Freewriting is a way to put thoughts down onto a paper without having to worry about editing. It is a way to help generate ideas for a paper or other writing assignment. Without having to worry about editing, it is easier for a person to get good ideas written down. The article did not really clearly define what a freewrite is, so I am taking little bits of things that I read. A freewrite is a means to generate ideas by just writing with a certain topic in your mind. Then, you can go back and look at the freewrite and pick out some really good ideas. Not having to worry about editing or making mistakes could make some really strong, good ideas to come out on the paper.
Freewrites are facilitate stronger writing because it gives the author a place to just get ideas down onto paper before having to worry about format and editing of the paper. It makes it so that you are almost "speaking" onto the paper. You do not have to worry about being wrong or not being able to think of what to write. As you keep writing in the freewrite, an idea may come into your head and you can write it down. One problem with writing essays is that our mind constantly edits the paper as we write. Freewrites are a way to teach our mind not to do the editing as we write the rough draft. It gives us an opportunity to just get ideas out onto the paper, and then go back and do the editing.
One thing that I found interesting about the reading was that it said that if you cannot think of something to write, just write that. You can repeat the same sentence or same word over and over. I did my freewrite for this week already. I have to say that it was actually kind of fun. I never had a moment during the freewrite that I could not come up with something to say. I was just writing whatever was on my mind. It was rather interesting to go into somewhat curious as to how I was going to be able to have something to write about for 10 mintues. I was surprised at how easy it was to think of something to write about.
Hi Michelle,
ReplyDeleteI am so glad to hear that you enjoyed you free writing exercise. I have not done my as of yet but after reading your post I'm feeling much better about doing it. I love the fact that you don't have to worry about editing it at all. Hey you brought up some good points that I had not thought of and that is that free writing is a great way to be able to get great ideas down on paper without any worries. In fact I bet people come up with some of their best stuff this way because you don't feel like you have someone looking over your shoulder, making sure that it is done correctly, so you are free to write whatever is on your mind and pick any ideas from there. I love how you described it like speaking on paper because it seems like that is just what you’re able to do. No one stops you when you are talking to say that you used the wrong word or placed a word in the wrong context. Free writing sound like it is going to be enjoyable thank you so much for all your input, I'm looking forward to it now. Talk with you soon Stacy
what a free piece of advice if you cant think of something to write ..write that ...I have found myself in the past practicing this and it works...this class of course has reminded me to dust some of these things off that I somehow quit using along the way and need to start reapplying...but thanks for your reading!! Great stuff!!
ReplyDeleteDaye
I'm glad you enjoyed it, so did I. I used to do them alllll the time in my english class in high school, we would have to do it everyday before class and it got kinda boring after a while but really it shouldn't cuz you can never really run out of things to think about.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad that you enjoyed freewriting! I did too and I also think that freewriting turned out to be a lot easier then I had orginally thought it would be. I feel that freewriting itself is easy if you don't have a topic, but with a topic I had thought it'd be a lot harder then it actually was.
ReplyDeleteHi Michelle,
ReplyDeleteIt is great that you have found the useful resource of free-writing. I also enjoy this technique very much in brainstorming and generating ideas for papers.The picture of your baby is adorable thanks for sharing it with us !
Hi Michelle,
ReplyDeleteI found that writing “I have nothing to write” an interesting thing too. It was amazing that when given the opportunity to write just that over and over again freed my mind enough to be able to write about so much more. I’m going to have more fun with freewrites. Just being able to have the freedom and not care really can free the problem that I have with writing. At least right now I think it can be an interesting tool, I’ll as this semester gets going on how it really aids me. I’m just not so sure about how it will aid me in better organizing my thoughts or aid me in better sentencing structure. Having the freedom not to worry about editing until the end can be extremely rewarding and making oneself aware of how restricting it can be. Editing can muffle ones thoughts and being able to stop that can be a real key to having the ability to writing well.
Michelle M.