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Advanced Freelance Writing (Applied Writing)

Course CodeBWR201
Fee CodeS3
Duration (approx)100 hours
QualificationStatement of Attainment

Improve Your Career In Writing - study this advance Freelance Writing course by distance learning.

This course has recently been revised and is now available online! Expand your knowledge of freelance writing and sharpen your writing and inject commercial appeal... in the comfort of your own home!

  • Gain independence as a freelance writer
  • Write feature articles
  • Get more confidence in your writing
  • Get freelance jobs

This is a course for people who already have skills in freelance writing, who have perhaps had some minor work published, but need to improve their overall technique and develop a more "commercial" approach to their work.   If you already have skills in freelance writing and have perhaps had some minor work published, this course will help you take your writing to the next level. Improve your overall technique and develop a more "efficient" approach to your work.

This course is suitable for anyone who wants to improve their writing skills, both professionally or for their own interest. For example -

  • Bloggers
  • Writers
  • Content Editors
  • Copywriters
  • Web development writers
  • Marketing writers
  • Article writers
  • Teachers

Learn about the key elements of different genres of writing, this course covers the main different areas of freelance writing.

 

Lesson Structure

There are 7 lessons in this course:

  1. Introduction
    • Writing Themes.
    • Sentence Structure.
    • Summary Skills.
    • Theme Development (e.g. Deductive, Inductive, Classic, Chronological, Descriptive, Analogy, Cause & Effect, Classification, Definition Analysis, Comparison & Contrast, Flashback etc.).
    • Writing a Regular Column.
    • Newsletters.
    • News Columns.
    • Criticism Journalism (e.g. Theatre Critics, Book Reviews, Film Reviews, etc.).
  2. Educational Writing
    • Interviewing Skills.
    • Illustrating an article.
    • Putting it all together.
  3. Scientific Writing
    • Technical Writing.
    • Statistics.
  4. Writing a Biographical Story
    • Developing a draft plan.
    • Research.
    • Writing the final manuscript.
  5. Writing a News Article
    • Analysing a news article.
    • Writing and illustrating a sporting event.
  6. Fiction Writing
    • Category Writing.
    • Mainstream Writing.
    • Characteristics of good fiction (i.e. A strong plot;. A hero or heroine; Obvious motivation; Plenty of action; A colourful background).
    • Forming and developing an idea.
  7. Other Writing
    • TV & Radio Scripts.
    • Science Fiction.
    • Conducting a Survey.
    • Developing a Story.

Each lesson culminates in an assignment which is submitted to the school, marked by the school's tutors and returned to you with any relevant suggestions, comments, and if necessary, extra reading.

Aims

  • Review basic writing skills and discuss theme development.
  • Develop skills in writing a regular magazine or newspaper column.
  • Describe the key elements of educational writing.
  • Describe the key elements of technical writing.
  • Develop skills in interviewing and preparing a biographical story.
  • Develop skills in writing news articles.
  • Develop skills in writing fiction.
  • Describe other writing styles including script writing.

Student Testimonial

"This Freelance Writing course has been one of my most favourite due to the ease and flexibility of correspondence. I have found the staff always helpful and friendly. I appreciated that there were no deadlines and I could complete the work involved when I had time."

Janine, Freelance Writing

Writing Columns

  • Your writing must be succinct. Space is limited, and production costs are generally expensive so don’t waste valuable column space on wordy and irrelevant writing.
  • Your column must be informative. Keep to the main points and make sure your writing is free of ambiguity. Check the facts are correct – this is especially important in ‘What’s on’ columns (always check addresses, dates, names etc. are correct).
  • Your writing should be in a style appropriate for the publication. A chatty and entertaining column will be appropriate in some cases, but not others.
  • Always write to the highest standard possible, no matter who the target readers are. Sloppy spelling and poor grammar are always unacceptable.

 

Writing Critical Reviews

Newspapers and magazines employ journalists to write critical reviews of all sorts of things, from artistic subjects (e.g. reviewing film, theatre or exhibitions) to reviewing products or events.

Reviews can be approached in two different ways:

a) Looking outwards – telling readers what they might expect.

b) Looking inwards – judging the subject against the critic's own standards of excellence.

If the aim is to tell the readers what to expect, the journalist must have a very good understanding of who the readers are. It becomes important to study readership demographics and to be sympathetic towards comments from readers, i.e. in letters or reader surveys, and towards those who deal with readers more closely, i.e. talk with newsagents who sell the publications.

If the aim is to produce a critical review, it is important that the standards which will be judged against are based on very sound reasoning. Failure to do this will leave the critic exposed to being criticised themselves.
  • Consider whether the criticism is subjective or objective.
  • Consider whether the criticism is based upon set guidelines or not.

