REU Writing Workshop III

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REU Writing Workshop III

• John Anderson
• Northwestern University
• July 31 and August 1, 2007

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Overview

• Large group discussion 20 min
• Recap the writing process in action
• Using different types of feedback
• Questions for revision stories, structures,
  sentences
• Using figures effectively
• Writing an effective abstract
• Individual writing 30 min
• Status of the project
• Examining the structure of the draft
• Flagging sentences for revision
• Small group discussion 40 min

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One model of the writing process

• Create figures and draft captions
• Figures express results and data
• Discuss with advisor
• Make outline
• Write draft
• Review with other students
• May or may not be co-authors on the project
• Revise prepare error-free draft for advisor
• Iterate from there
• Abstract is usually written last

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Some thoughts on process

• Stages are usually not a simple linear series
• Planning, drafting, revising, more planning, more
  drafting, more revising, editing, revising,
  editing, revising
• Drafts are tools for getting feedback
• Reflect on what decisions you need to make
• Understand what kinds of feedback you can expect
  from different readers
• Bring different types of readers into the mix
• Ask them specific questions
• Not all pieces of a draft may be equally cooked
• So they may require different amounts of heat and
  pressure to finish them

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Revising vs. editing vs. proofreading

• Revision seeing again
• How can this point be different?
• Global revision questions about purpose,
  audience, meaning that affect the whole thing (or
  a major section of the thing)
• Local revision questions about paragraphs and
  sentences
• Editing clarifying meaning
• How does this point connect with a reader
• Once I know what I want to say, what is the best
  way to say it?
• Proofreading eliminating mistakes
• Better eliminating ambiguity
• To make any of these steps easier, try breaking
  it down into distinct subcategories

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Using different types of feedback

• Reader-based feedback
• What happens when the reader reads movies of
  the readers mind (Peter Elbow)
• Can help locate problem passages
• Criteria-based feedback
• How the draft meets or does not meet specific
  parameters
• Can mean mechanics spelling, grammar, formatting
• Can also mean conventions expectations, style,
  voice
• Submission guidelines good example of criteria
• Learn how to get the most out of both types
• Understand how one can masquerade as the other
• Ask for what you need

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Questions for revision

• What story are you telling?
• What appears at the beginnings and ends of
  sentences, paragraphs, and sections?
• Where is new information introduced?
• What are the actors and actions?
• Do your actors and actions map on to subjects and
  verbs?
• Are the subject and verb close to each
  other?(see Gopen and Swan)

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Using figures effectively

• Choose appropriate figures
• What type of data?
• What type of story?
• Preserve the quality of the original graphic
• Vector vs. raster
• Screen vs. print resolution
• Make captions stand on their own
• Avoid cryptic references to figures (See figure
  1)
• Avoid chartjunk
• Drop shadows
• 3-D bar graphs and pie charts

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Every picture tells a story
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But it doesnt tell it on its own
Figure 9 AFM images of collagen type I fibrils
on ethanol-cleaned glass slide. (Scan rate of
1.001 Hz.) Topography (left), amplitude (right).
Figure 10 Digitally processed images of Figure 9
(left) using the MetaMorph Image Acquisition and
Image Processing Program (Universal Imaging,
Inc.).
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Explain what the figures show

• Perhaps the most interesting image is shown in
  Figure 9. In this figure, and in the processed
  image (Figure 10), the ends of several collagen
  fibers are visible and appear to be composed of
  several smaller structures wound around each
  other into the larger collagen fiber. This
  suggests that these structures are indeed
  collagen fibrils, and these smaller strands
  represent microfibrils wound together. We can see
  that several of these fibrils have these unwound
  ends, indicating that they have potentially been
  broken. This theory is supported by the structure
  on the upper-right corner of the original image,
  which appears to have been broken and
  consequently shows this striated structure. This
  seems to suggest that, unlike the poly-L-lysine
  samples, something in the preparation of the
  ethanol-cleaned samples caused the collagen
  fibers to be broken and prevent them from
  cross-linking sufficiently. This would be an
  interesting relationship to examine further if
  more conditions were controlled in order to
  determine exactly what is causing this behavior.
  (Nocedal, 2006, emphasis added)

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Writing an effective abstract

• Make it complete
• Abstract should stand on its own
• Test by reading as though skimming abstract
  figures decision
• Follow the order of the paper
• Purpose/problem
• Approach/methods
• Results/significance
• Make it succinct
• Select key statements from the body
• Remove supporting details
• Remember that the abstract is not an introduction

