Writing Process

Brainstorming: the writer generates ideas for writing. For example, free-writing; reading literature; creating life maps, webs, and story charts; developing word banks. They write without concern for conventions, and they focus on generating a variety of ideas.

Drafting: the writer writes out the essay, focusing on idea development and generating as much material as possible. May have a “working thesis.” Once several pages are written, organization becomes the focus along with further development using the methods of development. Introduction and conclusion are written, too, with the knowledge that these will change as the essay progresses.

Revising: the writer has developed her essay to the greatest extent possible on her own. The thesis is clear and the essay is organized and fully developed. Minor sentence work has been done. It is now ready to be reviewed. Feedback should center on the overall unity of the thesis and supporting ideas and the development of those ideas. The writer then revises in response to feedback.

Editing: sentence level work is the focus. The writer works on transitions between and within paragraphs, on sentence variety and combining, on word choice, and on streamlining. The very last step is proofreading, which involves simply checking for misspelled words, for words that were left out, for correct essay formatting, and for any other technical errors.

*Though the above list is the basic order of the writing process, elements of each stage may be used in future stages, depending on what an essay “needs.”