Technical Communication

Recommended Prerequisites

Portuguese knowledge at C1 level; English knowledge at B1 level (reading comprehension).

Teaching Methods

Presentations and discussion; practical writing, proofreading and editing activities; individual and collective oral presentations; body language awareness exercises.

Learning Outcomes

Successful students will have, on completion of the unit:

• acquired the necessary skills to communicate in professional contexts

• mastered parameters in a variety of formal oral and written genres in Portuguese and in English (e.g. project presentations, technical reports, handbooks, instruction manuals, messages, minutes, etc.).

Work Placement(s)

No

Syllabus

Contents will be presented in theoretical courses and put into practice in small working teams.

1. Types of communication: Verbal, non-verbal and paraverbal

- professional / technical context

- addressee / audience

- oral/ written - formal / informal distinctions

- issues of professional ethics and protocol.

 

2. Textual building, editing and revision techniques

- text planning

- cohesion, coherence and anaphoric recovery

- use of specialized and technical vocabulary

- textual sequences: narrative, descriptive, expository, argumentative and instructional

- sentence structures for data contraction

- discursive markers

- revision and editing techniques.

3. Written and oral textual genres

- abstract

- user instructions/ reference manual; tutorial

- technical report (expository/ argumentative)

- article (dissemination, technical, scientific)

- presentation of project/ proposal

- formal letter (presentation/ motivation/ complaint).

Head Lecturer(s)

Alexandra Maria Fernandes Baltazar

Assessment Methods

Assessment
Mini Tests: 20.0%
Exam: 35.0%
Oral: 20%; Writhe: 25% NB: Execution of 35% minimum in all tasks and 9,5/20 mark on all assessment parameters: 45.0%

Bibliography

Adler, R.B. & Rodman, G. (2006) Understanding Human Communication. New York/ Oxford. Oxford Univ. Press

Amaral, I. (2002) Imagem e sucesso. Guia de protocolo para empresas. Editorial Verbo

Beer, D. & McMurrey, D. (2005) A Guide to Writing as an Engineer. John Wiley & Sons

Cargill, M. & P. O’Connor (2013) Writing Scientific Research Articles – Strategy and Steps. John Wiley & Sons

Duarte, N. (2008) Slide:ology. The art and science of creating great presentations. O'Reilly Media

Finkelstein Jr.,L. (2008) Pocket Book of Technical Writing for Engineers and Scientists. McGraw-Hill

Koegel, T. J. (2007) The exceptional presenter: a proven formula to open up! and own the room. Greenleaf Book Group Press

Madeira, A.C. & Abreu, M. (2004) Comunicar em Ciência – como redigir e apresentar trabalhos científicos. Escolar Editora

Sylin-Roberts, H. (2000) Writing for Science and Engineering – papers, presentations and reports. Butterworth-Heineman

Weston, A.(1996) A arte de argumentar. Gradiva