The Writing Process

As with organization, the writing process is different for different people, and that's not only okay, but as it should be. If you're struggling with writing, try out different methods to see what works from each, and then develop your own strategy. Here are some writing-style types:

The Freewriter just starts writing and plows straight through a draft. The draft is stream-of-consciousness, unorganized, and may not even have a basic paragraph structure. The Freewriter gets everything down on paper, and then goes back and gives it structure, fixes errors, adds in specific evidence and analysis, introduces non-exhibit sources and acknowledgment/response. The first draft is usually quite messy, but the Freewriter has a good sense of their ideas when it's done. Freewriters may sometimes find that their thesis changes as they write, but they know what that thesis is by the end of the first draft and can then choose evidence accordingly.

The Outliner has a written outline that he or she fills in, sometimes in order, sometimes not. Outliners will often drop in quotations from exhibits and non-exhibits and write "towards" them as they move from point to point in the paper. Outliners tend to have a clear sense of how their argument unfolds and how they want to organize their paper, but may have trouble with transitions between points.

The Jigsaw-Writer does not write in order; rather, he or she takes individual pieces of the argument and writes them out (sometimes with quotations, sometimes without) and organizes them later. Often this means that each portion of the paper is well-fleshed out, but he or she might have trouble putting them in the proper order.

The Procrastinator puts off everything until the night before, then skims through the exhibit as he or she writes. When the Procrastinator runs into something that seems to need outside evidence, he or she then skims a likely source (maybe notes) for support. The flow of a Procrastinator's paper tends to be pretty solid because the whole paper is written at once; however, the evidence the Procrastinator chooses is often not the best (unless he or she has taken the time to organize sources earlier) and the organization of the paper is messy, as it has not been fully thought through.