Overview

Guide­lines for Writers

This doc­u­ment will pro­vide you with infor­ma­tion you need as a poten­tial writer for Voice:

• Mag­a­zine overview
• Types of articles
• Sub­mit­ting a query
• Writ­ing style
• Engag­ing the reader
• Pho­tographs
• Edit­ing

Mag­a­zine overview

• 70,000+ read­ers are ele­men­tary teach­ers, occa­sional teach­ers and sup­port staff
• Voice is a fed­er­a­tion pub­li­ca­tion and reflects ETFO pri­or­i­ties and poli­cies In gen­eral writ­ers are mem­bers or staff

Types of articles

Read two or three back issues of the mag­a­zine to get a feel for the kind and style of arti­cles. Gen­er­ally the mag­a­zine contains:

• Arti­cles describ­ing class­room practice
• Cur­ricu­lum inserts
  • Les­son plans in Eng­lish and in French
• Arti­cles describ­ing pro­fes­sional learn­ing events
• Reviews of books, CDs, web­sites, other resource materials
• ETFO ser­vice area columns

Fed­er­a­tion news

Sub­mit a query

Before you begin:

• Send a 50–100 word sum­mary of the topic and your pro­posed treat­ment by e-mail to izorde@etfo.org; or call provin­cial office, exten­sion 2336
• A pos­i­tive response to your query is not a com­mit­ment to pub­lish. The suit­abil­ity of an arti­cle can only be fully assessed after it is submitted.

Writ­ing style

Arti­cles are intended to be acces­si­ble and useful.

• Use plain lan­guage
• Write in your own voice
• Avoid teacher/board/subject jargon
• Use the active voice

Engag­ing the reader

A story is like a les­son plan. It needs:

• An emo­tional hook
• Rel­e­vance /connections to the class­room or teach­ers’ pro­fes­sional lives
• Details and con­crete examples
• Research
• Human inter­est

The emo­tional hook

You would not expect a stu­dent to be inter­ested in a les­son just because you are pre­sent­ing it, or because it’s good for them. In the same way, give your col­leagues a rea­son to read your arti­cle. You could:

• Personalize/particularize the issue.
  • For exam­ple: This is Jane and this is her problem/experience
• Begin with a chal­leng­ing state­ment or inter­est­ing short anec­dote. (Keep it short—save the detail for later)
  • How will it improve the reader’s pro­fes­sional life?
  • What impact does it have on the fed­er­a­tion, its poli­cies or its profile?
  • Why you did what you did
  • The steps/actions you took
  • Who helped
  • The cost, if any­thing • What chal­lenges you faced and how you over­came them.
  • A humor­ous story
  • Reactions/quotations from stu­dents and adults involved
  • Dig­i­tal pho­tographs are preferred.
  • Prints will not be returned.
  • Set your cam­era to the high­est pic­ture quality.
    • Each pic­ture file will be bigger.
    • Not as many pic­tures will fit on your mem­ory card.
  • The file size for each pic­ture should be 500 KB or larger (PC users: You can check this after you down­load by click­ing View Details in the View menu.)
  • Min­i­mum photo size:
    • 1400 X 1600 pix­els at 300 dpi
  • Sub­mit your story by e-mail in MS Word .
  • Pub­lished story length is gen­er­ally 1000 words.
  • Your arti­cle will be edited for length and style.
  • You will have an oppor­tu­nity to review your arti­cle before it goes to print.

Rel­e­vance

Show the reader why this may be of inter­est. • Who is it meant for? • What makes it unique, worth read­ing about? • How will this improve stu­dent success?

Pro­vide details and examples

Describe what you did. Think about (not all are required):

Research

Does the research sup­port what you do? Pro­vide references.

Pro­vide human interest

Pho­tographs

Pho­tographs are a plus.

Dig­i­tal photographs

For print repro­duc­tion dig­i­tal pic­tures must be high resolution.

Edit­ing

 

Thanks!

For your inter­est in the magazine.