Steps of the Writing Process Outline

I. Why Steps to Essay Writing?

Following the Steps of the Writing Process:

• Avoids the need to begin an essay with a blank screen, as these steps give you a roadmap to follow during writing
  
• Takes the guesswork out of writing by pre-planning your approach
  
• Front-loads the process so that the actual writing of the essay is done more efficiently
  
• Produces essays that are better organized and more concise
  

II. The Steps of the Writing Process

1. Understanding the Prompt
2. Forming a Thesis
   
3. Prewriting + Outlining
   
4. Drafting
   
5. Revising
   
6. Proofreading
   
7. Publishing
   

III. Understanding the Prompt

Prompts are directions for writing an essay, and should:

• Be read carefully: Give the prompt the time it deserves—even during a timed-writing, where the average time spent reading a prompt is less than one minute
  
• Be annotated: Highlight key words and phrases (and repeat them in your essay)
• At some point, offer "action" words: Paying close attention to "action" words will ensure you write the right type of essay
  

***

Here is a typical prompt you may encounter:

Inter-faith couples face many unique challenges. They must deal with issues that most same-faith couples take for granted, such as who will officiate their marriage ceremony and how to observe religious holidays. Indeed, the problems raised by couples of differing religions often aren’t resolved until one person succumbs their beliefs. Couples should save themselves the trouble and stay with their own kind.

Write an essay in which you support, qualify, or dispute the above statement.

***

The following prompt is ideally annotated:
Inter-faith couples face many unique challenges. They must deal with issues that most same-faith couples take for granted, such as who will officiate their marriage ceremony and how to observe religious holidays. Indeed, the problems raised by couples of differing religions often aren’t resolved until one person succumbs their beliefs. Couples should save themselves the trouble and stay with their own kind.

Write an essay in which you support, qualify, or dispute the above statement.

This annotation highlighted the prompt’s key words (e.g. interfaith couples, unique challenges), but it also noted its "action" words. In this case, the prompt offered three very different action words: support, qualify, or dispute. Each of these words lends itself to a very different essay, so it is important to take note of each.

IV: Forming a Thesis

Now that you understand the prompt, its time to form a thesis. Ideally, thesis statements should:

• Include the subject: Be specific about the essay’s topic
  
• Have an arguable point of view: Make more than just a statement, make a clear and logical argument
  
• Be broad but concise: Be singular in focus about your topic, but leave yourself enough room to explore several aspects
  

Also, keep in mind that generally prompts are broken into two parts: context and directions. The contextual part of the prompt establishes the parameters of your essay (e.g. subject), while the directional portion dictates instructions (e.g. “write a persuasive essay”).

***

Evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of this thesis statement:

Although couples of differing religions may have many struggles and clashes over their faiths, these couples can most definitely work if they have true love as the key to success in their relationship.

Strengths:

• On topic
• Singular in focus

Weaknesses:

• Wordy
• Illogical/Vague
• Does not utilize wording of prompt

***

Revised thesis:
While inter-faith couples may face unique challenges, honest communication is the key to their long-term success.

Strengths of this revised thesis statement:

• On topic
  
• Clear and logical argument
  
• Singular in focus -Economical wording
  
• Utilizes prompt’s wording
  

V: Prewriting + Outlining

Once you have a solid thesis in place, its time to think about potential evidence and directions for your essay. Prewriting can take any form, from simple notes to organized structures; these techniques generally break into two categories: structured and unstructured:

• Structured: Includes graphic organizers, and typically utilize shapes or charts to organize ideas visually
  
• Unstructured: Includes brainstorming and free-writing, and is less concerned with organization and more interested in simply recording key points on paper
  

Structured prewriting examples:


Spider-Mapping


Clustering


Venn Diagram

***

Outlining is the process of taking your initial thoughts and organizing them into a roadmap for your essay. As with prewriting, outlining can take many forms, from traditional (using Roman numerals) to non-traditional (loose or Informal outline). There is no right or wrong approach; instead, choose the style that best fits your needs and preferences.

***

Here is a loose outline based upon the revised thesis:

• Intro ¶: Intro subject; Thesis
• Body ¶ 1: Establish the value of honest communication in a relationship
• Body ¶ 2: Establish challenges unique to inter-faith couples
• Body ¶ 3: Honest communication at the beginning of the relationship
• Body ¶ 4: Honest communication during the holidays
• Body ¶ 5: Honest communication and family and friends
• Body ¶ 6: Honest communication and kids
• Conclusion ¶: Summarize; Reworded thesis

VI: Drafting

Once your outline is complete, it is time to actually write your essay. Keep in mind that at this stage, its often best just to get the entire essay written; worry about the details and fine tuning later.

