Anything that can make writing easier is a blessing, but many writers often approach it by the seat of their pants. There’s nothing wrong with that. Adding some structure to the writing process can make the work move along more smoothly though.
Many writers, who use structure, follow certain steps when planning or preparing to write:
1. Determine your audience or purpose.
2. Research: Gather facts and information.
3. Organize the information.
4. Write the first draft.
5. Revise and edit.
The first step; determining your audience and/or purpose can be difficult. The purpose for the material you want to write may be clearly defined but how you present this material or your arguments could be a bit trickier; especially if your message is intended to persuade instead of to inform.
To help define your purpose, ask yourself several questions:
Do you intend to analyze something or break it down into parts?
Do you intend to define something and give it a clearer understanding?
Do you intend to evaluate or explain something?
Do you want to focus on comparisons or contrasts?
Knowing the answers to these questions and others like them will help you when it comes time to research.
Research can lead to a bombardment of information. Knowing what you need to search for can prevent you from feeling overwhelmed and make research easier by looking for specific details and information.
Whenever possible, always verify your information with more than one source.
After you’ve gathered the information you want to present, it’s time to organize it. A simple outline will suffice.
Once you’ve created the outline it’s time to get down to the business of writing. Don’t get too caught up in the details at this point; this is merely a first draft. You can correct errors in punctuation, spelling, etc. when you revise and edit the material.
At this point, if you’re not on a tight deadline, it’s good to let the first draft sit for a day or two. When you come back to it for revisions and edits you’ll have a fresh start and catch more mistakes than if you write and revise the same day.
This is the simple version of using a writing process. Like I said, there’s nothing wrong with writing by the seat of your pants, but using a process and being organized in your writing will help you accomplish more.
Image courtesy: http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3287/3118534761_e4e46d12bc.jpg
i Agree with all your process specially "2. Research: Gather facts and information." Gathering facts and information is the most important part for writing blogs or articles.
Great post Patti, it's very useful infos for beginner like me, Thank you for writing this, keep it up!
I love the research step because I sometimes found more than what I searched!
Hi guys,
Patti the 5 step structure makes it very easy to write. It's simple and straight to the point.
Kind regards,
Sam
X
The clever process help me complish more.
The way is 1. Write, 2. Revise, Revise, Revise, Revise……….,3. Done
and in this days is important ton know that we don't need to stay at home for writing articles, with the tablets like ipad we can write everywhere and get more inspiration
Thanks for the article Patti. I'm fairly new to blogging and this kind of advice is a great help.