Developing Academic Skills

ASS086-1 Developing Academic Skills
Week 1:
Skills appraisal – What skills do you have?
Tick the items that you are reasonably skilled at. Put a star * against your 5 strongest areas.
Choose one you have starred and talk to your partner about how you developed that skill / quality.
People Activities and tasks Personal
Ability to get on with people Attention to detail Taking care of my health
from different backgrounds and well-being
Understanding other people’s Making decisions Assertiveness
point of view *
Teamwork * Searching for Staying calm in a crisis
information
Sensitivity to cultural Setting priorities Determination
differences
Leadership skills * Facilitating meetings Learning from my mistakes
Teaching, training or Technological skills Managing stress *
mentoring others
Supporting and motivating Working with numbers Willingness to take risks
others
Speaking clearly and to the Practical skills Setting my own goals
point
Giving constructive feedback Problem-solving * Working independently
Consideration of others’ Languages Maintaining a high level of
feelings motivation
(Adapted by Study Hub from: Cottrell, S. (2013) The Study Skills Handbook 4th edn. Basingstoke:
Palgrave Macmillan)
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Features and Styles of academic writing
Work in pairs and take two of the following categories each. Find the examples from the boxes
below(and on screen) that best fit your category and write them down. Then compare your answers.
It has been suggested by X (2010) // Jones (2015) found.... //
stuff // possibly // may be // i.e // It’s // etc // tends to //
sort of According to Crystal Crystal (2015) suggested...//
(2015)...// things // It is likely that...//
probably // didn’t // a bit It has been demonstrated by...//
It is suggested // really // e.g.//
It has been illustrated by ...// Begum (2015) It has been illustrated
by ...//
Formal
Academic writing is formal. You should not use ‘casual language’ in your . Sentence
fragments that are perfectly acceptable in everyday speech must be avoided in writing. You
should not use abbreviations.
Task: Find the examples of casual language to avoid in your writing, add them here.
Others
Academic writing builds on what others have previously done and thought about your subject.
This means reading and thinking about what others have written and using their ideas in your
writing using quotation and citation. Your ideas should be based on evidence from others.
Task: Find the examples of language to introduce others in your writing, add them here.
Cautious
Academic writing is often rather cautious. Academic work is open-minded and enquiring; as a
student you should generally wonder about things rather than being certain.
Task: Find the examples of cautious language to use in your writing, add them here.
Succinct
Succinct writing refers to a style of writing that is concise, to the point and relevant to the
brief. It avoids waffle and unnecessary or irrelevant words and description.
Task: Remove the unnecessary words in each of the three sentences on the board. Add the
removed words here.
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Make your own notes about the different styles of academic writing. How do they differ? When
are they used?
There are mainly for types of academic writing that cane be used in different manner such as
descriptive, analytical, persuasive and critical. In descriptive type of style, all contents like
places, experiences, situations, objects all are being described in a a detailed manner.
Persuasive is the most common form of academic style used in schools. It is being written in
argumentative form by showing that why your content is good and how you are good than
others. In expository types, students require investigating idea and evaluating evidence that
can support idea. It also has a proper way of writing such as clear introduction, main body
that evaluate main findings and thesis statement. In last narrative type of writing students
require writing in a manner of telling a story about their personal experience and learning.
Week 2: Searching for literature
This week you will meet Keith Daniels one of Academic librarians who will explain how you can make
best use of the library facilities to find good sources of information. Before next week’s class think
about a topic that you are interested in researching, this can be any social issue that is relevant to
your course and should be something that you are passionate about. Using the skills that Keith has
taught you find three pieces of information about the topic. One piece should be an academic
journal article, one should be a newspaper or magazine article and one should be an academic book.
In the space below note how you went about the search – what steps did you take? What key words
did you use? What happened? How many sources did you find? Did you have to revise your search
terms? Did you experience any problems? Also write down the details of the sources you found.
Topic researched: Impacts of drug abuse on people.
Key words used: Criminal, drug abuse, risks, mental health.

Results: The mean and casual age of alcohol abuse is 16 years and drug abuse is at middle
adulthood and has several negative impacts on society as whole. The main reason behind this is
poverty and lack of education.
Problems/notes: Problems in adolescence and early adulthood is abuse.
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Journal Article Title: Academic achievement and drug abuse risk assessed using mental variable
analysis and co relative designs.
Author(s) name(s): Kenneth S, Henrik, Abigail
Date of publication: November 2018
Journal Title: Drug abuse risk
Newspaper/Magazine Article Title: Drug abuse
Author(s) name(s): Kenneth S, Henrik, Abigail
Date of publication: November 2018
Newspaper/Magazine Title: Drug abuse
Book Title: Drug abuse
Author(s) name(s): Kenneth S, Henrik, Abigail
Date of publication: November 2018
Publisher:
Week 3: Planning your s
This week we will discuss some general principles for planning s and we will also discuss
your s for this unit in detail. Please bring copies of your briefs with
you (either hard copies or electronic) so that you can make your own notes.
Week 3: Active critical reading
You will be given an article to read this week. Read the article and answer the following questions.
1. Who wrote the source? Is the author a subject matter expert? If not, are they qualified to
discuss the area they are reporting?
Yes, author is qualified and a subject matter expert.
2. Who published the source and where was it published? Is the source published in a well-
established peer reviewed journal?
It published by author Kenneth in 2018. Yes source is published in a well
established peer reviewed journals
3. What date was the source written or published?
2018.
4. What is the author’s aim in relation to the reader?
To identify risks of drug abuse influenced by casual processes.

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