VII: Revising

Once your essay is on paper or the screen, its time to step back and evaluate it as a whole. Some questions to ask about your essay at this point include:

• Does it contain a solid thesis?
• Do the body paragraphs support the thesis, and are they singular in focus?
• Does it flow?
• Does it have a solid conclusion that both summarizes your argument and rewords the thesis?

It is also important, at this stage, to think structurally. Revising is the point at which an essay can radically change shape. Likewise, essays should be trimmed at this stage so as to keep the emphasis on only those paragraphs that best support your thesis. Do not be afraid to cut a paragraph if it is not doing what its supposed to do, which is strengthen your overall argument.

***

First draft essay:

• Intro ¶: Intro subject; Thesis
• Body ¶ 1: Establish the value of honest communication in a relationship
• Body ¶ 2: Establish challenges unique to inter-faith couples
• Body ¶ 3: Honest communication at the beginning of the relationship
• Body ¶ 4: Honest communication during the holidays
• Body ¶ 5: Honest communication and family and friends
• Body ¶ 6: Honest communication and kids
• Conclusion ¶: Summarize; Reworded thesis

Revised draft essay:

• Intro ¶: Intro subject; Thesis
• Body ¶ 1: Establish challenges unique to inter-faith couples
• Body ¶ 2: Establish value of honest communication in a relationship
• Body ¶ 3: Honest communication during the holidays
  
• Body ¶ 4: Honest communication and kids
• Conclusion ¶: Summarize; Reworded thesis

These changes took advantage of both swapping paragraphs (Body paragraphs 1 and 2) and combining (or eliminating) paragraphs 3 and 5 ("Honest communication at the beginning of the relationship" and “Honest communication and friends and family”). These changes not only better organized the argument logically, they also increased the flow of the essay overall. Again, major structural changes are appropriate at the revising stage.

Another option at this stage is peer-editing, in which another person reads your essay and offers constructive criticism. It is often helpful to have a fresh set of eyes to review your writing.

VIII: Proofreading

Unlike revising, in the proofreading stage the emphasis is on the smaller details; generally punctuation and grammar. By this point, the structure of your essay is in place and so proofreading turns your attention the finer points of the essay.

***

Proofreading tips:

• Take a break: Many find it beneficial to take a short break between revising and proofreading as a way to refresh your brain.
  
• Read it aloud: Often, your ears are better editors than your eyes
  
• Don’t rely too heavily on your word processing program’s grammar check feature: Though helpful, these features are not very sophisticated and can miss many errors.
  
• Revise on paper: Often you’ll catch more mistakes by reading a printed version of your essay rather than on computer screen
  

***

Here are some common grammatical errors:

• Your vs. You’re: “Your/You’re putting your relationship at risk by not being honest with your partner.”
  
• It’s vs. Its: “It’s/Its important that both religions be respected.”
  
• There vs. Their: “There/Their will be times when things get tough.”
• Affect vs. Effect: “What will be the end affect/effect?”
  
• Dangling Participles “Walking through the church, the statues were stunning.”
  

Here are the corrections:

• Your vs. You’re “You’re putting your relationship at risk by not being honest with your partner.”
  
• It’s vs. Its “It’s important that both religions be respected.”
  
• There vs. Their: “There will be times when things get tough.”
  
• Affect vs. Effect: “What will be the end effect?”
  
• Dangling Participles: “Walking through the church, I saw statues that were stunning.” ¨

IX: Publishing

To make your essay print-ready (or publishable), it must conform to MLA style, the formatting standard of college literature and composition classes.

General MLA style includes:

• 12-pt Times New Roman font in black ink
• Double-spaced throughout
• A right-aligned header containing your last name and page number
• 1” margins on all sides ¨Centered title
• Indent the first line of paragraphs one half-inch (one tab) from the left margin.

Sample MLA style format:

Research Paper Assignment

This paper requires you to synthesize, contextualize, and analysis an issue from the worlds of spirituality and faith. Specifically, you are asked to consider one of ten [10] topics: Homosexuality in Christianity, Evolution vs. Creationism, The Power of Prayer, The Search for New Faiths, Death in America, Fundamentalism, The End of Days, Women in the Church, Religion vs. Art, or a topic of your choice.

See the full prompts for specific directions for each topic.

