When I was in high school I had a fabulous English teacher. Every time my schedule allowed, I registered for her course. One morning she came into our classroom in her usual, disheveled way, dropping her books clumsily on her desk. She then instructed us to pick an object that we loved, and for 15 minutes, write whatever came to our mind.
I chose my favorite sweatshirt.
When I began, I couldn’t imagine what I was going to write about – 15 minutes seemed like forever! It’s grey, stained, says “Michigan”, but what else? Then my writing led to thoughts about my sister (who bought it for me), how I felt now that she had moved out of the house, how I had spoken to her the night before and that she suggested a book for me to read, and so on. When 15 minutes were done I was amazed at how much I had written. I thought it would be difficult getting past one descriptive sentence, but with the push of my teacher – and the clock - I realized how much I had to say!
Sometimes I use this freewriting technique when I need to start a paper, but don’t know what to write or which direction to take. I sit in front of my computer and force my fingers to type for 15 minutes about a topic without stopping – trying to stay a bit more focused than I did when I wrote about my sweatshirt. Usually I am surprised at how much I know – and in the cases where I truly don’t know a lot, I get a clearer idea of where I have questions!
Here are some tips for doing a freewrite:
Find a comfortable place to freewrite, with few (or no!) distractions
Set an alarm for 15 minutes (or 10, or even 5, if that’s where you want to start!)
Keep writing or typing for the entire time – if you draw a blank, write a sentence or a word over and over again until you pick up a new idea
Don’t worry about grammar or sentence structure – just go for it!
Be confident!
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1 comment:
I couldn't agree more. Writing is a process and sometimes we forget that it does not consist in just writing but editing and re-writing and sleeping on it and doing it all over again. It might be that when it is looked at as such it stops being so intimidating.
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