Coursera - Academic English: Writing Specialization by University of California, Irvine

Transform Your Writing Skills. Prepare for college-level writing and research in just four courses.

Grammar and Punctuation
Do you need to review English grammar? Have you forgotten the grammar you once studied? If so, this course is perfect for you.

The first course in this specialization is a refresher on some tools needed for good writing. It will help prepare you for the other courses. You will need about 10 hours to complete this first course. Writing is a skill and to learn a skill well, you need to practice. In this course, you will watch short video lectures and then practice and discuss what you have learned. Make sure you take good notes and use the peer discussions to ask questions. Then you'll be able to remember the rules you learn in this course when you start writing essays in the next course.

After completing this course, you will be able to:
- identify the correct verb tenses to use
- use commas effectively
- utilize several different sentence types
- write more effectively in English

Please note that the free version of this class gives you access to all of the instructional videos and handouts. The peer feedback and quizzes are only available in the paid version.

Getting Started with Essay Writing
This is the second course in the Academic English: Writing specialization. By introducing you to three types of academic essays, this course will especially help prepare you for work in college classes, but anyone who wants to improve his or her writing skills can benefit from this course.

After completing this course, you will be able to:
- create effective thesis statements for your essays
- plan and write compare/contrast, cause/effect, and argument essays
- write well-developed body paragraphs

Note: The lectures and practice activities are available for free, but you must upgrade to the pay version in order to take the quizzes and get feedback on writing assignments.

Advanced Writing
This is the third course in the Academic English: Writing specialization. By raising your level of academic writing, this course helps prepare you for college-level work.

After completing this course, you will be able to:
- plan and write a more sophisticated argument essay
- identify plagiarism and explain how to prevent it
- read and analyze several articles to form your own opinion on a topic
- make connections between several articles
- form thesis statements from your readings
- use sources effectively when writing an essay

Please note that the free version of this class gives you access to all of the instructional videos and handouts. The peer feedback and quizzes are only available in the paid version.

Introduction to Research for Essay Writing
This is the last course in the Academic Writing specialization before the capstone project. By the end of this course, you will be able to complete all the steps in planning a research paper.

After completing this course, you will be able to:
- choose appropriate research topics for college classes
- write detailed outlines for research papers
- find source material for research papers
- take and organize good notes for research
- use appropriate academic tone and language
- document sources by creating a Works Cited list in MLA format
- avoid plagiarizing your sources

Project: Writing a Research Paper
Welcome to the capstone project for the Academic English: Writing Specialization! This project lets you apply everything you’ve learned and gives you the practice you need for college classes by having you write a research paper. You'll have several due dates throughout the capstone to help you stay on schedule.

In this capstone project, you will:
- conduct research on an academic topic of your choice
- create an outline to plan out your essay
- write a short annotated bibliography to help you evaluate your sources
- write a 7-8 page research paper
- use source material correctly with MLA format