Unconventional approaches to writing
scientific papers
Todd S. Rosenstock
World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF)
Cologne, Germany | 10 November 2017

Who knows how to make this meal?
Like cooking ugali:
No one was born able to write papers
Quality
ingredientsRecipe
Keep
trying Modify to
your taste

Where are we going today?
• Define the goals and approach for this series
• Brainstorm struggles (with writing): It’s not just
you
• Three principles of writing
• Name 5 rules of thumb for clear and concise
writing
• Getting started: Goals, Prepare, Copy
• Deconstruct the introduction, methods, results
and discussion

GOAL
To provide tools to help finish your
first paper or reduce the time it
takes to write your next 20 papers
What’s yours?

What are the most
difficult parts of
writing papers for
you?

Learning to write
takes _____ & _____
Scientific fact #1

Learning to write
takes time & _____
Scientific fact #1

Learning to write
takes time & practice
Scientific fact #1
“The first time I saw his [Todd’s] writing, I
wondered how he was in graduate school”
– Eike Luedeling (ICRAF Sr. Scientist) speaking
about the join writing on the USAID Global
Horticulture Assessment in 2005 at UC Davis

Writing is ______
Scientific fact #2

Writing is rewriting
Scientific fact #2
Avoid perfect drafting!

If you can’t outline it,
you can’t write it
Scientific fact #3

Rules of thumb
• Topic sentences
• Use shorter words when possible
• Less is more. Write sentences with less than
11 words/no compound sentences
• Active tense is OK
• Buy or get a style guide

Set (daily) goals
Getting started #1
Times, pages, paragraphs,
sentences, etc

Prepare
Getting started #2
You can’t create a a meal when you
don’t have ingredients (lit review,
outline, graphs, tables, etc)

COPY
Getting started #3
No I mean MIMIC

The Introduction

What is the
purpose of the
introduction and
what do you need
to accomplish in it?

Structure of the introduction
Big problem statement
Research
Specifics
Construct an argument
Logical
Flow of
Ideas

What are methods
and results for and
what not to do?

Do’s and Don’ts
• Don’t innovate.
• Don’t report everything (unless it is critical)
• Don’t explain the results
• Don’t do a literature review of the methods

What is the
discussion for?

Two ways to write
the discussion

1. They said, We
found, The results
agree or disagree,
here’s why

1. They said, We found, The
results agree or disagree,
here’s why
2. We found, They said, The
results agree or disagree,
here’s why

Thank you
See you next time (TBD)