{"id":44783,"date":"2018-08-06T13:12:33","date_gmt":"2018-08-06T20:12:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/world.edu\/?p=44783"},"modified":"2018-08-06T13:12:33","modified_gmt":"2018-08-06T20:12:33","slug":"writing-regularly-matching-time-and-task","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/world.edu\/writing-regularly-matching-time-and-task\/","title":{"rendered":"Writing regularly \u2013 matching time and task."},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

You\u2019ve all heard the advice that it\u2019s good to write regularly. Perhaps it was phrased this way \u2013 productive writers write a lot\u00a0because<\/em>\u00a0they write regularly. You\u2019ve been told that you can get a lot done if you just write every day. That it\u2019s no good hanging around waiting for the next big gap in your diary to magically appear because that may never happen.<\/p>\n

But hang on. Perhaps you\u2019ve also heard that not everyone who publishes a lot does regular writing\u00a0and<\/em>\u00a0they manage to carve out big slabs of time when they write all the things at once. Some\u00a0productive writers don\u2019t follow<\/a>\u00a0the \u00a0maxim, yet they seem to organise themselves to write a lot anyway.<\/p>\n

And I dare say you\u2019ve probably heard that many people\u00a0vary<\/em>\u00a0the amount of time they spend writing, sometimes a little, sometimes a lot, depending on how much time they actually have available. Regular writers they might be, but they write for varying times, regularly.<\/p>\n

But for the sake of argument, let\u2019s pretend that none of this is you. Yet. You think you want to write regularly and are not quite sure what to do other than sort out the time in your \u00a0life \u2013 each morning or night you\u2019ll set aside time to write something. Anything.<\/p>\n

Well not quite anything. And here\u2019s the thing. A little -or a lot \u2013 of writing time\u00a0can<\/em>\u00a0be highly productive. But that productivity depends on you knowing how to use whatever time you actually have wisely. You can get a lot done \u2013 or not much at all \u2013 in little bits of time, or in lots. You can waste regular time just as much as you can use it to be productive.<\/p>\n

The thing is that you have to do a bit more than simply set aside time, sit down at the keyboard and write. You really don\u2019t want to spend a lot of precious time, in big or little chunks \u00a0\u2013 however much time you have, a little or a lot \u2013 getting nowhere. Trying to sort out what to do, making several false starts and generally not going anywhere fast. You have to make the most of whatever time is available.<\/p>\n

You need to\u00a0match the task to the time<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Matching task and time requires a little bit of thinking ahead. It means a little bit of thinking about ALL of the tasks that go into a particular piece of writing, Writing is not simply sitting down and tapping away. Writing is also thinking, making notes, reading, sorting out references, selecting data, working out who to cite and not cite\u2026 there\u2019s a lot of different types of work that add up to academic writing<\/p>\n

And of course you can make that thinking ahead the first writing task that you do.<\/p>\n

The easiest way to explain what I mean is to give you a hypothetical example.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s say I want to write a paper about the ways in which a writing task can be organised. So there are a range of tasks that I have to do in order to make the paper happen.<\/p>\n

I start a paper master file.<\/p>\n

An early task which can be done in bite sized pieces \u2013 search the literatures. I can easily search and then store the results in one short sitting, then proceed in small steps to check out promising papers and flag them. I can read the title abstract introduction and conclusion as a way of building a short list. I don\u2019t have to do that all in one sitting. As I find useful texts, I can capture them and their bibliographic details using my bibliographic software.<\/p>\n

I can also amass empirical data that I need. Again this can be done in smaller bursts or in one larger block of time. I store cut and paste selections of data in a separate doc in the master file.<\/p>\n

I might then want to develop my ideas. I might first of all want to use\u00a0 some prompts and do some speed writing. For example I can finish these sentences\u2026<\/p>\n

My paper is about\u2026 the reason I am writing is to influence\/inform\/challenge\/etc \u2026 \u00a0who\/what \u2026.. so that\u2026 . The paper is needed because\u2026<\/p>\n

In order for the paper to work I need to argue\u2026 I need to provide evidence that\u2026<\/p>\n

But I could also brain storm or write some chunks of stuff.<\/p>\n

I could then write a tiny text abstract for the paper. And at the same time, before or after I could sort out a title which sums up the major message that the paper is going to give \u2013 the point I want to make.<\/p>\n

Once I have a tiny text, it acts as a kind of road map for the first draft of the paper. I can then write it piece by piece, in big and larger gobbets and slabs of time.<\/p>\n

By having matched time and task I can keep in touch with my paper no matter how little or much time I happen to have available. The paper is not left sitting until I have a day to do the literature search or three days to write the first draft. I\u00a0 can manage a little something or a larger something or a very substantive something and keep at it.<\/p>\n

I can chip away at essential bits of the paper and keep the momentum going as long as I am working at a task that is useful to the writing.<\/p>\n

Regular writing is good if you know how to use your time to advantage. If you have thought through all of the various things that you have to do as part of writing. If you recognise that actually putting hand to mouse is dependent on associated tasks of reading, noting, brainstorming, organising.<\/p>\n

Matching time and task is an important part of making a regular writing habit work for you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You\u2019ve all heard the advice that it\u2019s good to write regularly. Perhaps it was phrased this way \u2013 productive writers write a lot\u00a0because\u00a0they write regularly. You\u2019ve been told that you can get a lot done if you just write every day. That it\u2019s no good hanging around waiting for the next big gap in your […]\n… learn more→<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":44784,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15645],"tags":[13315],"coauthors":[11733],"class_list":["post-44783","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-education","tag-academic-writing"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nWriting regularly \u2013 matching time and task. - World leading higher education information and services<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/world.edu\/writing-regularly-matching-time-and-task\/\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Writing regularly \u2013 matching time and task. - World leading higher education information and services\" class=\"yoast-seo-meta-tag\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"You\u2019ve all heard the advice that it\u2019s good to write regularly. Perhaps it was phrased this way \u2013 productive writers write a lot\u00a0because\u00a0they write regularly. You\u2019ve been told that you can get a lot done if you just write every day. 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