The writing process
Essays or reports are important assessment tasks in many university subjects. Successful writers generally go through a series of steps when planning and producing their assignments.
The following five sections outline the key steps:
- Understanding the question and brainstorming
- Finding and reviewing the literature
- Taking notes from texts
- Drafting written work
- Editing and proofreading
Understanding the question and brainstorming
Before you start reading, note-taking or writing, you need to make sure you understand what the question is about. You should also be clear about what you’re expected to do in your answer. After that, you can start exploring, or ‘brainstorming’, some ideas.
- Read the question carefully. It is vital to identify its ‘content’, ‘limiting’ and ‘directive’ terms. For instance: the ‘content’ (A) could be ‘the outbreak of World War I’, the ‘limiting terms’ (B) could be ‘the naval arms race’, and the ‘directive’ terms could be ‘assess the contribution of (B) to (A)’. (You can find further material about how to analyse an essay question in the Writing Lounge at Gate 2 of AIRport: https://airport.unimelb.edu.au/login.php).
- Now start ‘brainstorming’. Let your mind run over how you plan to address the question. You might already be thinking of adopting, or opposing, particular approaches that came up in your lectures or tutes. You’ll probably also have some preliminary ideas about what to read, or re-read. Write these down.
Finding and reviewing the literature
- Start with your set readings. They indicate current approaches to your topic-area.
- Many assignments specifically ask you to locate and use additional material. You can follow up studies mentioned in lectures, tutes or in the reference lists of the set readings.
- Learn how to use the university’s library resources. Use keywords to search the book catalogue. Visit a library in person, go to the relevant shelves and browse through what’s available. Use SuperSearch to locate journal articles in electronic form – for guidance, see www.lib.unimelb.edu.au/find.html. Also try Google Scholar.
- Now you can start ‘reviewing’. Identify different approaches to your topic in the material you read. What are the areas of agreement and disagreement – and what are these based on? What kind of evidence is put forward? What, in your view, are their strengths and weaknesses? Which one will you take up? Why?
top of pageTaking notes from texts
- In your ‘reviewing’ step, you might have started to make some notes from your reading. Perhaps you used a highlighter. But simply highlighting ‘key points’ will not be enough.
- Use your own words. See www.studygs.net/booknote.htm. This will give you a basis on which to build your first draft.
- The best notes are interactive. When you summarise something you’ve read, try to make connections between that and other relevant material. This will help you to develop your own viewpoint.
- Summarise and question/elaborate at the same time. You might use a ‘split page’ technique: write your summaries on the left, and your questions and thoughts about them on the right.
Drafting written work
- If you follow the suggestions we made in Taking notes from texts, you’ll now have a set of notes and reflections, organised by themes. You should also have kept some notes from your initial brainstorming. You can also try mind-mapping.
- Your assignment needs an introduction, a main body and a conclusion. Introductions and conclusions have specific jobs to do. See Introductions and Conclusions (53KB |PDF)
- The body of your assignment should directly address the task (see Understanding the question and brainstorming. Put in section-headings to check that the various parts of your draft combine to provide a balanced answer. (You can always remove these later).
- Within each section, each paragraph should cover a particular topic, or a specific aspect of a topic. Paragraphs need to build on one another in a smooth and logical way. See Cohesion (53KB |PDF)
- Give yourself time to look carefully at your first draft before producing a final one. See Effective time and task management skills (53KB |PDF).
Editing and proofreading
- Before you hand in your assignment, check that it’s in the required presentation format – and that you’ve appropriately referenced all your sources, following the guidelines you’ve been given.
- Read your final draft very carefully, word by word. Don’t just rely on your computer’s ‘Spelling and Grammar’ function. Make sure that you haven’t accidentally left out any lines - or even whole sections. See editing (53KB |PDF). For further assistance with editing, proofreading and appropriate word choice see the following website: http://www.lextutor.ca/