Hi there... I have a technical writing test tomorrow amd I need to know if it is really as easy as all of the specific feedback is saying. I enjoy writing, but little experiance in a office setting. (Hardly any on technical documents) How indepth does the questions get? I know what a proposal is and the BASIC setup. Will I be asked which goes first the background info or the ...? I know what a memo ,reports etc are--- is that enough? Am I required to know the ins and outs of the documents? I am fairly good at basic grammer. How much is there? THANKS!!! You guys are incredible

I took the Dantes Tech Writing in Jan. If you know the parts of a proposal just learn what order they are in I do seem to remember some questions about which comes first. Grammar seemed to be a big part of the test to me. There were questions like a long paragraph and they would ask you the order the sentences should be in or if you added a sentence which version was best, things like that. I also seem to remember a few instances where you needed to do a good job of proofreading the question and answers because one answer seemed better until you noticed a small perposful typo. I remember thinking when I was studying that most of it was stuff you just know if you write much.

Good Luck

__________________
Linda

EXAMS TAKEN
1/07 TECEP Psycology of Women (Needed/ acheived) 60/74
1/08 DSST Technical Writing 46/64
4/07 TECEP Word Processing Fundamentals 65/75
4/07 CLEP Info Systems & Computor App. 50/64
3/07 DSST History of the Vietnam War 44/66
11/07 DSST Intro to World Religions 48/65
5/08 CLEP Analyzing & Interp. Literature 50/69
5/29/08 CLEP Intro to Psychology 50/65
6/12/08 CLEP Intro to Sociology 50/69
1/27/09 CLEP Social Science & History 50/66
Finally 3 FEMA Done!!
Planned
Intro to Theater TECEP
Organizational Behavior TECEP or DSST
Physics I TECEP or EXCEL
Physics II TECEP oe EXCEL
Physical Geology TECEP or DSST
Calculus CLEP or EXCEL
Foundations of Education DSST
Intro to Education Psycology CLEP
2-3 FEMA credits
Global Environmental Change class
+ 43 B & M CC credits and 3 TESC credits and Finally on 6/30/08 an AA Degree
Eventually a BA in Natural Science/Mathmatics

• Know about abstracts (this site should tell you what you need to know).
• Know the structure of a lab report (here's one possible description).
• Know that appendixes go at the end of a book or report, and what kind of information goes there (i.e., more technical/detailed backup information)
• Know the difference between types of charts (line, pie, bar) and tables, and have an idea of when you might choose one over the other.
• Be clear on the difference between passive and active voice

There are a lot of questions of the variety "what best connects these sentences," "if you were going to rewrite this portion of this sentence for clarity, which version would be best," and "in the paragraph above, which is not a sentence" (or, which is not punctuated properly).

My exam made me write something at the end (a product comparison for a report to my boss, including recommendations) which was automatically graded. I did not expect that!

Good luck to you!

__________________
Alix

Excelsior College, pursuing a B.S. in Psychology
Initial Transfer: 38.67 community college credits

Exams taken (39 credits):
May 2008: A&I Literature-78, General Anthropology-70 (A), Info Sys & Comp. Apps-73, American Government-60, Technical Writing-67 (A), Principles of Supervision-65 (A), Fundamentals of Counseling-68 (A), Drug & Alcohol Abuse-66 (A), Principles of Marketing-73
June 2008: Biology-73, MIS-58 (A)

Comm. college courses taken since enrolling (4 credits): Info Lit, Drawing & 2D design

Next up:
ECE Cultural Diversity
ECE Ethics
More in-person art classes