It can be valuable to adopt a standard formula which can be applied when making a critical judgement. Perhaps you might break the judgement down into a series of characteristics, assigning different numbers of points for each characteristic: this is only one way of making the judgement (perhaps) fairer.

Would you like to work as a freelance writer? Or improve your existing journalism skills? This is the course for you!

Any questions? Our writing tutors are more than happy to help and advise you - use our FREE COURSE COUNSELLING SERVICE.


Meet some of our academics

Adriana Fraser Adriana has been a professional writer since the 1980's. She was a regular contributor to Australia's Grass Roots magazine for more than a decade, and in the 90's wrote a biography of one of Victoria's pioneering women. She has contributed to newspapers, magazines and newsletters for decades, and seen hundreds of pieces of her work published across Australia and beyond. Today, she is a regular contributor to Home Grown magazine, and part of the stable of authors who work on developing ebooks for ACS publishing division. She has been a tutor with ACS since the mid 1990's and has also been contributed to the development of course notes for several different education institutions. Qualifications -Cert.Child Care., Adv.Cert.App.Mgt., Cert in Assessment and Training., Cert.Hort., Adv.Dip.Hort.
John Mason John Mason is one of Australia's most prolific writers. He saw his first work published when at secondary school, where he worked on the school magazine. In 1973 he was writing a weekly column for his local newspaper and by 1975 he was a regular contributor to Australia's national magazine "Your Garden". John was engaged by Victoria's Dept of Youth, Sport and Recreation to write a book on Fun and Fitness Trails in 1978. In 1981 he saw two more books published (one in America, another in Australia), and commenced writing regularly for the Self Sufficiency Magazine, Grass Roots. John is a long term member of the Australian Society of Authors, the Garden Media Guild (UK) and the Horticultural Media Association (Australia). He has written or contributed to over 100 books, many published by international publishers and published more than 2,000 articles across a range of genres (Gardening, Education, Business, Farming, Fitness). In addition, John has contributed to and overseen the development of more than 600 distance education courses which encompass around 20 million words. He has been an avid photographer for 40 years, building a collection of over 100,000 images, which are used to illustrate his work. His marine animal photos are even used by Legoland in England, on their Atlantis ride! Writer, Manager, Teacher and Businessman with over 40 years interenational experience covering Education, Publishing, Leisure Management, Education, and Horticulture. He has extensive experience both as a public servant, and as a small business owner. John is a well respected member of many professional associations, and author of over seventy books and of over two thousand magazine articles.
Rachel SyersRachel has worked as a newspaper journalist for the past 15 years in a range of roles from sub-editor and social columnist to news reporter, covering rounds such as education, health, council, music, television, court, police, Aboriginal and Islander affairs, and agriculture. Her current role is Fashion Editor, features writer and features sub-editor with The Gold Coast Bulletin. She has co-authored a successful biography "Roma: From Prison to Paradise" about former prisoner-of-war turned yoga guru, Roma Blair, as well as freelanced as a writer, reviewer and researcher for Australian music and celebrity magazines such as WHO Weekly, Rave, Australasian Post and New Idea. Rachel has a B.Journalism.
Tracey JonesWidely published author, Psychologist, Manager and Lecturer. Over 10 years working with ACS and 25 years of industry experience. Qualifications include: B.Sc. (Hons) (Psychology), M.Soc.Sc (social work), Dip. SW (social work), PGCE (Education), PGD (Learning Disability Studies).


Check out our eBooks

Professional Practice for ConsultantsExplore becoming a consultant. This ebook contains chapters on how to be a consultant, packaging your services, delivering the services, building your resources, finding the work and getting the job, planning and ethics.
Professional WritingHow many people dream about becoming a professional writer? Professional writing is any writing that you are being paid for. It can include fiction writing, a best-selling book, articles in a magazine, articles in a newspaper, blogs for companies, technical manuals, copy for catalogues, newsletters, text books, other academic material and so on. However, many people just write for sheer pleasure. A must read for anyone wanting to make money from writing. 63 pages
Counselling HandbookFull of interesting case studies, this ebook is a wonderful introduction to the complex world of the human psyche. Chapters include: Using Counselling, Seeing Behind the Mask, Emotions and Attitudes, Communicating Better, Theory vs Practice, Diffusing Difficult Situations and Golden Rules for Counselors. 43 pages
Creative WritingCreative writing is relevant for both fiction and non fiction, and in any place where you write, from business writing to technical reports and children's books. Writing that is creative will usually be more interesting, communicative and effective. Through this book you explore both how to be more creative, as well as how and where to use it.