Getting Started
I realize there is always some confusion with an online courses at the beginning to the semester. There are always a few students that have difficulty getting logged into the site. Sometimes, the technician inadvertently links in pages from the old website, and I change and tweak the course each semester according to my student evaluations, so thank you all for your patience and for alerting me to any errors you may discover. I will fix them as quickly as I find them. And, of course for some of you, learning online is a new experience; it was new to me once as well, and I can remember the amount of time spent learning the tools and feeling comfortable teaching within this environment. Working with new media tools and social networking are skills you need, and I hope you will enjoy the process and satisfaction of acquiring these new skills.
Here is a question you should be able to answer:
What are the differences between an email message and an email memorandum?
If you can’t answer the above question, please review the assigned pages in our textbook [318 – 319].
You will notice that assignments sometimes ask for a memo and sometimes an email, you will have the opportunity to practice these two forms of professional communication a number of times and you need to understand the differences:
- an email memo has a different purpose, form and function from an email message.
- memos differ not only in terms of standard titles and formatting, but most specifically in terms of the reader[s] or audience needs and expectations.
- Before you write any communication – the first consideration is your reader’s needs and expectations.
You want to read assignment instructions very closely indeed. A part of your challenge as a professional and technical writer is to not only write instructions and definitions, but to also read and follow instructions closely.
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