How do you Write in Partnership?

Writing – on your own or in a group – is a difficult thing to do. Of course, one of the things you may decide at this point is to produce a document which uses lots of pictures and photographs, or to develop a display instead of producing a written report. If you do decide to write a report, here are some ideas that we hope will be helpful:

• One way of getting started is by each person writing or recording a list of ideas that they want to write about. Some people may need help to do this. These lists/tapes/pictures can then be used for discussions about the ideas. If you begin in this way, everyone can work at their own speed and think about what they really want to say. If everyone’s ideas are written down, or recorded, you can make sure that everyone has a chance for their ideas to be discussed.

When the group who wrote ‘This is What we Think’ met for the first time, Kathy (a university researcher) decided it would be easier if she gave out a short list of her ideas for people to talk about. This helped to begin a conversation about ideas. Sometimes people will not realise how many good ideas they have until they get a chance to talk. See An example of writing in partnership and Kathy talks about writing in partnership for more information.

• It is a good idea to make audio (or video) recordings of your meetings. You can then listen to these recordings to give you ideas for the next meeting. Sometimes there will be good ideas that you missed the last time. Sometimes you will notice that people don’t seem happy with the ideas you have been discussing. It can be hard for people to say these sorts of things in a meeting. You may need to think about how they could be encouraged to give their opinions.

• If you type out what people have said you can read this at the next meeting. This will allow you to check again whether everyone is happy with the ideas. It will also give everyone the chance to change or develop what they have said before. This process can take a lot of time. You will need to think carefully about how much time you leave for writing at the end of a project, if you have a deadline to meet.

• To help make it easy for everyone to understand you may want to use big print (some people also prefer yellow paper) and pictures (drawings and photos). You will also need to think about whether everyone can understand the words that are being used. Taking the time to talk about the meaning of difficult words can be another way of having useful conversations about ideas.

• Some members of the group may find it difficult to say “I don’t understand”. All members of the group should look for people who may be having trouble and think of good ways of helping them. See Partnerships: Questions and Challenges for further discussion of some of the problems you might face.
• Because writing together can take a long time and feel quite difficult it is a good idea to think about how to make the meetings enjoyable. This means giving people refreshments and having breaks so that people can talk about other things if they want to.