“Carefully defined writing activities” in a learning situation have an even less direct relationship to “writing” than “pasturized process cheese food” has to “cheese.”
This wonderful quote comes from a post by Professor E. Shelley Reid on the Writng Program Administrator’s listserv last April. Professor Reid was involved in a discussion of Automated Essay Scoring (AES), which I mentioned in a post a couple of days ago.
About a year ago, I posted Kitty, ABC, and beautiful locations when I learned that the Association for Business Communication (ABC) chose me as the winner of the Kitty O. Locker Outstanding Researcher Award. I’ve just returned from New Orleans where I attended the ABC’s annual convention and had the privilege of addressing the convention audience in a plenary address titled “What is outstanding…
Yesterday’s post, Language choices can be unsuccessful — but never wrong, raised a few eyebrows. For some of you, my belief that language can never be wrong contradicts with my belief that I can prepare students for writing successfully in the workplace. The apparent contradition deserves an explanation. So today’s post is about grammar rules. (I’ll get…
The ability to communicate clear messages in writing is critical for the success of individuals in the workplace and the organizations they represent — though I have argued that plain language is only one of the communication strategies a pro must master. There are gads of folks who condemn business and government for creating ineffective documents and who advocate clear…
One of the comments to How Do Your Sell Plain Language to Your Manager? insisted that a software program called StyleWriter is the key to management support for more successful writing in the workplace. I want to respond to that recommendation. But I realized that the commenter and I understand “plain language” differently. So I’m going to…
Today, I am correcting proofs for a teaching note that will soon appear along with my lecture-tutorial on tone in Journal of Organizational Behavior Education. The paper explains the teaching philosophy behind use of video lecture-tutorials like those I have been posting here at ProsWrite. (Click on the tab to view the complete collection on…
In my very first post (now the Pros Write About page), I stated how bizarre I find it that teachers who like to read literature are tasked with teaching young people how to write. I’m not the only one who has noted the ensuing — and negative — consequences. It turns out that many industry people agree….