Requirements:

• Minimum six pages in length
• MLA format, including parenthetical citation and works cited page (papers without citations are automatically failed)
  
• Six sources minimum (at least two [2] must be scholarly journals from SJSU's academic databases; do not count Wikipedia as a source)

Due: Tuesday, December 9th

Week 5

Tu 9.23
Listen to: LGG, 35:19-1:12:20
In-class: Library Session—Meet in Room 219 of the MLK Library

Th 9.25
Listen to: LGG, 1:12:21-2:06:30
In-class: Oral presentations (Sec. 30: Candace R, Matt A, Nick A; Sec. 40: Danielle B, Kent W, Veronica C); Monologue discussion; Comparative analysis essay preview
Due: Journal 4

The Push to ‘Otherize’ Obama

By Nicholas D. Kristo
Op-Ed Columnist, New York Times
September 21, 2008

Here’s a sad monument to the sleaziness of this presidential campaign: Almost one-third of voters “know” that Barack Obama is a Muslim or believe that he could be.

In short, the political campaign to transform Mr. Obama into a Muslim is succeeding. The real loser as that happens isn’t just Mr. Obama, but our entire political process.

A Pew Research Center survey released a few days ago found that only half of Americans correctly know that Mr. Obama is a Christian. Meanwhile, 13 percent of registered voters say that he is a Muslim, compared with 12 percent in June and 10 percent in March.

More ominously, a rising share — now 16 percent — say they aren’t sure about his religion because they’ve heard “different things” about it.

When I’ve traveled around the country, particularly to my childhood home in rural Oregon, I’ve been struck by the number of people who ask something like: That Obama — is he really a Christian? Isn’t he a Muslim or something? Didn’t he take his oath of office on the Koran?

In conservative Christian circles and on Christian radio stations, there are even widespread theories that Mr. Obama just may be the Antichrist. Seriously.

John Green, of the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, says that about 10 percent of Americans believe we may be in the Book of Revelation’s “end times” and are on the lookout for the Antichrist. A constant barrage of e-mail and broadcasts suggest that Mr. Obama just may be it.

The online Red State Shop sells T-shirts, mugs and stickers exploiting the idea. Some shirts and stickers portray a large “O” with horns, above a caption: “The Anti-Christ.”

To his credit, Mr. McCain himself has never raised doubts about Mr. Obama’s religion. But a McCain commercial last month mimicked the words and imagery of the best-selling Christian “Left Behind” book series in ways that would have set off alarm bells among evangelicals nervous about the Antichrist.

Mr. McCain himself is not popular with evangelicals. But they will vote for him if they think the other guy may be on Satan’s side.

In fact, of course, Mr. Obama took his oath on the Bible, not — as the rumors have it — on the Koran. He is far more active in church than John McCain is.

(Just imagine for a moment if it were the black candidate in this election, rather than the white candidate, who was born in Central America, was an indifferent churchgoer, had graduated near the bottom of his university class, had dumped his first wife, had regularly displayed an explosive and profane temper, and had referred to the Pakistani-Iraqi border ...)

What is happening, I think, is this: religious prejudice is becoming a proxy for racial prejudice. In public at least, it’s not acceptable to express reservations about a candidate’s skin color, so discomfort about race is sublimated into concerns about whether Mr. Obama is sufficiently Christian.

The result is this campaign to “otherize” Mr. Obama. Nobody needs to point out that he is black, but there’s a persistent effort to exaggerate other differences, to de-Americanize him.

Raising doubts about a candidate based on the religion of his grandfather is toxic and profoundly un-American, cracking the melting pot we emerged from. Someday people will look back at the innuendoes about Mr. Obama with the same disgust with which we regard the smears of Al Smith as a Catholic candidate in 1928.

I’m writing in part out of a sense of personal responsibility. Those who suggest that Mr. Obama is a Muslim — as if that in itself were wrong — regularly cite my own columns, especially an interview last year in which I asked him about Islam and his boyhood in Indonesia. In that interview, Mr. Obama praised the Arabic call to prayer as “one of the prettiest sounds on earth at sunset,” and he repeated the opening of it.

This should surprise no one: the call to prayer blasts from mosque loudspeakers five times a day, and Mr. Obama would have had to have been deaf not to learn the words as a child. But critics, like Jerome Corsi, whose book denouncing Mr. Obama, “The Obama Nation,” is No. 2 on the New York Times best-seller list, quote from that column to argue that Mr. Obama has mysterious ties to Islam. I feel a particular obligation not to let my own writing be twisted so as to inflame bigotry and xenophobia.

Journalists need to do more than call the play-by-play this election cycle. We also need to blow the whistle on such egregious fouls calculated to undermine the political process and magnify the ugliest prejudices that our nation has done so much to overcome.