Friday, June 6, 2008

How To Write An Effective Article

By Theo McLanahan

Article writing is a useful means to express your ideas on paper so as to become professional writer.

The crux of an article is the content. Organizing your ideas will make your article more readable and will earn you a greater audience. Consider these two steps when writing an article:

1. Use the simplest possible language

Your writing should be able to reach maximum number of readers. This means that it must be written in the simplest language which can be understood by the widest range of people. Most frequently the writers of magazines and newspapers use the fourth grade level.

These writers are highly skilled and could write at a much higher level, but keep their reporting at an almost universal level, so the news can reach more people. Of course not all publications can communicate at such a remedial level.

Technical, social, or political magazines involve more advanced issues than mere reporting, so the language in such publications is more complex and specialized, as are the readers of those articles. Aside from these specialized magazines, a straightforward and simple style of writing is preferred.

2. Present your ideas in an interesting way

You want your readers to be interested in your ideas, and you want your ideas to be useful to your readers. Readers will be attracted to your articles if you learn to frame your ideas. You can keep the attention of your readers by keeping your ideas well-organized, and by entertaining your readers with your content. Don't allow the reader to grow tired with repetitive description that is boring or unnecessary. The "five paragraph essay" is an ideal model for writing articles intended for magazines or internet publication. This format is a clear, organized, and interesting way to order your article while keeping the reader interested from start to finish.

A guide to the five paragraph essay:

1) In the first paragraph, briefly introduce the actual topic and concepts that are related.

2) In the second, third, and fourth paragraphs, expand on the topic from the introduction in simple, yet creative language.

3) In the fifth paragraph, summarize the topic that you've introduced.

By keeping the language of your articles understandable, simple, and clairvoyant, you will be able to write for magazines or Internet publication. By organizing your ideas and keeping your reader interested throughout, and by using "Spellings and Grammar" facility in Word software, you can become a successful article writer with a wide range of readers.

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