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Sample abstract Nocedal

• The aim of this research was to investigate the
  use of atomic force microscopy (AFM) for the
  high-resolution imaging of collagen fibers in
  aqueous media. Collagen plays a vital role in
  many processes in vivo, especially in structural
  integrity, yet few studies have used AFM to
  investigate the structure of these fibers. Type I
  collagen was used in this study on AP-mica,
  poly-L-lysine-coated glass slides and on
  ethanol-cleaned glass slides to determine what
  structures these fibers assume in vitro under the
  various conditions. It was found that AFM is in
  fact a viable method for determining collagen
  structure, and that type I fibrils can be seen in
  both cross-linked and isolated forms. A
  resolution of about 2030 nm was achieved. This
  research forms a foundation for further
  investigation into the different types of
  collagen structures in vivo and the environmental
  conditions that cause them. (Nocedal, 2006)

Purpose Methods Results
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Sample abstract Wei

• The use of a variable resistor-capacitor (RC)
  bridge circuit was previously reported to be a
  viable solution to the spurious contribution of
  fringe capacitance during nanoscale impedance
  microscopy (NIM). In this paper, a refinement of
  this technique combined with standard NIM is
  presented as an impedance characterization tool
  for organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs). In
  this technique, a sinusoidal bias is split into
  two equal branches, which are subsequently sent
  to the tunable RC circuit and the sample. By
  balancing the phase and magnitude of the two
  branches, the contribution to the current through
  the sample/tip junction can be directly
  monitored. To demonstrate the improved detection
  limit offered by this technique over more
  conventional NIM, conductive AFM measurements
  were performed on 8 µm by 8 µm OLED devices,
  demonstrating significant improvement in
  resolution in the current and phase maps. This
  paper also suggests possible future research that
  is necessary to fully enable impedance
  spectroscopy at the nanoscale. (Wei, 2006)

Purpose Methods Results
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Example deriving the purpose

• Abstract
• The use of a variable resistor-capacitor (RC)
  bridge circuit was previously reported to be a
  viable solution to the spurious contribution of
  fringe capacitance during nanoscale impedance
  microscopy (NIM). In this paper, a refinement of
  this technique combined with standard NIM is
  presented as an impedance characterization tool
  for organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs).
• Body
• A previous experiment9 presented the use of a
  variable resistor-capacitor (RC) circuit to
  compensate for the spurious contribution to the
  AC flow by fringe capacitance in NIM
  measurements. By analogy to the variable RC
  components in electrical bridge circuits, this
  technique was referred to as bridge enhanced
  nanoscale impedance microscopy (BE-NIM). In this
  experiment, cAFM scanning was performed on gold
  electrodes patterned on silicon oxide grown on
  n-type silicon at a single AC bias and frequency.
  It was demonstrated that with BE-NIM, the
  detection limit of NIM could be improved by at
  least several orders of magnitude. Here we
  present a refined BE-NIM technique that is
  applicable to operational OLEDs for the first
  time. This work may lead to future development in
  impedance study at various frequencies.
• (Wei, 2006)

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Which statement most accurately describes your
current status?

• We have results (or expect them very soon) that
  validate our hypothesis. The draft tells an
  interesting story (even if not complete yet), and
  Im ready to write an abstract.
• We have results, but theyve taken us in an
  unexpected direction. The draft tells a story,
  but Im not sure its the one we want or need to
  tell.
• Our results are incomplete (or worse,
  uninteresting). We are in the process of
  changing our direction. Im not sure what story I
  can tell about what we did.
• Technical difficulties have prevented us from
  following through. The draft tells a story, but
  its more about where the problem came from than
  what we did with it. Theres something
  interesting here, but results confirming the
  hypothesis will have to wait for another day.
• Write a statement that describes the current
  relationship of the writing to the research. How
  close is the story in the draft to the story you
  can tell (or will soon be able to tell) from the
  results?

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Examining the structure of the draft

• In each section, mark the divisions between
  chunks
• Larger than a paragraph
• Smaller than a section
• Any places where a subheading would be helpful
• In each paragraph, underline the most important
  sentence
• What statements are essential to the meaning of
  the whole paragraph?
• Where are they located?

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Flagging sentences for revision

• Assemble a collection of key sentences
• Key sentence in each paragraph
• Sentences at beginnings and ends of sections
• Figure captions
• Draw a line under the first six words
• How clear is the meaning of the sentences
  opening?
• Select three sentences to revise
• Try this bring subject and verb closer together
• Try this replace placeholder verb with real
  action
• Try this reverse order of information presented

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Discussion

• Looking for stories
• Compare notes project status
• For drafts closer to completion review abstract,
  figure captions
• For earlier drafts review introduction
• Looking for structure
• How many subsections does each section have?
• Where are sections in need of reordering?
• Looking at sentences
• Compare originals and revisions