Pre-writing strategies Tips for writing on demand

Familiar Strategies 0 Brainstorming 0 Try to capture all thoughts, ideas, and fragments on paper. 0 Make up questions and answers about the topic, no matter how strange. 0 Clustering 0 Starting with an idea in a middle circle, draw lines to other, smaller circles that contain issues related to the main idea.

Visual Organization: Relationships Listing and outlining Clustering and mapping Topic I. Intro A. Main idea/thesis B. Examples

Some New Strategies

Journalistic Technique: Thinking like a Reporter 0 Who, what, when, where, how, and why. 0 Writers can use these questions when writing stories. 0 This allows you to make certain you have provided all the important and specific details of a situation.

Tagmemics: looking at something from three different perspectives 0 As a particle (as a thing in itself) 0 What are the characteristics of your topic? What are the particular elements of your subject? 0 As a wave (as a thing changing over time) 0 What differences are there between the past and present of your topic? 0 As part of a field (as a thing in its context) 0 How does your topic relate to other topics?

Narrative Prompts A: Your school newspaper is holding a contest for the best story about a disagreement between friends. The winning story will be printed for the enjoyment of high school readers. For the contest, write a narrative depicting a disagreement between friends. Tell what the disagreement was about and where the conflict took place. Develop your story with details. B: Think about a time you or someone you know was given advice and then had to decide whether to follow it. Write a story of such a time. Make sure your story includes details about the situation, the decision, and the consequences that followed.

Persuasive Prompts A: Your mayor is considering a teen curfew of 9:00 P.M. on weeknights because of a problem with vandalism. Write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper in which you convince readers to accept your point of view on the proposed curfew. Be specific in developing your argument. B: State legislators believe that students’ driving privileges should be directly linked to their performance and attendance in school. For example, students should be required to maintain a certain grade point average and attendance record in order to drive. Or, if students fail a class, they would not be allowed to drive until their grade was improved. State and defend your position on this issue to an audience of state legislators. Be sure to include specific reasons to support your position.