Literacy introduction
Literacy is the ability to read, write, speak and listen in a way that lets us communicate effectively and make sense of the world. It is an important skill to have confidence and competence in when working in healthcare and choosing to undertake an apprenticeship. Within higher education, your will combine literacy with academic writing to create your evidence-based assignments
Academic writing description
Academic writing is clear, focussed, structured and backed up by evidence. Its purpose is to aid the reader's understanding and has a formal tone and style. However, you do not need to use long sentences and complicated vocabulary.
There are some clear characteristics of academic writing including:
- Planned and focused: answers the question and demonstrates an understanding of the subject.
- Structured: is coherent, written in a logical order, and brings together related points and material.
- Evidenced: demonstrates knowledge of the subject area, supports opinions and arguments with evidence, and is referenced accurately.
- Formal in tone and style: uses appropriate language and tenses, and is clear, concise and balanced.
Preparing your literacy skills
There are many ways that you can start to prepare for your course and build confidence in your literacy including:
- Accessing the literacy section of our school's Academic skills website http://academic-skills.health.herts.ac.uk/academic-writing/
- Accessing the following university website for resources https://www.monash.edu/learnhq/resources/study-better
- Watch this video on Academic Writing https://youtu.be/44CLK-3Fja4
- A good dictionary https://dictionary.cambridge.org/
- A good collocations dictionary http://www.ozdic.com/
- A thesaurus (you must use a dictionary together with a thesaurus) http://www.thesaurus.com/
- A good website to practice the most important academic skills you will need http://aeo.sllf.qmul.ac.uk/
- A grammar website (complete the exercises and check your answers) http://www.uefap.com/grammar/gramfram.htm
- Some useful academic expressions (you can adapt these generic expressions; they are not plagiarism) http://www.phrasebank.manchester.ac.uk/
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