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Generative Writing / Pre-Writing
Most writers spend a good deal of time thinking out their topics on paper or even trying out several different topics or approaches before beginning to more formally draft an essay. Including time for this in a Junior-Year course can help students both make better choices and give you a chance to comment/discuss their ideas with them before too much work has gone into the process.
There are several ways to approach “generative writing,” so named to reflect the process of generating ideas that goes on at this stage. One is to assign fairly generic techniques to help students begin thinking (i.e. prewriting strategies); other instructors assign prewriting activities more specific to an assignment; still others use generative writing as a way to “scaffold” a longer assignment by engaging in low stakes writing (i.e., informal, ungraded tasks) to practice many of the skills needed in longer assignments.
General Prewriting Strategies
There are several prewriting strategies students may be familiar with from Englwrit 112 or other writing classes that are helpful in getting them to think through their options for topics and approaches or to begin generating material for an eventual draft.
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Brainstorming: A list of topic ideas or “everything I know” about a specific topic.
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Freewriting: Timed bursts of writing where no stopping or editing is allowed on a specific topic or several times on a variety of topics.
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Clustering: An associative technique where the student writes the main topic in a circle at the center of a page and then draws lines and subsequent circles for each idea generated, and continues a string for as long as he or she can. Typically, many lines will come off of the main circle and the sub-circles generated by the main topic.
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Journal Responses: For a few weeks, students write a page or two each class meeting, informally responding to a given reading, lab, or topic; they can then reflect back on these responses when choosing a paper topic.
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Annotations: Have students annotate sources they find related to different class topics where they define the purpose and scope of the work and offer an evaluative statement about the work in relation to the class project. Another way to use annotations would be to assign a certain number of articles on a topic not covered in the course for each student to annotate. Compile all the annotations into a handout for the class. The handout could serve as a resource for future paper assignments.
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Problem-Creation: While students frequently get practice at problem-solving, they are less adept at framing a problem. Have students search outside sources in the community that could be addressed by the course content and write up a frame for the problem that could be addressed by the class. Alternatively, such problem-statements could be developed from in-class reading.
Specific Prewriting Strategies
These kinds of prewriting strategies are more difficult to discuss in the abstract since they are typically closely linked to class content and other class activities. The rule of thumb here is to attempt to think through what a writer might need to ask herself before writing by considering how you might approach the topic yourself. Some strategies other instructors have found successful include the following:
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A series of heuristic questions designed specifically about the topic or course that students answer in writing.
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Online discussions in response to a specific prompt where students can read and respond to others’ ideas as a way of expanding their sense of what can be written about.
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Rhetorical analyses that ask students to read widely on their chosen topic and define what perspectives and debates already exist on their issue. Such assignments usually include a page on how they might contribute something to this ongoing conversation.
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Devil’s Advocate approaches that ask a student to write one-page on their own position on the topic and then one other page taking the opposition’s position and arguing that side.
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Observation Journals are especially useful for qualitative research assignments. Many instructors begin by assigning a site of observation where students record details and impressions without yet knowing how they will analyze a specific site or group.
Updated September 3, 2008
