Effective Writing Skills

The course teaches students to write to their intended readers in a concise and readable style.  It is a good refresher-writing course for those who need to brush up on basic writing skills.  Topics include writing basics, as well as editing, choosing subjects, organizing documents, using library sources, and APA citation.

UPON COMPLETION OF THE COURSE, THE STUDENT WILL BE COMPETENT IN:

• Organizing and implementing the appropriate rhetorical patterns for developing an idea in written communication.
• Identifying the major types of readers and addressing the subject of the document to them.
• Organizing a unified document into its three component parts: introduction, text, and conclusion.
• Presenting a statement of purpose developed by means of the major rhetorical strategies of written communication: description, analysis, and persuasion.
• Writing objective, subjective, and thematic descriptive essays.
• Analyzing a subject by means of comparison and contrast and according to the point-by-point (alternating) or subject-by-subject (dividing) patterns of exposition.
• Describing a subject showing cause and effect relationships.
• Analyzing a subject according to strategies of classification and extended definition.
• Developing a personal vocabulary that precisely expresses the writer’s thinking in written form.
• Editing the writer’s documents to eliminate grammatical and stylistic errors.
• Implementing corrective procedures for revising a document for presentation in a professional setting.
• Editing compositions for punctuation, emphasis (style), and low-information content.
• Transforming expository information into alternative modes of expression.
• Composing summaries of expository information.
• Identifying techniques of persuasion in compositions.
• Identifying the elements of argument.
• Distinguishing between stated and implied premises and conclusions in argument.