*** Save 15% with the code EARLYBIRD through September 8! ***
Are you ready to get your chapter into shape?
In this facilitated 10-week Book Chapter Shortcut, which runs from September 14 to November 20, you'll work alongside a cohort of authors to revise a messy draft into a solid, argument-driven book chapter. Through practical, manageable prompts, you'll learn how to plan structural revisions and implement them. And along the way, you'll develop writing and revision strategies that fit into your life—doable within your schedule, adapted to your writing habits, and responsive to your source material.
The core of the course will be our weekly 90-minute Zoom meetings, which will be held on Wednesdays from 1 to 2:30pm Eastern. We'll also hold an optional coworking session/office hour on Fridays from 1 to 2pm Eastern. And we'll have a discussion board and a library of video clips, plus we'll post recordings of the meetings, so you can easily catch up if you have to miss a session.
Who is this course for? This course is designed for authors who have a solid vision for their scholarly book's argument and need to revise a chapter to match that vision. Those authors should have some existing writing (notes, a dissertation chapter, conference papers, seminar papers) to work with.
Who is this course NOT for? It is NOT designed for authors who need to figure out what their book as a whole is arguing (for that, see The Dissertation-to-Book Workbook) or for authors who merely have an idea for a chapter but have not yet written any material. You will not have time to write a chapter from scratch in 10 weeks. Trust us here—we want you to be successful!
We can't guarantee that you'll have a finished draft by the end of the course, since a lot depends on how much time you have to spend on it outside of our weekly meetings. But we'll work in a way that will allow you to tackle the biggest issues first, and save the smaller ones for later—so even after the course is finished, you'll be able to keep working with the tools you've acquired. And because you'll have permanent access to the materials after the course is done, you can go back at any time and catch up or review.
Week 1: Take Stock of Your Evidence
Week 2: Assemble Your Draft
Week 3: Assemble Your Draft
Week 4: Evaluate Your Draft
Week 5: Fill In Your Draft
Week 6: Fill In Your Draft
Week 7: Fill In Your Draft
Week 8: Revise Your Draft
Week 9: Frame Your Draft
Week 10: Tie Up Loose Ends
"After feeling stuck, I learned to trust my initial idea/interest in my topic again by following the very actionable steps proposed by Katelyn and Allison. From the overall framing and research questions to troubleshooting points of tension/weaknesses in my argument and even considering what the project is NOT, Katelyn and Allison's workshop provided the guidance we all needed regardless of whether this was our first or second project or even third."
"I really liked the specific exercises/tasks given in Teachable that we could experiment with each week. What was most valuable for me was to gain a method, or rhythm, of generating lots of messy writing and then "cleaning it up" with specific tasks (paragraph tagging, bolding key sentences, generating a reverse outline, etc). As someone who likes to generate a lot of messy writing, I need help in the clean up phase, so the workshop modeled for me that back-and-forth rhythm. Before, I would remain in the "messy writing" phase for too long and then spend time editing and revising sentences and paragraphs that would not eventually make it into my final drafts. The reminder to work at something till 60% and then take the step back was really valuable, as it will hopefully help me curb the messy writing that then leads to overwhelm and paralysis."
"This workshop was really helpful in giving a method to the madness (or least what's how working on a big project feels to me sometimes). The concrete exercises, step by step instructions, opportunities for feedback in the Friday writing hour, and the sense of community was all really inspiring. I felt like I was very in control of the process and my progress in ways that have fundamentally changed (for the better!) how I work."
"I have been talking so much to my colleagues about how the structure of this workshop and its content is so helpful—breaking down the work into smaller tasks and actionable steps that feel doable in the time span."
"I learned a system for revising a chapter that helped me observed my capacity or effectiveness through each step."
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