A common misconception students have when they are starting to take academic writing seriously is that the thing to do is just sit down at a computer, open a blank document, and let the brilliance come pouring out of our minds and on to the screen.

It would be great if it worked that way. But it doesn’t. No matter what it’s being used for, good writing requires a vision and a plan.

Have you ever sat down, typed eight words, read them back, hated them, deleted, tried to start over, got frustrated, and gave up? I know, right!?!? 😡  

But this doesn't mean you can't write. It means you are unprepared to write and show the world your brilliance. 

Without first having a vision and drafting a plan, writer’s block, frustration, missed deadlines or superficial, leaky compositions are inevitable.

So there is no reason why we should start our significant writing projects and tasks in this way. Until you know where you want to take readers, you won’t fully realize the best strategies for getting them there.

Personally, I write with a center-out process, which means, I make sure my argument and ideas are clear, fully illustrated and supported, and organized in an effective way before I add (the incredibly important) cosmetic features like introductions and conclusions.

But that's just my style. You should develop the strategy that works best for you, experimenting with your technique, and adjusting your procedure to conform to the requirements of the specific and immediate writing task you are working on. But, no matter what form your method takes, you should think of writing as a multi-step progression of your ideas: a writing process.

Steps in the Building (Writing) Process

1. Pick a project (Get your bearings)

You probably know that we have been engaged in the writing process since the first day of class. Reading different stories, articles, and essays and responding to them is an incredibly important step. Both reading and writing are conversational. They allow us to dip our toe into large conversations, survey where others stand in these debates, and offer our reactions. Reading and writing are so closely related that it is hard to distinguish the border between them. When we read actively we are engaged in a conversation. We aren’t passively accepting what the authors are saying. We are constantly checking in with our own experiences and beliefs to see how the authors’ ideas relate to our own. This can be an incredibly creative activity. As we read, we should be:

This should give us a sense of where we stand in these large conversations. How do we situate ourselves on the continuum of varying opinions or perspectives? Just as a builder has to decide whether to accept a contract to build a bathroom at a national park, a fire station, a school, a museum, or a sky scrapper, a writer has to decide what type of composition they will construct. This gives us a sense of the scope of the process and what steps need to be taken. Are we going to inform? persuade? entertain? all three? agree? disagree? both?

2. Gather your materials (Prewriting)

Just as a contractor has to think about what materials they will need in order to construct a building, as writers, we should start generating the raw intellectual materials we’ll need to construct our argument. There are many ways to practice your prewriting strategies. But the point is to allow your mind to freely explore the topic without judgement about whether or not your ideas make sense. When freed in this way, our minds are capable of coming up with pretty amazing stuff. Let your thoughts drip onto the page unfiltered. Later on, you can evaluate these raw materials and think about how they will help you accomplish your purpose for writing. Prewriting allows you to:

• generate ideas

• organize those ideas

• sharpen your focus

3. Build your foundation (Working thesis Statement)

Once you have a bunch of ideas floating around, you should evaluate them and think about where you stand in this discussion. What tentative direction do you want to head? What question or questions do you want to answer? (ex: what is the meaning of this story? what does this story tell us about generational changes in the south? what does the story show us about the institution of marriage when it was written?) 

What is your opinion? What will you argue in your composition? Having a clear direction to go will allow you to proceed to other steps in the writing process. You can start constructing your argument, thinking about supporting points, doing further research, revisiting the texts you are engaged with, and coming up with ways to illustrate and support your argument. 

Generally speaking, your working thesis should:

• give you some direction

• fulfill the requirements of the writing prompt or your purpose for writing

• answer a question or questions

• offer your opinion

• engage in a debate

• give your writing a point

Just like a foundation provides the fundamental footing upon which a building will be constructed, a thesis statement requires other elements of your composition to fit into and serve this clearly-defined shape of your thoughts and opinions.  But keep in mind, you can (and should) always go back and make adjustments to your thesis statement if things aren’t panning out, you get lost in a forest of tangents, you come to an even more brilliant idea, or you hit road blocks. This is why it is called a working thesis. You will find that the writing process is very exploratory. So you need to balance the focus and direction of developing a working thesis with keeping an open mind and a willingness to recalibrate the path you are heading when the writing process uncovers new lines of reasoning.

4. Framing the Structural Supports (Outlining)

A contractor needs to make sure that solid supporting structures are carefully placed upon and within the foundation if the building is going to stand. The stronger these structures, the more likely the building is to resist destructive natural elements like weather, earthquakes, or the slow decay of time. Your composition will need to hold up against elements bent on undermining your purpose for writing: elements like criticism and counterarguments. This means that you need to attach viable premises to the argument you assert with your thesis statement. What do you need to give your readers to get them to come over to your line of reasoning? What is the most effective way to organize those ideas and examples? Outlining is sort of like blueprinting your ideas before you commit to typing out a draft. It will allow you to plan out what you need to argue to support your main idea and how you should organize those arguments.

5. Filling in the Gaps (Drafting)

Once a building has a foundation and the structural frame, the contractor can now start filling in the gaps and make a building functional. This may include adding electrical and plumbing apparatus, stuffing the walls with insulation, and putting up drywall.

This is when a writer can start filling out and substantiating her argument with assertions, quotes, examples, descriptions, stories, evidence, explanations, and clarifications. Having a clear understanding of what you want to accomplish before starting in on the drafting process is going to save you tons of time and allow you to construct tighter, more effective arguments.

For first drafts, you should try to stick to your outline and power through from beginning to end. Don’t worry if it isn’t perfect or if it is underdeveloped. Just try to more fully flesh out the ideas organized on your outline. It’s ok if it’s still a bit rough around the edges or you suspect that there is other things that you need to put in there. You can develop your ideas in a variety of ways, but there are certain things that each of your body sections should do. Take a look at this handout for tips on substantiating your supporting claims or assertions. This is a rough guide, and you should feel free to experiment or mix up the AXES sequence to suit your specific purposes and style. But generally, your supporting ideas must do all of the things listed on the handout.

 6. Finishing Touches (Revisions)

You made it through a draft. Take a breath. Take a break! But come back to it soon.

Now that your structure has taken shape, you can start to put some blue tape down, identifying both cosmetic and structural defects. “Whoops! I accidentally missed a spot when I painted the foyer. Wait a minute! I don’t want that to be a sliding glass door. That needs to be a set of French doors! Fuchsia carpet in my office?? What was I thinking?!? I wanted Xeriscaping, not a water-wasting lawn!”