The Right Way to Write With or Without a Diet Rite.

Basic Reminders

Time Effort Tools Prewrite, Rewrite,

and Revise Deadlines

The Right Way to Write

Step 1: Understand the boundaries of assignment.

The Right Way to Write

Step 2: Determine your purpose.Determines the essay’s content,

organization, emphasis, and choice of words

• Inform or explain• Convince or Persuade• Entertainment

The Right Way to Write

Step 3: Determine

your audience Identify needs and

expectations, and take them into account

• EX: An essay about the cafeteria food for your chemistry professor vs. the school newspaper

The Right Way to Write

Step 4: Determine your tone & written voiceReflects attitude toward yourself, your

purpose, your subject, and your readers

• Structure and word choice

The Right Way to Write

Step 5: Think about your subjectQuestion the general subjectBrainstorm on general subject

• Narrow to limited topic

The Right Way to Write

Step 6: Prewrite to gather “raw material”FreewritingBrainstorming individually or with a

groupMap out limited subject

• Diagramming or clustering

Conduct research

The Right Way to Write

Step 7: Organize the “raw material”Create a formal or a scratch outline

The Right Way to Write

Step 8: Identify the main idea or thesis Often contains two “parts” or accomplishes

two roles • One part presents your paper’s limited subject• The other presents your point of view or attitude

about that subject

Don’t make a factual or a broad statement Avoid announcements Don’t be afraid to make changes as your

essay develops

MLA Format and Mechanics

All our essays will be in MLA format. More on this later…

Homework

1. On a piece of paper:

2. Write your audience

3. Write your purpose

4. Write the prompt you are thinking about writing about

5. Explicate the title1. What exactly is it asking

6. Prewrite

7. Outline

8. Write a working thesis