Content

One of the most challenging, yet highly important tasks for academic teachers/advisers may be to develop their students’ writing skills in an effective way. Not only will it be necessary to provide them with a set of basic rules (the Dos and Don’ts of Scientific Writing), but also to guide them when facing widespread questions and problems, such as: How do I organize my material into a first concept? I really don’t know how to get my writing started, do you have any tips on how to keep myself motivated?
In this workshop you’ll get to know, and experience in practical exercises, a variety of methods suited for the different stages of the typical writing process. We’ll also identify some of the most frequent stumbling blocks that might occur when working with students, and develop approaches on how best to deal with them.
Please also bring specimens of your students’ written assignments, projects, or theses (both excellent and not-so-convincing examples), so we can discuss common issues hands-on.
Learning objectives:

• heighten your awareness of the complexity of the writing process
• reflect your own academic writing to obtain useful insights to pass on
• develop your toolbox for systematically teaching writing skills
• gain new momentum and fresh ideas for advising your students

Contents:

• the academic writing process in its different stages
• tools to help students diagnose their writing conditions
• creative techniques for getting started and staying motivated
• various methods to organize the material into a concept
• approaches to reviewing students’ texts and giving them feedback
• teaching the basics of academic English as a second language