CHAPTER 16: TECHNIQUES FOR WRITING
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CHAPTER 16: TECHNIQUES FOR WRITING

CHAPTER PREVIEW

Writing is a way of discovering ideas as well as a way of expressing them. Therefore, few writers are able to make all their ideas and words work together perfectly on the first try. Most writers produce several drafts, or experimental versions, of a piece of writing before arriving at a final draft. As you write your drafts and move toward a final one for each of your writing projects, you will be examining your own thoughts and developing skills for expressing them. Chapter 16 offers some techniques and tools for use along the way. You will learn to

1. FREEWRITING

Freewriting is a way of discovering what you want to say. In freewriting, you set aside all the usual rules of writing for readers, and you write fast, without stopping. You don't have to capitalize letters or spell correctly. You can wander off your topic and say outrageous things. The point is simply to capture as much as you can of what passes through your mind in a short period, so you shouldn't waste time erasing and reconsidering what you've written. There's only one rule: Keep your pencil moving all the time. If you feel as if your mind goes blank at some point, just write your last phrase over and over until new words begin to come.

Here is an example of freewriting by a young woman who wanted to write an essay about working mothers. The passage is hard to read because the writer was not worrying about spelling, punctuation, or organization; she was simply trying to record her thoughts rapidly in their earliest stages so that she could go back and think about them later.

EXERCISE: Get a pencil and paper. Write non-stop for five minutes on one of the following topics:

  1. eating out
  2. living alone
  3. writing

2. CLUSTERING

Clustering helps you organize thoughts as you discover them. In clustering, you write a topic in the center of a page and then surround the topic with your thoughts about it, jotting ideas down as they come into your mind. When several thoughts are related to each other, put them together in a cluster, and when a completely new thought comes, put it on another part of the page. There are two rules: 1) Don't try to write out each whole thought; just jot down a phrase quickly and see what comes next. 2) Don't reject any thoughts; they are all potentially useful. When you are finished, check to see that related thoughts are close together in clusters.

Here is a clustering sample that one student developed as he was preparing to write a paragraph about football. Notice that after he finished jotting his ideas in the ring, he crossed out two items and moved them closer to the clusters where he felt they belonged.

EXERCISE: By clustering, explore one of the following topics. Write the topic in the center of a blank piece of paper and spend five minutes collecting your thoughts around it.

  1. part-time jobs
  2. holidays
  3. television
When you are finished, look for groups of related thoughts and adjust the clusters. Clustering helps you to scan the many things you might say about a topic. Later you can decide what you will say and what you won't.

3. LIMITING A TOPIC

Once you have looked over your ideas on a topic, you are in a position to select which ideas you'd like to develop in writing. That means shifting your focus from the broad view to a narrower one. If you've been exploring a topic in freewriting, you can circle one or two sentences or phrases and put the rest aside. If you've been clustering, you can circle some clusters for focus and ignore the others. There are three steps in limiting your topic: 1) Look for connections among the ideas you have recorded. 2) Let some ideas go for now. 3) Find a phrase that shows the connection among the ones you keep.

The clustering sample below shows how a student moved from a starting topic, football, to a limited one: the role that football has played in my education.

EXERCISE: Study your freewriting or your clustering for ideas that are connected. If there are several connections, pick the one that interests you the most. Circle the items you've chosen. Write a phrase that identifies your new limited topic.

4. WRITING TOPIC SENTENCES FOR PARAGRAPHS

A paragraph is a sequence of sentences which cooperate in supporting one main point. Sometimes that point is so obvious that it doesn't need to be stated, but often a paragraph begins with a topic sentence which states the main point directly. Before you can decide on a topic sentence, you must decide what you want to say and what you don't want to say. In other words, you must first explore your starting topic and then select your limited topic. The next step is to make a statement about the limited topic. Keep these points in mind: 1) A starting topic is usually broad, stimulating many ideas. 2) A limited topic is narrow, connecting a few selected ideas. 3) A topic sentence makes a statement about the limited topic. For example, study this progression:
  • Starting topic: Football
  • Limited topic: The role that football has played in my education
  • Topic sentence: If it hadn't been for football, I might never have taken school seriously.
EXERCISE A: Study a limited topic you have chosen as a result of freewriting or clustering. What statement can you make about that topic? Write a topic sentence that could introduce a paragraph on that limited topic. Check to make sure that it is a complete sentence.

