Writing in Style - for January 27th, 2009

Do a contrastive study of your own writing style and that of a professional. Count the number of paragraphs in your paper, and then evaluate it against the same number of paragraphs in the professional’s writing (for example, if your op. ed. is 6 paragraphs, use 6 paragraphs of the professional). However, if there are extremely short transitional paragraphs (1-2 sentences) or a paragraph of just quoted materials, do not count those in your total.

Professional Student

Total number of words ___________ ________

Total number of sentences ___________ ________

Longest sentence (in # of words) ___________ ________

Shortest sentence (in # of words) ___________ ________

Average sentence length ___________ ________

Number of sentences w/ more than

10 words over the average length ___________ ________

Percentage of sentences w/ more

than 10 words over the average ___________ ________

Number of sentences w/ more than

5 words below the average ___________ ________

Percentage of sentences w/ more than

5 words below the average ___________ ________

Paragraph Length

Longest Paragraph (in # of sentences) ___________ ________

Shortest Paragraph (in # of sentences) ___________ ________

Average Paragraph (in # of sentences) ___________ ________

Now that you've got the stats, write a paragraph about how your writing differs from a professionals, not just in regards to the numbers, but in regards to the style of writing, the tone, the way ideas are put together, etc.

Label to put on post: style

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