Developing an academic writing style

Developing an academic writing style resources

• Analysing the task: direction words

  Analysing a task in the right way can help you to meet the task requirements, and prevent you from going off-topic in your assessments and exam responses.

• Developing clarity and focus in academic writing

  Academic writing aims to be clear and precise, with a direct style that moves logically from one idea to the next. This page describes how you can structure sentences and paragraphs to achieve clarity and ‘flow’ in your writing.

• Developing originality

  What is the 'significant contribution' of your writing to your field of study? This guide explores the concept of originality at different levels of university study, and provides techniques to help you open your mind to new ideas.

• Connecting ideas in writing

  Suggestions for connecting ideas at the sentence and paragraph level in academic writing.

• Four key features of academic style

  Academic writing in English has a distinctive style – it is formal and uses particular language norms that you need to learn.

• Email etiquette

  Communicating effectively with your lecturers and tutors.

• Reflective writing

  Writing reflectively: it is about you – putting the ‘I’ in reflection.