A topic sentence is always a complete sentence expressing an idea about the limited topic. It is not a title (What football means to me), or an explanation of the writer's plan (I am going to tell you about the role football played in my education.) The more clearly it focuses the reader's attention on the points covered by the paragraph, the better.

EXERCISE B: For each limited topic below, circle the numbers of two items which could serve as topic sentences.

Limited topic: how to train a cat.

  1. This paragraph is about how to train a cat.
  2. Before a cat learns anything, it first teaches its owner a lesson in humility.
  3. Everything you wouldn't have thought to ask about training a cat.
  4. Training a cat takes physical stamina.
  5. Animal training is a complicated subject.

Limited topic: changes in patients' attitudes as they settle into convalescent homes

  1. Americans are learning how to grow old gracefully.
  2. The outside world seems to shrink when seen through the window of a convalescent home.
  3. Closing up a home and moving to a small room can make even an extrovert turn inward.
  4. It is important to look at the changes in patients' attitudes as they settle into convalescent homes.
  5. The increasing delight in daily conversation as patients become accustomed to life in a convalescent home.

Notice that choosing a topic sentence helps to focus the topic still further. The student writing about the role football played in his education could have chosen one of these topic sentences instead:

  • My high school football coach transformed a sport into a powerful mental discipline.
  • The lessons I learned from playing high school football prepared me for the challenges of college.
Each sentence declares a slightly different role that football played in this student's education and alerts the reader to a different focus in the paragraph. Therefore, the topic sentence acts as a tool for organizing the rest of the paragraph.

EXERCISE C. Click HERE to see a table showing the Nielsen Ratings for the week of January 22, 1996. (This is a large document -- 205k -- and may take a moment to download.) Nielsen ratings purport to show the relative popularity of television programs; they measure the millions of households tuned in to various programs and rank those shows accordingly. The figures on the chart are explained at the bottom of the chart.

Below are three topic sentences. Use the topic sentences to help you select and organize the facts in these Nielsen ratings. Under each topic sentence, list three details a writer could include in a paragraph introduced by that sentence.

1. Topic sentence: Sports programming has proven to be a big winner for television networks.
Supporting details:


2) Topic sentence: Commercial sponsors were wise to invest in NBC during this week in 1996.
Supporting details:


3) Topic sentence: Situation comedies ("sitcoms") such as Friends and Seinfeld seem to do best when grouped with other sitcoms.
Supporting details:


Compare your selection of facts with those of a classmate to see that you have considered all the possibilities. Be sure that neither of you has included facts that will not support the topic sentence.

5. GIVING EXAMPLES AND EXPLANATIONS

Giving examples and explanations helps your reader understand what has led you to a conclusion. Whenever you're writing, imagine a reader asking constantly, "What makes you say that?" "What do you mean?" If you heard that question in conversation, you'd probably answer, "Well, for instance. . . " and then you would give an example. You need to give examples in writing, too. Here are some statements that could lead readers to ask those questions:
  • Fruit is good for you.
  • People who live together fight sometimes.
  • Reading enriches your life.
An example may offer further information, apply a general statement to a specific problem, or tell a story. Its purpose is to tie your idea to other ideas that everyone recognizes, proving that you know what you're talking about and encouraging your readers to stay on the path of your thought.

EXERCISE A: Support each statement below with examples and explanations, adding one more item to each column.

Statement: Fruit is good for you
Examples of good fruitExplanations with further information
a. applesa. contain roughage which helps to clean
digestive system
b.______________b. ____________________________
_______________________________

Statement: People who live together fight sometimes.
Examples of things they fight over Explanations with specific situations
a. moneya. My roommate and I can't agree about
how to divide the heating bill. She
uses more than half our heat by sleep-
ing with the windows open.
b. b. ____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________

Statement: Reading enriches your life.
Examples of ways this worksExplanations with stories
a. by broadening a person's
range of experience		a. Rita has never met an Indian, and
until last summer, she'd never been
out of Ohio. But last spring she read
Black Elk Speaks and began to see that
Black Elk's visions could help her
understand her own life better. When
she traveled across South Dakota last
summer, she found she could guess
what was around every bend as surely
as she could interpret different
neighborhoods in Toledo.
b. _________________
___________________
 b. ____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________

EXERCISE B: Add one sentence to each item below, giving examples to clarify the words in italics.

