Teaching Academic Writing in the Health Sciences: A Guide for Instructors, Mentors, and Trainers

Abstract

Writing--at its core--is a social practice. Immersing trainees into the academic research culture helps them learn to think, write, and publish like full-fledged researchers. This book offers best practice pedagogical strategies to help instructors, mentors, advisors, lab leaders, and ministries of health guide trainees toward professional development and publication. Part 1 pairs pedagogical approaches with practical strategies and examples to support mentoring skills; create effective writing assignments; provide effective feedback; develop writing courses; and plan publication workshops, retreats, and writing groups. Strategies are provided to help you support writers with varying backgrounds, including second language speakers and neurodiverse writers. Chapters on collaborative writing and writing productivity support professional development and publication. The book also weaves strategies for using generative artificial intelligence technology, such as ChatGPT, into the teaching and writing process. Open-access resources and instruction planning activities are included at the end of each chapter. The second part of the book offers a review of how to write a scientific paper. This part is primarily for instructors, mentors, and advisors who have never been formally trained on scientific writing. It is intended to help instructors build a strong foundation for understanding the structure of and strategies for successful writing, as well as providing customizable teaching materials. It may also be useful to students and early-stage researchers as a guide on how to write a scientific paper. Part 2 includes chapters on planning a paper, crafting writing to get attention and reach your readers, developing persuasive arguments, building a successful author team, and choosing the right target journal. It also provides a how-to for writing each section of a paper, starting with crafting the introduction and ending with writing a compelling title. The final chapter offers advice and examples guiding author teams to effectively respond to peer-reviewer comments.