As a high school student, I remember being charged with creative challenges. My English teachers provided opportunities for me to create new characters, scenarios, problems, and solutions. I remember enjoying this kind of writing, especially the colorful prose. When, in college, my passions shifted to history, I discovered a whole new style of writing: academic or scholarly writing.
No longer tasked with creating scenarios of my own, I found myself seeking and sharing the stories of others. It was important that I could factually retell their experiences while explaining the significance of these details. To explain the significance of a moment, person, or era in history, one inherently includes some personal bias. What I believe is significant may be small dice to someone else. Another challenge of scholarly writing is the repetition of ideas. When completing scholarly writing, you must take someone else’s thoughts and re-express them in your own words.
I leveled up my scholarly writing in my master’s program in learning technologies. In this program, I discovered long scientific studies published as 20+ page papers. Each began with an abstract full of higher-academic terms that I knew would be repeated in the many pages. Each is jam-packed with statistical studies and the data they returned. While learning to read this style of writing was challenging, I came to appreciate how every study I read contributed to the same pool of knowledge: how we use technology to teach and learn.
Academic writing differentiates itself from other forms of writing by serving the purpose of advancing learning. Academic writing explains what learning has occurred and how that learning relates to the field of study. Academic or scholarly writing is usually completed in an academic setting by students, professors, or researchers. Because this style of writing is meant for factual learning, it removes emotions, metaphors, purple prose, or slang.
In this blog, I write from my experiences. I hope my writing resonates with other learning technologies professionals. Because this is an informal forum, I can speak in a conversational tone and include some words or phrases that represent my writing and speaking style. Upon reflecting on scholarly vs. non-scholarly writing, I realized that this blog represents a chance to combine the creativity I enjoyed in my high school English classes with my interest in studies and conversations that advance the field of learning technologies.
Jessica White's Learning Technology Blog & Portfolio 