What is Good GP Writing Like?

Passionate – Surely a teacher will be happy to see a student’s passion for their subject shining through in their work, but the way that passion is expressed needs to be highly controlled. No gushing, please!

Formal – Yes, but not pompous or elevated for the sake of it.

Themes – Yes, but these will be explicitly-stated topics, not subtextual ideas to ponder (as in literary writing).

Characters – Yes, but real rather than fictional.

Rhetorical – No. Although we may say academic writing is “persuasive”, it is so only by expressing the right ideas in the clearest language with the most compelling evidence. Writing which uses rhetorical persuasion is polemical – suitable for politics and social campaigns, not academic papers.

Creative – Yes, in the broadest sense, but not in the sense of “creative writing”, which implies fiction and highly subjective exploration.

Speculative – Yes, but only after a factual account of current situations – then we may consider the future, in particular how taking (or failing to take) our suggested actions will affect the issue.

Imaginative – Imagination plays a role in empathy, and supports vision, which helps us think up directions for our research – but of course, GP writing is not fictitious.

Stylish – Avoid style over substance, please! If we focus on clarity, precision, concision, accuracy, and other such virtues, we will probably find the “style” looks after itself!

Artistic – Although artistic perspectives on issues can be valuable, GP writing itself can’t really be called artistic.

Concise – Yes! We’re working to word/time limits, so spend words efficiently to maximise creditable content!

Citations/references – Yes, academic writing shows the reader where every claim comes from.

Precise & accurate – let’s try to distinguish between these: if I say the time now is 10:57:34 UTC but actually it is the middle of the afternoon, my claim was very precise but very inaccurate!

Impersonal

Perhaps not – but this is where it gets contentious!

For academic writing, students are often advised to avoid the personal pronouns I, me, my, etc. In my opinion, this misses the point slightly. True, most academic writing doesn’t need to make much reference to the author, and yes, immature student writing often uses a voice that is too personal, but that is a symptom rather than a cause of weak writing. Trying to fix the symptom alone may promote clumsy phrasing without improving academic quality. Instead, fix the underlying academic focus on fact, evidence and reasoning, and the voice will tend to fall into line naturally. Moreover, practice varies among academic disciplines: astronomers and mathematicians may prefer to stay out of the picture, but fields such as anthropology positively require the researcher to acknowledge their personal involvement when using methods such as participant observation. Finally, I note with pleasure this blog by a staff writer for the UK Government website, defending the GOV.UK preference for the active voice over the passive, and clarity over formality to better communicate matters of government to the people.

To me, a more personal tone also seems to more honestly express that Individual Reports are a record of an individual student’s investigation, and cannot pretend, at this level, to be academically thorough. A professor has a duty to leave not stone unturned, whereas the IGCSE student only has to demonstrate an ability to turn over a “balanced range” of stones. A more personal voice helps to reflect the limited nature of the personal exploration. This takes us nicely onto the next word:

Reflective

Using a personal voice also helps a student to fulfil the requirement to be reflective. Assessment Objective 2 (AO2) stipulates empathy and development of the student’s own perspective. Thus, for example, if the student discovers something shocking they need to report it as shocking. If something is pleasing, they should say so. We are teaching students to form opinions based on facts and sound analysis; striving to maintain an impersonal tone could get in the way of this. For instance, which of the following sounds better to you?:

“One item of personal learning which has been acquired through this project is…”

“This investigation has shown me that ____”

The Reflective Paper for the Team Project is predominantly reflective, but even in the IR, students need to “reflect on their personal perspective and how this has been impacted by their research and the perspectives explored” (0457_s19_er). AO2 is weighted at 15% of the IR – which implies including a commensurate proportion of reflective content in an Individual Report. My preference is for spreading such reflective comments through the report in positions where they are most relevant (typically at the ends of paragraphs) though it may be safer to put it in one place under a single heading if you fear the examiner might miss it otherwise.

Do you agree? What guidelines do you have for good GP writing?