It’s a Matter of Style (Part 1)

When it comes to the “Polishing Stage,” most of the work is fairly straightforward. For formatting, you follow the guidelines the teacher has given to you or the requirements of the style for the discipline and make it look the way it’s supposed to look. For grammar and mechanics, you can consult a handbook and look up where the comma goes or whether you should use “who” or “whom.”

It might be time-consuming and sometimes frustrating, but there’s a right answer, and there are resources to help you find it.

This isn’t true of Style. Style is the trickiest part of the Polishing Stage because there are not right answers for how you should construct your sentences. It’s up to you. However, there are choices that are more appropriate for some audiences than others, and if you don’t pay attention to style and make the choices carefully and with intention, all your hard work from the Making Stage can get lost.

In my opinion, Style is the most important of the Polishing Stage elements, and it’s the hardest to teach.

You have to find your own writing voice over time.

Watch the Video

Practice It

Supplies: You’ll need 3-4 different types of writing (a magazine article, a novel, a nonfiction text, a story aimed at adults, a story aimed at children, an opinion piece from a newspaper, a breaking news report, etc.) 

Directions: Take a look at the different writing samples before you. Analyze their sentence structure. How many sentences are in a paragraph? How long is a typical sentence? How often do they use words that you would consider “academic” or harder to understand? How complex is the punctuation in a sentence?

Take it Further: Take what seems like a representative sentence from each piece and write it down. Compare these sentences to one another. What’s similar about them? What’s different? 

One of the best (and most fun) ways to explore style is to play with it a bit. 

Supplies: You’ll need a piece of writing written with a specific style (lyrics to a song, a really formal academic paper, a slang-filled blog post). 

Directions: Read a piece of writing that is clearly written with one specific style in mind. (I like to do this activity with song lyrics.) Now switch the style up. If the original was really informal and lyrical, turn it into a very formal academic paper. If the original was really formal and serious, turn it into a silly song. See how the same message can be delivered in different ways by changing up the style. 

Reflect on It

Style is a mix of putting forward your personal preferences and meeting your audience’s expectations. It’s a complicated dance. Think about what kind of writing style resonates with you most when you read it. 

  • What kind of writing do you most enjoy reading (magazine articles, poems, sci-fi short stories, graphic novels, etc.)? 
  • What style reads the best to your eyes/ears? Long, flowing sentences? Short, simple sentences? Lots of big, fancy words? What makes a sentence “good” in your mind?
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