Efficient Writing

How to Write

Learn how to write by distance learning.

• What is a noun?
• What is a verb or adjective?
• How do you punctuate, write more clearly and communicate more effectively? 
• Learn to express your thoughts faster and with greater confidence.

This external study course allows you to better understand all of these things which will help in both your business and private life.  It will also help you to write job applications.

If you've never developed your ability to write to the extent you would like; this course could be a perfect way for you to do that.

As the course is self paced and you have your own tutor, you can deal with issues and master things in a home study environment where you might have otherwise been left lagging behind everyone else in a classroom.

Comment from one of our Efficient Writing students:

"I am glad I did the course and wish to do another one."   M. Tanzi

Lesson Structure

There are 6 lessons in this course:

1. Introduction
   • Scope of writing -where is writing used
   • What is effective writing
   • Good writing is direct
   • Good writing is objective
   • Variety is good in writing
   • Understanding human communication
   • The communication process
   • Types of communication (verbal, non-verbal, etc)
   • Communication channels
   • Communicating efficiently
   • Writing for a purpose
   • Understand your reader
   • Content
      
2. Basic Writing Skills
   • Parts of speech
   • Types of nouns -proper, common, collective
   • Plurals
   • Possessive nouns and pronouns
   • Types of verbs: regular, irregular etc.
   • Adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions
   • Common grammatical errors: comma splices, fragmented sentences, dangling modifiers, etc
   • Sentence construction
   • Types of sentence: declarative, interrogative, exclamatory, etc
   • Sentence structure
   • Constructing sentences
   • Combining sentences
   • Expanding basic sentences
   • Adding modifying words, phrases or clauses.
   • Linking words or phrases
      
3. Clear Wording
   • Introduction
   • Common causes of confusion: homophones, malapropropisms, etc
   • Ambiguity
   • Making meanings clear: Illustrative context, glossing, etc
   • Informative language
   • Persuasive language
   • Imaginative language
   • Other types of language: colloquial, formal, informal, etc
   • Simplicity
   • Building a paragraph
   • General guidelines for effective writing
      
4. Concise Wording
   • Conciseness
   • Circumlocution
   • Condensing your writing
   • Common problems contributing to lack of conciseness
   • Active and passive voice
   • Condensing text: how to Precis
      
5. Punctuation and Accuracy
   • Punctuation purpose
   • Semi colon, colon, dash, comma
   • Spelling
   • American or English spelling?
      
6. Planning what you write
   • Business formats
   • Business letters
   • Planning what you write
   • Writing a media release
   • Writing an answer or an essay
   • Academic writing, verbs, quotations
   • Unpack the question
   • Research
   • Referencing

Each lesson culminates in an assignment which is submitted to the school, marked by the school's tutors and returned to you with any relevant suggestions, comments, and if necessary, extra reading.

Aims:

• Define the nature and scope of writing.
• Discuss the way written sentences and paragraphs are properly structured.
• Develop an increased capacity to write clearly.
• Develop improved conciseness in writing.
• Develop and improve punctuation skills.
• Apply basic writing skills more efficiently in a range of situations.

Request your free info pack!