To paraphrase John Tukey, the beauty of working with data is that you get to "play in everyone's backyard." A corollary to this statement is that working with data necessitates collaboration. Although students often learn technical workflows to wrangle and analyze data, these workflows may break down or require adjustment to accommodate…

The purpose of this article is to discuss the process of teaching graduate students in school psychology to write psychological reports that teachers and parents find readable and that guide intervention. The consensus from studies across four decades of research is that effective psychological reports connect to the client's context; have clear…

This article considers how narrative constructs could be used to strengthen the writing process. The authors outline the narratological devices of plot, point of view, authorial distance, and character, and examine how these concepts can be used when writing with qualitative data. Narratological tools equip the researcher to selectively manage the…

Qualitative manuscripts occupy a multidimensional world and can vary by their "latitude" (where they are with respect to the humanities and sciences), "longitude" (where they are with respect to the length and number of data excerpts), and "altitude" (where they are with respect to the level of theorizing). In this article, I discuss these 3…

With the development of Web 2.0 technologies, online document collaboration tools are becoming increasingly available, often free of charge. Although the technology is considered interactive and collaborative, it does not necessarily mean learners themselves will interact and collaborate. This paper discusses the conditions required for successful…

Writing formal "journal-style" lab reports is often one of the requirements chemistry and biochemistry students encounter in the physical chemistry laboratory. Helping students improve their technical writing skills is the primary reason this type of writing is a requirement in the physical chemistry laboratory. Developing these skills is an…

In this article, the authors focus on the decision-making process that goes into professional writing and ways to emphasize ethical decision-making in writing classrooms. Professional writing has at its core an emphasis on action and audience. Certainly teachers want their students to write effectively--to serve their clients, organizations, and…

In the training of doctoral researchers in the use of qualitative research methods, considerable effort goes into preparation for fieldwork and the collection of data. Rather less attention, however, goes into what happens when they have collected their data and begin to make sense of it. In particular, relatively little attention has been paid to…

This article presents a conceptual framework for the writing process to facilitate motivation, learning, retention, and knowledge transfer in readers of expository material. Drawing from four well-developed bodies of knowledge--cognitive science, learning theory, technical communication, and creative writing--the author creates a model that allows…

A diamond-shaped model depicts the researcher/writer's progress from problem definition through preliminary research and major research to the stages of consolidating the data, writing, revising, rewriting, and final production. (RL)

Explains why technical communicators should help translators. Offers tips for creating "translation-friendly" documentation. Describes the research and design process used by the authors to create an online tutorial that provides technical communicators at a medical technology company the information they need to help them write and…

This article introduces an activity based on Standard 12 of the "Standards for Technological Literacy" that will help students develop good writing skills. It also describes the elements of a writing prompt and of a rubric, the advantages of using rubrics, and the writing development process itself. It provides an activity through which students…

Suggests that the use of visual models in writing technical material can affect the order of the entire writing process and uses a case study to explain how a model is developed, what purposes it serves, and how it affects the writing process. (DF)

Summarizes the most effective techniques for preparing instruction manuals for non-English readers. Reviews techniques such as human translation, machine translation, and controlled English. Argues that writers of such manuals must take into account differences in language, culture, and learning style. (JAD)

Discusses networking as a collaboration tool in the teaching of technical writing. Argues that some degree of collaboration is innate to all writing, that word processing already facilitates that collaboration, and that networking is the next enhancement to the collaborative process. (RS)