Writing Tips: 1. Pay attention to punctuation, especially to the correct use of commas and periods. These two punctuation marks regulate the flow of your thoughts, and they can make your text confusing even if the words are clear. 2. Thomas Participate in NaNoWriMo, which challenges you to write a 50,000 word novel in a month. I noticed that my writing has definitely improved over the course of the book — and it’s not even finished yet. 3. Bill Harper Try not to edit while you’re creating your first draft. Creating and editing are two separate processes using different sides of the brain, and if you try doing both at once you’ll lose. Make a deal with your internal editor that it will get the chance to rip your piece to shreds; it will just need to wait some time. A really nice trick is to switch off your monitor when you’re typing. You can’t edit what you can’t see. 4. Jacinta In a sentence: write daily for 30 minutes minimum! It’s easy to notice the difference in a short time. Suddenly, ideas come to you and you think of other things to write. You experiment with styles and voices and words and the language becomes more familiar… 5. Ane Mulligan Learn the rules of good writing… then learn when and how to break them. 6. Pete Bollini I sometimes write out 8 to 10 pages from the book of my favorite writer… in longhand. This helps me to get started and swing into the style I wish to write in. 7. Nilima Bhadbhade Be a good reader first. 8. Douglas Davis While spell-checking programs serve as a good tool, they should not be relied upon to detect all mistakes. Regardless of the length of the article, always read and review what you have written. 9. Kukusha Learn to take criticism and seek it out at every opportunity. Don’t get upset even if you think the criticism is harsh, don’t be offended even if you think it’s wrong, and always thank those who take the time to offer it. 10. John England Right click on a word to use the thesaurus. Do it again on the new word and make the best use of your vocabulary. 11. Lillie Ammann After editing the work on screen or in print, I like to read the text aloud. Awkward sentences and errors that slipped through earlier edits show up readily when reading out loud. 12. H Devaraja Rao Avoid wordiness. Professor Strunk put it well: “a sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts.” 13. David Write as if you’re on deadline and have 500 words to make your point. Then do it again. And again. dailywritingtips/34-writing-tips-that-will-make-you-a-better-writer/
Posted on: Tue, 16 Jul 2013 09:32:23 +0000