Chapter Two

Composing
 Composing
For most experienced and skilled writers, the
composing process breaks up into roughly five parts

Composing

Situational Drafting and

Discovery Arrangement Editing
Analysis Revising

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 Scenario
 Coal

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 Analyzing the writing Situation
 It involves Situational analysis, that time
when you’re trying to bring a thought from
nowhere to somewhere.
 It’s a time when you think about such things
as your
 Audience
 Topic, and
 Purpose

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 Discovery
 In the second stage, you “discover” the
material you need to satisfy your purpose
and your audience.
 That discovery process may go on
completely within the trillion cells of your
brain or, as is often the case in technical
writing, in libraries, laboratories, and
workplaces as well.

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 Arranging
 When the discovery stage is almost
complete, you pass into a stage in which
you arrange your material.
 That is, before writing a draft, you may
rough out a plan for it or even a fairly
complete outline.

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 Drafting and Revising
 With your arrangement in hand, you are
ready for the fourth part of the composing
process, the drafting and revising of your
document.
 For many competent writers, drafting and
revising are separate steps; for others, they
are almost concurrent.

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 Editing
 In the final stage of the writing process:

you edit your work to satisfy the

requirements of standard English and proper
format

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 The Writing Process
 Analyzing the writing situation: identify the
reason and purpose for writing, the situation in
which the document is used, and the audience.
 Choosing/discovering content: find the
information to achieve your purpose and meet
the readers’ needs.

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 Situation and Content Analysis
Worksheet
What is your subject or topic?

What is the purpose of the document you will write?

Who are your readers?

Why are you writing? Why is the document required? What is the
situation that led to the need for this document?
What topics do you need/are required to cover? What do your readers
need to know? What do they need to do?
What structure do you plan to use? Are there any required report
sections?
What information resources do you have? Which ones do you need?

What types of visuals are you considering using? How will these
improve your content?

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 The Writing Process
 Drafting and revising: write the rough draft and
revise for meaning.
 Revision: revise in terms of logic, completeness,
style, and visuals.
 Document design: decide how to arrange and
display information—headings, font, color,
placement of visuals, etc.

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 The Writing Process
 Arranging content: use a standard
organizational approach or choose your own.
 Editing: perform a mechanics edit, a
documentation edit, and an edit for document
integrity (document as a whole).

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 Time Factor
 Time spent on writing may vary from
document to document
 Time spent on each of the 5 parts is not
equal

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 Situational Analysis:
Topic and Purpose
 You may have to define a term or explain a
procedure.
 You may have to report the results and
conclusions of a scientific experiment or a
comparison shopping study.
 New research has to be proposed.
 Work delays have to be explained.
 All these and many more are the “topics” of
technical writing

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 Situational Analysis:
Topic and Purpose
 Although the topics of technical writing are
varied, the purposes are more limited.
 Generally purpose is either to inform or
to argue.
 Most topics can be handled in one of these
two ways, depending on the situation.
 Often, you are simply informing.

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 Situational Analysis:
Topic and Purpose
 Be sure to have your topic and purpose in
hand before you proceed on in your writing
project.
 It’s good practice to write them down,
something like this:
I will define alcoholism in a way that reflects recent research. Further, I
will demonstrate that my definition, which includes the genetic causes
of alcoholism as well as the environmental ones, is more complete and
accurate than definitions that deal with environmental causes alone.

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 Audience and persona
 Persona refers to the role the writer has,
or assumes, when writing.
 It relates to, among other things, the
position of the writer and his or her
relationship to the audience and the
situation.

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 Audience and persona
 Here are some questions you need to ask
about your audience and persona when
you are preparing to write
 What Is the Level of Knowledge and Experience of Your
Readers?
 What Is the Reader’s Point of View?
 What Is Your Relationship to the Reader?
 What Is Your Reader’s Attitude about What You Are Going to
Say?
 What Persona Do You Wish to Project?
 What Is the Influence of International Cultures?

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 Discovery
 At some point in your writing process you must
“discover” the material you will use in your
writing.
 Discovery is teasing out of your mind the
information you will use and modify to meet
the needs of your topic, purpose, audience,
and persona.
 the more you read, observe, and experience,
the better writer you are likely to be

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 Discovery
 Of course, all the material you need may not
be in your mind when you begin.
 Discovery includes to fill in the gaps in your
knowledge
 using libraries
 the Internet
 laboratories
 Interviews
 On-site inspections

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 Discovery: Techniques
 Brainstorming
 Using Arrangement Patterns for Discovery
 Other successful discovery techniques

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 Arrangement
 When you begin your arrangement, you
should have a good deal of material to work
with.
 You should have notes on your audience,
purpose, and persona.

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 Arrangement example
 A procedure to write:
 you may use a standard instruction
arrangement:
 introduction,
 tool list and
 description, and
 steps of the procedure in chronological order.

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 Arrangement example
 Arranging an argument:
 you have your major opinion, often called
the major thesis, and your sub-arguments,
often called minor theses.
 Generally, you want to start and finish your
argument with strong minor theses.
 You’ll place weaker minor theses in the
middle of your argument.
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 Drafting and Revising
 The rough draft
 Revision
 Arrangement and content
 Logic
 Style
 Graphics
 Document Design
 Sharing your work

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 Editing
 Checking Mechanics
 Checking Documentation
 Checking Graphics
 Checking document design
 Editing with word processing programs

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 Using Computers in the Writing
Process
 Analyzing the writing situation: open/name a
file and write notes about your readers and
purpose.
 Arranging content: use computers to sort
material electronically.

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 Using Computers in the Writing
Process
 Drafting and revising:
 When beginning the draft, open a file and
save with the name of your document.
 You may wish to use “free writing” to begin
the document.
 Keyboard ideas or sections.

 Arrange, delete, and add ideas as necessary.

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 Using Computers in the Writing
Process
 As you insert material from sources, use ( )
or [ ] to remind you of the source.
 During this stage, revise only for meaning.
 Correct mechanical problems your software
marks only if this doesn’t slow your ability to
key in ideas.

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 Using Computers in the Writing
Process
 Document design:
 Use the software capabilities to choose
effective font(s), typeface(s), and color(s),
and to position visuals on the page.
 Choose design elements carefully so as to
encourage readers to skim and then begin
digesting your message

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 Using Computers in the Writing
Process
 Editing: when your software highlights a
problem with a sentence, check the sentence
carefully.
 Start and stop process: often a workplace
necessity.
 Use by choice for long documents so as to
avoid errors.

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 Using Computers in the Writing
Process
 Stop when you finish drafting, then return for
revising/editing.
 When leaving a task, make notes about what
you need to do next time you open the file.

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