Writing Academically

Writing academically is the opposite of nursing charting.  We as nurses -are used to providing the facts, nothing more, nothing less :-)  In scholarly or academic writing, the repetition or redundancy is desired (it may be because of the volumes of reading a professor does, the repetition ensures that the professor does not miss any important points.

So if you feel you are being repetitive, you are writing in a scholarly manner.  Keep the nouns related to your main topic the same and switch up the verbs, and adjectives when writing.  Make sure each paragraph has a minimum of four sentences (MEAL method) where:  M= Main Point; E= Evidence (citation) and/or example; A= your analysis of why this is important or the advantages/disadvantages, compare and contrast or implications of your E-sentence; L= Link to the next paragraph.

If you get stuck writing one of the four sentences, just type in blue font "NEED A " for need an analysis sentence and then go back later and fill that aspect in your paper.  Most nurses find the "A" and the "L" the most difficult for the reasons I stated earlier.

Keep the thesaurus function open in MS word (found under “Tools>Language”) to help use a variety of verbs.  Remember to keep the nouns related to your main topic the same throughout the paper, using various verbs and adjectives in the writing. All of this will soon become second nature with practice.

The video below tells how to set MS Word (2010) to default APA formatting for a paper.  On the right side of the screen you will also find numerous videos explaining many other aspects of using MS Word to create APA formatted papers such as a title page and abstract.  You tube is an excellent source of help for APA and  using MS Word.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9pbUoNa5tyY

For more information go to:   http://sxu.edu/academics/colleges_schools/son/under_programs.asp

Dr. Maggie