The Where: Constructing an effective writing environment

Once you know what you need to work on, establishing an environment with the right atmosphere, tools, and resources necessary for completing the project is equally important. In the previous article, we explored the first W – The What: Defining a research project. In this article, we will focus on The Where: Constructing an effective writing environment. This discussion began with a self-reporting of participant writing environments and continued with discussion of ways to improve them.

Q1: How would you describe your current writing environment?

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The What: Defining a research project

During Academic Writing Month 2018, TAA hosted a series of #AcWriChat TweetChat events focused on the five W’s of academic writing. Throughout the series we explored The What: Defining a research project; The Where: Constructing an effective writing environment; The When: Setting realistic timeframes for your research; The Who: Finding key sources in the existing literature; and The Why: Explaining the significance of your research. This series of posts brings together the discussions and resources from those events. Let’s start with The What: Defining a research project.

Before moving forward on any academic writing effort, it is important to understand what the research project is intended to understand and document. In order to accomplish this, it’s also important to understand what a research project is. This is where we began our discussion of the five W’s of academic writing.

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Online marketplace Bonanza.com takes key steps to prevent the sale of pirated e-textbooks on its platform

Several leading higher education publishers announced that online marketplace Bonanza.com will join them in efforts to stop the sale of pirated e-textbooks by implementing a series of steps designed to prevent their sale on its platform. These steps will help disrupt digital piracy while not impeding innovation and the lawful growth of marketplaces. The educational publishers, Cengage, Elsevier, Macmillan Learning, McGraw-Hill Education and Pearson, have worked hard in recent years in partnership with distributors and sellers to combat the sale of pirated ebooks and counterfeit textbooks, which hurts authors and readers and stifles innovation and the creation of the rich content that consumers want.

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3/25 TAA Webinar: “How Trello Can Transform Your Life as an Academic”

Do you juggle multiple teaching, scholarship and service projects and worry about ‘dropping the ball’? Do you wish you had one place to easily organize your life as an academic? Then Trello might be for you. Join us Monday, March 25 from 1-2 p.m. ET for the TAA webinar, How Trello Can Transform Your Life as an Academic, where Angelique M. Davis and Rose Ernst, both associate professors of political science at Seattle University, will provide an overview of the magic and logic of Trello. They will show you how to use it to masterfully manage multiple projects in one place—without having to switch between paper and multiple digital programs! They will also show you how to use Trello to move your scholarly projects forward. This will include a demonstration and template of a Trello board based on Erin Furtak’s publishing pipeline. You will leave this webinar with a plan to set up your Trello account so you can become a master juggler and calmly manage your academic life.

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3/13 TAA Webinar: “Show Me! The Art of Using Visual Elements to Enhance a Manuscript”

Visual elements, such as tables and figures, can improve the readability and overall quality of a manuscript when used properly. After all, a picture speaks a thousand words, right? But poorly developed images can be more distracting than helpful. Join us Wednesday, March 13 from 11 a.m. -12 p.m. ET for the TAA webinar,  Show Me! The Art of Using Visual Elements to Enhance a Manuscript, where textbook author Eric Schmieder will highlight ways to effectively incorporate visual elements into your journal articles and textbooks. He’ll also share some important tips for maintaining accessibility guidelines in the process.

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