1) I miss my family, but I know that when they join me here, I will be able to give them the very best.

2) When you move to a new city, you will have to make many adjustments.

3) People shovel all sorts of things into their pockets without stopping to evaluate what they really need.

4) It was hard for me to get an education because of my family's demands on my time.

5) Progress involves taking risks.

6. USING SPECIFIC LANGUAGE

General language describes large categories. Specific language describes individual things and actions. In the diagram below, notice how the language becomes more specific as your attention moves down the scale from general towards specific.

EXERCISE A: Identify the most specific word or phrase in each group.

1) hammer, hardware, tool

2) gems, diamonds, jewelry

3) washing machine, electrical appliance, household convenience

3) difficulties of the first year in college, problems in college, overscheduling the first year of college

5) buying a car, undertaking a major financial committment, accepting a burden of independent life

Writing has to strike a balance between specific and general language. Often a topic sentence uses more general language than the sentences that support the topic sentence:
The sociable old moviehouse may be a thing of the past. The jokes in the ticket line and the smell of popcorn are no longer able to lure people away from the comforts of the home VCR. . . .
Specific details that refer to the five senses (like the smell of popcorn) convey ideas vividly. The five senses are sight, sound, smell, taste, and touch (including motion), and they form the basis for most of our thoughts about the world. If you refer to senses in your writing, you help readers to form an appropriate base on which to build their understanding of the ideas you're discussing. That makes your job of communicating and persuading much easier. Compare these two sentences:
The dean is in a bad mood today.
The dean is mumbling as he brushes past us in the hall and doesn't even nod when we greet him.
The second sentence contains sound, sight, and motion details, and allows readers to come to their own conclusions about the dean's mood.

EXERCISE B: Rewrite each sentence replacing the words in italics with details from the five senses.

1) Charlie was tired.

2) Gabriela is the most beautiful child in the family.

3) Our motorcycle was speeding down the road.

4) The air in the subways is stale.

5) Lois walked clumsily.

EXERCISE C: Imagine a person doing something outside. Picture the weather. In three sentences, describe the person in action. Do not mention the sky, the air, or the temperature, but make your reader feel what the weather is like through its effect on the person you are describing. Use details from the senses.

Read your paragraph to a classmate. Ask the classmate to describe the weather in your paragraph. Did your details give an accurate impression?

7. MAKING PARAGRAPH BREAKS

In an essay, each paragraph contains a group of sentences which discuss one limited topic. Paragraph breaks show readers where new limited topics begin. A writer indents a few spaces at the left margin of the page when introducing a new point in an essay or a new stage of a discussion. The patch of white space gives readers a chance to stop and think about the last limited topic before starting in on the next one.

EXERCISE: When a student wrote this essay, she separated it into four paragraphs. Click HERE for a one-page duplicate of this text, which you can then easily PRINT. Circle the first word of each new paragraph.

Some people think that children are interested only in material things, and that adults invent symbols to make life complicated, but I think that symbols start in childhood. For example, I remember learning about one symbol before I could even read. A door was one of my first symbols. I was four years old when I faced that door, the door of a kindergarten in a small elementary school in Patillas, Puerto Rico. The door was big, and it was painted a bone white color. When I saw it, I felt defenseless because I knew that beyond it, someone would take away my freedom to do the things I wanted. Besides, I was scared because the other children were bigger than I was, and the teacher wasn't my mother. I started to cry. Then my mother lost her patience and began to yell at me. At the same time, the teacher pulled me towards the door. I just saw the room on the other side and I could not see any light, any fun. I cried because I wanted to go with my mother, and I couldn't understand why she was leaving me by this door. I felt miserable and angry as she walked away. However, everything changed when I decided to go through that door. The teacher closed it in back of me and I had to stay. First I was quiet and watched. Then I began to understand about routines. For instance, there was a time for everything: a time to play, a time to eat, a time to sleep, and the time that I liked most, a time to go home. I tried to survive. Soon I began to make friends and to behave the way the other children did. Meanwhile, I learned to make arrangements with myself to adapt to an environment full of new rules and methods. I learned to color figures, to complete puzzles, and to walk instead of run. Finally, I walked in and out of that door freely every day. Now, looking back, I can see that the door that made me afraid and confused yesterday opened the way to my present life. In addition it opened the way to other doors, more complicated, surrounded with decisions, and leading to events that have been sometimes good and sometimes bad. There are others waiting for me, and they all offer me different choices. In fact, though, they all look a little bit like that big white door I first decided to go through when I was very small.
-- Luz Raquel Cruz
Form a group with three or four other students and discuss the paragraph breaks and your reasons for them. See whether your whole group can agree on where the breaks should fall. Explain your conclusions to the rest of the class before clicking HERE to see the original paragraph breaks.

