less-words.md

via @ilana_horn

Are you struggling to shave words off of your writing?

I am weirdly good at this, so let me share some of my tricks. #AcademicTwitter #phdlife #gradstudent

1. Make things plural to omit articles. They can add up.

Ex: "The teacher needs to know..." --> "Teachers need to know...."

2. Turn some prepositional phrases into adjectives.

Ex: "Schools in urban communities" --> "Urban schools"

3. Some multi-word phrases can easily be turned into one word.

Ex: "Due to the fact that" --> "because" "In order to" --> "to"

4. If you are describing something with two adjectives, pick one.... maybe a new one

Ex: "Classrooms are blooming and buzzing" --> "Classroom are hectic"

5. Get rid of passive voice.

Ex: "This study is focused on... " --> "This study focuses on"

6. Plain(er) language is your friend.

Ex: "Consistent with the theoretical perspective that learning is fundamentally situative..." --> "Aligned with our view on situative learning"

7. If a multi-word term is going to be repeated a lot, use an acronym. (And this is from somebody who loathes acronyms! But they help with word count.)

8. A common writing quirk: Writing a thick, dense sentence followed by "In other words," with a lucid explanation. Get rid of the first sentence and start with the second.

9. Omit unnecessary intensifiers like “very” or “extremely”.