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5 Tips to Get Writing Rolling
By Leigh Pretnar Cousins, MS
27 Aug 2015

I love to write, but on some days the words flow more easily than on others.

So many students resist writing and it’s often because they can’t get started. I try several approaches:

Brainstorming ideas and jotting them down as they emerge can help by getting those ideas out without worrying about the shape they’ll take. I tell my students that Step One is to locate your thoughts and Step Two is to worry about how artfully you express those thoughts. Keep those steps separate! (Many kids do a good job of organizing and expressing their thoughts coherently, once they’ve identified what those thoughts are.)
The opposite strategy may also work: begin with a blank outline. I sketch the bare bones of a five-paragraph essay outline…
I. Introduction
II. First Point

III. Second Point

IV. Third Point

V. Conclusion

…and from here encourage the student to fill in as much as he can, in whatever order it occurs to him. Again, so much of what makes writing intimidating is this feeling that what one writes needs to come out perfectly right away. But writing is a tool for thinking, and it can start out sloppy and incomplete and disorganized and imperfect.

I’ve had a few kids who need me to write the first three or four words of the first sentence of their essay. It seems to uncork all the rest of their thoughts and they flow.
I love this trick from my writer friend, Jane: Pretend you are explaining your subject to one person, and write down what you “say.” Edit it later.
I discovered this last trick as I was preparing a presentation: Use your computer’s PowerPoint program. It has all kinds of outlining suggestions and templates. Brainstorm or write your outline or rough draft on PowerPoint, then copy it onto a Word document and finish up.

5 Tips to Get Writing Rolling I love to write, but on some days the words flow more easily than on others. So many students resist writing and it’s often because they can’t get started. I try several approaches: Brainstorming ideas and jotting them down as they emerge can help...

https://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2011/09/19/how-to-inspire-your-kids-to-write-and-why-its-so-important/

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