Writing Guides

Writing Guides - Handouts

The following guides (with printable handouts at the bottom of each page) are overviews of specific writing skills, components of academic writing, or process-based advice that writers may find useful. The guides offer explanations, strategies, examples, templates and other types of writerly advice. They are not, however, intended to suggest that these are the only correct approaches to these academic genres and conventions; rather, we hope these will simply be a resource for writers who may need a refresher, some explanation, or advice on getting started. While these are oriented towards writers, we believe teachers may also find them useful for developing in-class activities or just to share with students when working on related assignments. 

 

If you'd be interested in a course-specific or writing-skill specific writing guide, please reach out to CWC Director, Kate Navickas, ken43@cornell.edu. 

 

In addition to our CWC-developed handouts, occasionally other teachers share their writing guides with us. The following are shared with permission: 

Writing Guides - Videos

Writing Application Materials: Statements of Purpose

The CWC collaborated with Career Services to offer two workshops on writing statements of purpose--one for students applying to medical schools and one for those applying to graduate school. Below, we have shared the google slides for each presentation. 

Health Careers Writing Workshop 

Writing Personal Statements for Graduate School 

"How-To" Research Videos

These video guides were made especially for first-year writing seminar (FWS) students at Cornell University, as we transitioned to online instruction in Spring 2020 (though, we expect others may find them a useful starting point for research, too!). The videos use the above handout on Evaluating Sources in order to discuss different types of sources, criteria for evaluating all sources, and the second video offers a demo of locating scholarly sources through the Cornell library and explains some of features of the library's website.

Evaluating Sources Video Guide  (Part 1)

 

Locating Scholarly Sources in the Cornell Libraries Video Guide (Part 2)

Online Writing Resources

For citations and grammar, we often turn to the web. These are some of our favorite websites for writers:

 

Paid editors, tutors, and translators we trust: 

Writing with Sources

Don't see a resource for a specific writing issue you're struggling with? Email Kate Navickas, WC Director. Kate and the tutors are always in the process of developing writing resources and revamping old ones, and they love suggestions!

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