Where to Start

It's an issue that every writer has to address. The first issue, actually. Where to start.

It seems like the simplest question. If your paper prompt is about health care policy, you write about health care policy. If your paper prompt is about Aristotle's ethics, you write about Aristotle's ethics. Easy, right?

Well,

Is it a research paper? Is it an opinion paper? Is it an analytic paper? Are you supposed to incorporate outside sources or limit yourself to the text? Is it a short paper? A long paper? Are you supposed to choose a specific topic within the realm of health care policy or Aristotle's ethics? Are you supposed to address one entire text? All the texts? What do you know about the topic? What do you need to know about the topic?

Uh...

What was a clear assignment is now rather mirky. Luckily, The Bedford Guide for Writing Tutors suggests a few possible ways to clarify a paper subject and select a solid topic. They include brainstorming/listing, freewriting, webbing, and outlining.

Of these, I've personally found webbing to be the most helpful. Webbing allows you to see all of your ideas, which ideas link, and how they proceed from each other. This method naturally allows you to see all the paths your essay could take, and gives the writer a network of mini-outlines to work from. One idea might seem really appealing, but if you realize you can't expand that part of the web very far, it might not make a great topic for a longer paper. On the other hand, if you can develop a few concise branches off of one web, you may have just found focus points for your thesis.

The danger is any type of early planning is that writers get caught up in an interesting idea and may diverge from the intention of the prompt. Pre-writing bestows no benefit if the writer is clearly organizing a paper that the professor doesn't want.

Most writers will dismiss prewriting as an elementary exercise. They will claim they don't need to pre write. That they have a good idea of their topic and how their paper will go. They'll say it's a waste of time.

Bull. Shit.

Pre-writing is probably THE most time-effective measure a writer can take. A decent webbing pre-write can take somewhere between 10-20 minutes to lay out, but the clarity of ideas the writer obtains can cut their essay writing time in half.

Any journey starts with a step, and the first step is always critical. Make sure you start your writing on the right foot, and take the time to pre-write.