Helping students understand your expectations is one of the most powerful ways you can help them improve as writers. One way to ground this conversation is to write down some of the important elements of writing in your disciplines. If you use such a guide to establish a vocabulary for writing in your course, you will be able to refer to this language in your feedback on papers, when you write and discuss the paper assignments, and when you refer to writing techniques in any of the assigned course readings.
We have collected below some guides for writing in various disciplines. You are free to use these with your students, as long as you acknowledge the original author. Those labeled in blue were developed by teachers here at Yale. Those highlighted with other colors were designed at other U.S. universities. It’s the Writing Center’s goal to have this page go fully blue! If you develop a writing guide for your students, or if you’d like to talk about designing one, please contact the Writing Center Director.
Guides Developed at Yale:
- General Academic Writing Skills: Components of a Successful Essay
- Writing for Political Philosophy: Guide to Writing in PLSC 118
- Writing for Psychology: Guide to Writing in PSYC 235
Guides Developed at Other Universities:
- From the University of North Carolina
- From Harvard University (longer guides)
