Before You Begin Writing
- 1. Before You Begin Writing Why Am I Writing? What Should I Say? Organizing and Outlining Focusing and Planning
- 2. Why Am I Writing? Determine: subject, audience, goal (purpose), and form of your writing.
- 3. What Should I Say? “ The best way to have a good idea is to have lots of ideas.” Dr. Linus Pauling (1901-1994), winner of the 1954 Nobel Prize for chemistry and the 1962 Nobel Peace Prize “ I think I did pretty well, considering I started out with nothing but a bunch of blank paper.” Steve Martin (1945- ), American comedian, actor and writer.
- 4. Brainstorming Brainstorming helps you generate ideas about a topic. When you brainstorm, you write down every idea that pops into your mind about a topic. Good ideas, bad ideas, funny ideas, stupid ideas—write them all down as soon as you think of them. The important thing is to get as many ideas down on paper as fast as you can.
- 5. Brainstorming You don’t have to use every idea that you write down. When you are brainstorming, don’t judge your ideas, just write them down. You want ideas of all kinds. You probably won’t use them all, but you can decide later which ones to keep and which ones to throw away.
- 6. Brainstorming Brainstorming doesn’t have to be neat. You can brainstorm your ideas in the form of a list, or you can simply write all over the page. Many students find it helpful to use a clustering method (or web) because it allows them to show how their ideas are related to each other.
- 7. Freewriting Freewriting is another good way to come up with ideas. It’s most useful when you have the beginning of an idea and you want to figure out where to go with it. “ Write freely and as rapidly as possible and throw the whole thing on paper. Never correct until the whole thing is down.” John Steinbeck (1902-1968), American author of The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men, and other novels.
- 8. Freewriting To freewrite, just start writing and keep going for a minute or two. Keep your pencil on the paper and write whatever comes into your mind. Instead of simply writing words and phrases, however, try stringing them together into complete thoughts. Grammar, punctuation, and spelling don’t matter at this point. Working the idea through in your mind is what is important. You can polish your writing later.
- 9. Freewriting Your freewriting is not your final draft
- 10. Organizing and Outlining Once you have generated ideas about your topic, you will need to organize them.
- 11. Graphic Organizers Graphic organizers can help you gather ideas and organize them visually. Using a graphic organizer allows you to see how all your ideas are connected to each other. Graphic organizers can help you give information, compare and contrast ideas, define concepts, show causes and effects, or categorize items.
- 12. Graphic Organizers Use a graphic organizer that is easy for you to read and understand There are many types of graphic organizers. Find one that works well for you. Use a graphic organizer to help you plan your writing.
- 13. Outlining The best compositions include an introduction, a body, and a conclusion The introduction (the beginning) gets the reader’s attention, tells what the subject is, and lets the reader know what to expect. In shorter essays (such as the kind you’ll most often be asked to write for school), the introduction is usually a single paragraph made up of several sentences. The body (the middle) explains the subject in depth, giving details and examples to support the ideas. This part of the composition may contain several paragraphs. The conclusion (the end) wraps up the composition, usually by giving the reader a summary of what was written. Like the introduction, it is usually one paragraph long.
- 14. Outlining An outline is one way to organize your ideas. An outline lists the main idea for each part of the composition, along with the important supporting details and examples you plan to use. Think of an outline as a plan for writing. When you make your outline in advance, the writing process will be easier. You will already have a clear plan for what you’re going to say before you begin writing.