8. USING TRANSITIONAL EXPRESSIONS

Transitional expressions, such as therefore, however, and in addition, show readers how one idea relates to another. Consider these two sentences:

The river was gradually changing its course. The cliff continued to erode.
Is the river causing the erosion or not? Adding a transitional modifier can help the reader to know the answer:
The river was gradually changing its course; therefore the cliff continued to erode.
Different transitional modifiers imply different answers:
The river was gradually changing its course. In addition, the cliff continued to erode.
The river was gradually changing its course; however, the cliff continued to erode.
Study the following chart of transitional modifiers. (Click HERE for a one-page duplicate of this chart.) These expressions can be used within paragraphs to show the relationships between clauses and sentences, and they can be used within essays to show how paragraphs relate to each other.
TRANSITIONAL EXPRESSIONS
To show time and sequence:
meanwhile, eventually, soon, later, first, second, then, finally,
also, besides, furthermore, moreover, in addition, too
To compare and contrast:
likewise, similarly, in the same way, however, nevertheless,
still, on the other hand, on the contrary, even so
To show cause and effect:
therefore, as a result, accordingly, consequently, thus, hence, otherwise
To offer examples and conclusions:
for instance, for example, after all, in fact, of course
in conclusion, in other words, on the whole, in short
EXERCISE A: If you haven't already done so, PRINT Raquel Cruz's essay above and then circle the transitional expressions within the essay.

EXERCISE B: Show the relationships between ideas in the paragraph below by adding transitional modifiers in the blanks.

For some people, high school and college are a waste of time. , a friend of mine was an A student throughout high school. , he was accepted into college without any trouble. He studied hard for four years. he received a degree and entered the job market. , he was unable to get a job in his field of study, even though he applied everywhere. , he was forced to apply for a job which required none of the skills he had obtained in school. ,I have become convinced that high school and college are not always the best preparation for the real world.

9. WRITING THESIS STATEMENTS FOR ESSAYS

An essay is a group of paragraphs which all support a main point, or thesis. Often the reader will understand the ideas in the paragraphs best if the essay's main point is stated directly somewhere in the first paragraph. A thesis statement does for an essay what a topic sentence does for a paragraph; it helps the reader to understand the main point. A thesis statement can tell the reader how a large idea will be broken down into smaller ones, set the scene for a story, or take a stand on a controversial issue. It always expresses a firm statement in a complete sentence. For example, the thesis statement for Raquel Cruz's essay doors is A door was one of my first symbols.

EXERCISE A: Identify the thesis statement for each of the following essays:
1) John Carey's essay on making money. (Click HERE to review the essay.)

2) The essay on the therapeutic effects of laughter. (Click HERE to review the essay.)

A thesis statement may use more general language than the topic sentences of the paragraphs supporting the thesis. For example, notice the use of the general terms, business and entertainment activities in this outline for an essay, in contrast with the more specific language of examples in the topic sentences.

Thesis Statement: Nowadays, people stay at home for many of their business and entertainment activities.

Topic Sentence #1: Mail order catalogues eliminate the need for shopping trips.
Topic Sentence #2: Giving a credit card number over the phone can bring goods and services to the door.
Topic Sentence #3: A VCR and a tape deck can turn the average living room into a private theater.
EXERCISE B: Below are topic sentences for the paragraphs in two different essays. Write a thesis statement that expresses a suitable main point for each essay.

1)Thesis statement:

Topic sentence #1: Sylvia carried good luck charms in each of her pockets.
Topic sentence #2: I remember one Friday the 13th, she refused to get out of bed.
Topic sentence #3: Sylvia used to read the clouds for instructions about how she should spend each day.
2) Thesis statement:

Topic sentence #1: Testing employees for drugs emables an employer to avoid problems with new hires and to treat the drug problems of veteran workers.
Topic sentence #2: A company that tests employees for drug use is protecting its clients and the public.
Topic sentence #3: Drug testing at the workplace deters drug use elsewhere.

FUN WITH GRAMMAR

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