Writing
This site is designed to provide a wealth of resources for fledgling to advanced scholarly nurse writers. There are many aids, instructions, links, and examples to guide you to the tools or resources you need to be effective and even excel at writing tasks.
The Writing Resources bar moves you to resources, tips, guidelines, and instructions to help you in a variety of topic areas. Please explore. If you have a resource to contribute, please email the College of Nursing. You will find:
- Bibliographies of resources on a topic
- Links to established sites to help you with tasks
- Instruction sets that will step you through specific functions (especially for technical skills)
- Exemplar documents that serve as models (including an APA 6th manuscript template)
- Writing skills must be learned and practiced. Scholars are expected to have effective writing skills—and the expectation is a requirement, not a ‘nice to have’ skill. This site will guide you to the resources and tools you need to effectively communicate within your scholarly community.
- Scholarly writing is technical writing. It is systematic and formal, which means the wheel has been built, and you don’t have to have an encyclopedic knowledge of the rules. You need a map to guide you to the resources and tools you must apply to write, and instructions on how to use those resources.
- Many writers actually have weak writing skills; others may believe that they do. Writing is not an innate gift bestowed on the few. Writing is a skill that one learns by practice. There are aids to help you strengthen your effectiveness at writing tasks.
- The primary skill a writer must start with is the ability to use technical tools—a Word processor and other such software—in order to develop content.
- Following that, your expertise in developing content will ascend through a number of areas: basic writing skills, scholarly style, publishing standards, writing and publishing processes, electronic submission of manuscripts or grant applications, etc.
- Nurse leaders must have good writing skills. Clinical leaders must develop reports, as change agents in the evolving health care system, must be able to disseminate opinions and program information in writing. Researchers must write grants and publish research findings. Educators must know writing protocols in order to effectively design curriculums and to evaluate course materials submitted by students.
Technical Writing
Scholarly writing is technical writing. It is systemic formal writing; i.e., it is
formatted according to certain standards. The standards for scholarly writing vary
depending on the context of your writing. Grant writing differs from report writing,
and writing a dissertation differs from writing for publication or from preparing
an abstract for a conference presentation. Scholarly writing is a skill that must
be LEARNED; it is not an innate talent.
Because technical writing is a SYSTEM, the rules have been written—the wheel has already been built. You don’t need an encyclopedic knowledge of the rules, just the knowledge to know where to go for the right resources. Many resources are provided on links on the Office of Research and Grants Support (ORGS) web site.
A prerequisite for developing and styling content for technical writing of any kind is knowing that you must have proficiency with writing tools: writing and reference software, use of guidelines, the ability to properly style tables and figures, etc. Resources are provided to help develop these skills on the sites linked to the Writing Resources on the top right of this site.
Writing Guidelines
What all forms of scholarly writing have in common is that the 'rules' (called 'Guidelines')
have already been developed and are published. No one has an encyclopedic knowledge
of the many guidelines that govern scholarly writing. But you can learn how to find
and follow the guidelines. Editors, reviewers, and colleagues expect that work presented
to them to read are styled and formatted according to guidelines.
Style
One type of guideline is called STYLE, which refers to a preferred manner of presenting
and formatting content. There are many types of style, which are published in style
manuals, on publishing web sites, etc. The default style for nursing publication is
APA 6th, which is published in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological
Association (6th ed.). Although you will find helpful tips about using this style
(or others) on the world wide web, it is important to own a manual for your discipline
and refer to it when you are writing.
Published Resources for Scholarly Writing
The editor of this web site has compiled bibliographies (reference lists) of publications
that you can find and refer to for specialized types of scholarly writing, and for
general writing skills. The bibliographies are available on the sites listed in the
Writing Resources bar located on the top right section of this site. Most resources
can be found online or in university libraries.
Linked from the Purdue University web site: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/
Purdue University has an excellent web site with resources provided by the Purdue Writing Lab. On their site you will find numerous resources to help academic writers develop writing skills. Some of their sites are listed below with links; however, you are encouraged to go to the Purdue home (Welcome) site and explore their numerous resources.
- Welcome to the Purdue OWL
- General Writing
- Research and Citation [There is a link to APA Style (the default style for nursing) for tips for applying APA style.]
- Subject Specific Resources [There is a 'Writing in Nursing' section on this site!]
- Medical Writing