Once you know your purpose and audience, you need something to say. Prewriting is the stage where you gather ideas and choose a topic small enough to cover well.
- Brainstorm or list: write every idea that comes, fast, without judging.
- Freewrite: write without stopping for five or ten minutes, then circle the best lines.
- Cluster (a web): write the topic in a circle and connect related ideas around it.
- Ask questions: who, what, when, where, why and how.
Key idea
Gather ideas first, then narrow the topic until it fits the space you have. A two-page paper needs a topic you can explain with real detail in two pages.
Why it works
A topic that is too big forces you to say a little about everything, so the writing stays vague. A narrow topic leaves room for the specific facts, examples and details that make writing interesting and convincing.
Worked example: Narrowing step by step
Narrow “sports” to a topic for a one-page paper.
- Sports: thousands of games across thousands of years. Far too big.
- Basketball: still a whole history, rules and players.
- The three-point line: one rule, but its whole history is still a lot for one page.
- Why our school added a three-point line to its middle-school league: one change, one place, one page.
Answer: Why our school league added a three-point line.
Worked example: Does it fit?
Which topic fits a one-paragraph answer: “The history of flight” or “How a paper airplane stays up”?
- The history of flight covers centuries and many inventors: a book, not a paragraph.
- How a paper airplane stays up is one process you can explain in a few sentences.
Answer: “How a paper airplane stays up.”
Common mistake
Choosing a topic far too big for the length, like “the history of sports” in two pages. Test it: can you name the three or four specific points you would make? If each point is itself a big subject, narrow again.
Narrowing can go too far. “The color of my left shoelace” has nothing to explain. A good topic is small enough to cover well and big enough to be worth a reader’s time.