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I am doing PhD in IT I have Bsc in Math (there wasn't writing in my study) and my masters was course based not research.

Today I got my paper returned with many comments

some of these comments are (boring, need more focus)

There are papers that I enjoy reading, as they have nice flow, they take me from one sentence to another smoothly.

When I write I put what I want to write in bullet points and then struggle connecting sentenses and have the flow from one sentence to the other.

I wonder if there is right way to do academic writing.

Shall I read many papers about the topic I am writing about then squeeze my brain to put that in a paper format.

or shall I take notes from each sentence in the papers I read and then connect them together.

or is there any other way to do the writing?

There must be a way most people use.

I appreciate any help here.

asmgx
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2 Answers2

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There are no "tricks", and everybody has a way that works best for them. This often involves revising the text many times. A few tips many people agree on are:

  • Start with the easier parts (often the methods section if there is one).
  • Put the paper away for a few days, then read it as if you were a reader instead of the author.
  • Don't make complex or long sentences, unless you are really skilled at doing so.
  • Get help from co-workers: let them read your paper and take their comments into account. Iterate until convergence is reached.
  • People often refer to the text by Vernon Booth about academic writing. It is old but still full of great advice (just ignore the bits about typewriters).

Writing well often takes many years of practice as well as lots of reading. It helps to read both well-written scientific articles (and identify why they are so well-witten), badly written ones (and identify why they are not so nice to read), and also literature (books): the latter are written by the real experts: writers.

Writing is also a talent that is not given to everybody. Don't take this the wrong way, but it is very well possible to be an excellent mathematician or computer scientist without being a good writer. A possible solution could be to focus on your research and ask for help to write or revise your papers before sending them in: you don't have to do everything on your own, and there is no shame in asking for help from your colleagues or supervisor in writing the paper. Some universities even have dedicated "scientific writers" to help researchers write their papers.

Louic
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I start by echoing what @louic said. Academic writing is hard, and takes anyone years of pratice to perfect, so don't be down hearted that you are struggling when you've just started.

Two resources I have found helpful are Claus Wilke's virtual book on scientific writing (https://serialmentor.com/virtualbooks/) and Joshua Schimel's "Writing Science: How to Write Papers That Get Cited and Proposals That Get Funded". Both focus on scientific writing (and biology in particular), but I think they should be informative for academic writing in general.

One thing to do with writing, if you are stuck on how you would connect the bullet points, is to think what you might say in conversation. What would you say if a new person in your department asked you to explain your reserach to them?

Ian Sudbery
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