Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Campus Journalism
Campus Journalism
Campus Journalism
Urdaneta City
SCIENCE WRITING
Ø A science writer should be able to communicate clearly and effectively so that he can popularize and
translate scientific reports into stories.
Ø He writes his story in such a way that the science un-oriented reader may understand and appreciate
it because it is written in layman’s language.
Ø He writes his story in such a way that the science un-oriented reader may understand and appreciate
it because it is written in layman’s language.
Technical Writing vs. Non-technical Writing:
• The main aim of journalistic writing is to inform, interpret, entertain, and to educate.
- The main purpose of technical writing is to inform and persuade by providing facts and opinion
based on facts that help readers answer question, solve a problem, make a decision, or perform a task.
All data could be verified and would not change unless new findings are made.
The writing depends on the author’s treatment of the subject and by the reader’s need to useful
information.
- Police and fire personnel write detailed incidents or investigation report that must be clear
enough to serve as evidence in court.
- Nurses and medical technicians keep daily records that are crucial to patients’ welfare particularly
as bases for litigations
- Secretaries must write clear and precise memos, letters, minutes, and reports.
To define something – as to insurance costumer who wants to know what variable annuity means.
To describe something – as to an architectural client who wants to know what a new addition to her
home look s like.
Avoid ambiguous phrases – in technical writing, a sentence should have one meaning only.
Avoid over-stuffing – a sentence that crams so many ideas, forces readers to struggle in order to get
what is meant.
Avoid un-stacked modifiers – too many nouns stacked up as modifiers in front of another noun make for
hard reading.
Rearrange word order – just as any paragraph has a key sentence, any sentence has a key word or
phrase. For emphasis, place the key word or phrase at the beginning or end of the sentence.
Make sentences concise (brief) – a concise sentence is brief but informative. It gets right to the point
w/o clutter.
Avoid “there” sentence openers – save words and improve your emphasis by avoiding “there is” and
“there are” at the beginning of the sentences.
11. Avoid certain “it” sentence openers – eliminate any ”It” that does not refer to somerthing specific.
12. Delete needless “to be” construction – forms of the verb “to be” (is, was, are) often add clutter w/o
adding meaning.
15. Fight noun addiction – excessive nouns make sentences awkward and wordy
16. Make negative positive – save words and get to the point by eliminating negative construction.
18. Delete needless preface – get to the point. Deliver to the point w/o a long wind-up.