragraphs: is any information in the paragraph

unnecessary or confusing?– Paragraphs: Is it clear what each paragraph is

about and how one paragraph follows logically from the one before?

– Paragraphs: What decides the limits of the conversation in each paragraph?

Editing and Proofreading

• Local Issues: – Sentence-level problems:

• Is it a sentence? Does it express a complete thought?• Does it express what you thought it expressed?• Do you jumble your sentence structures to reflect a

more lively or less droning rhythm?

– Phrasing and Word Choices:• Grammatical?• Appropriate?—register, etc.

Editing and Proofreading

• Logical and Grammatical Relations– Conjunctions: coordinators, subordinators and adjuncts

• Is the relationship between ideas joined accurate?• Is the relationship between items in parallel?

– Noun-noun substitutes (synonyms) and noun-pronoun substitutes

• Is it clear what ‘they’ refers to?• Are we talking about ‘cats’ in general or ‘those [particular]

cats’?• Do you think that your reader will understand that ‘these’ refers

to a list of events that were discussed three paragraphs ago?