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English 1121 Project: Discovery Writing
Exploring What Is On Your Mind
Goals:
1. to teach you that you always have lots to write about and that you
can get it out without too much agony;
2. to practice some brainstorming and discovery writing strategies
that may be new to you;
3. to introduce this semester's theme and explore topics that you might
choose for your other projects this term.
Main Assignment | Study
Topic | 6-Day Plan for Completing this Project
| Process Memo | Project
Requirements | Additional Readings
Main Assignment:
Write: Produce at least ten pages of discovery writing
by
trying the free-writing and mapping strategies described at the
Writers'
PLACE in Discovery Grove.
My advice is that you do not try to write all ten pages in one sitting.
Spread this writing out over about five days, trying to write for twenty
to thirty minutes a day -- a couple of pages at a time. You do want to
spend more than a few minutes per session; otherwise, you will always be
making notes about what is on the surface of your mind distracting you
at the moment. It takes more time, at least twenty minutes, to cut through
the surface stuff and get down to what is really on your mind. You may
want to begin each writing session with a few minutes of free-writing about
all the things that are distracting you and getting in the way of your
writing right now. Then try to focus on the topic that is suggested in
that day's exercise.
Read and think: after you have completed your 10 pages, read back
over what you have written. Can you discover any startling connections,
tangents, leaps, or obsessions? Try Thinking in
Discovery Grove. Describe your experience of this discovery writing,
reading and thinking in a process memo to me.
To complete this project in one week, you may want to follow the 6-day
plan step-by-step.
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6-Day Plan for Completing this Project
Day 1: Write to discover what is on your mind.
Day 2: Write to decide what to write about.
Day 3: The Writers' PLACE: Focused
Free-writing -- Continue with the questions or issue you wrote about
yesterday or choose another one of the topics from the list you made on
Day 2 and write at least 2 pages about it.
Day 4: The Writers' PLACE: Blind-Writing
or invisible writing (see Handbook, p. 32) -- Choose one of the
topics from the list you made on Day 2 and try blind-writing 2 pages.
Day 5: The Writers' PLACE: Mapping
or
clustering (see Handbook, p. 32) -- Make a map or cluster of two
of the topics chosen from the list you made on Day 2.
Day 6: Write your process memo.
Read and think: after you have completed your 10 pages, read
back over what you have written. Can you discover any startling connections,
tangents, leaps, or obsessions? Try Thinking in
Discovery Grove. Describe your experience of this discovery writing,
reading and thinking in a process memo to me.
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Process Memo:
Write 1 1/2 to 2 pages of process writing about what happens
when you work in Discovery Grove. Draft this process writing as a memo
to me, your teacher.
Sample memo: Student Process Memo
What should you say in your memo? Here are some suggestions:
Do you usually like to write or do you dislike writing? Why? Describe your
best and/or your worst writing experience.
Did you visit Discovery Grove this week? Which strategies did you use?
Were any of the exercises or readings particularly helpful or confusing?
What discoveries did you make during your private writing? About yourself
as a writer ... about your attitudes toward writing ... about your writing
process ... about what is on your mind?
What topic(s) did you write about?
Were you obsessed with one topic or did you write about several topics?
Why do you want to write about these topics?
Finally, at the end of your memo, tell me if you have any concerns about
this class or about your writing. Do you have any personal goals that are
not mentioned in the syllabus? Be sure to ask me questions about the class
and about your writing. I will write answers back to you.
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Project Requirements
To receive credit for completing this project, you must:
___ count off your 10 pages of discovery writing.
___ turn in your process memo (1 1/2 to 2 pages, typed).
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Additional Readings about Discovery Writing
-
Cameron, Julia.
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The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity. New York:
G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1992.
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Dorough, Donna K.
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"Mapping for Understanding: Using Concept Maps as Windows to Students'
Minds." The Science Teacher Jan. 1997: 36.
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Elbow, Peter and Pat Belanoff.
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A Community of Writers. (2nd ed.) New York: McGraw-Hill, 1995, 99-121.
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Goldberg, Natalie.
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Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within. Boston: Shambhala,
1986.
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Gorrell, Donna.
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"Central Question for Prewriting and Revising." Teaching English in
the Two-Year College. Feb. 1996: 34-38.
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Murray, Donald M.
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"What--and
How--to Write When You Have No Time to Write." The Writer Sept.
1996:5. (Available on line)
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Murray, Donald M.
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"Write
What You Don't Know." The Writer May 1998: 7. (Available on-line).
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Reynolds, Mark.
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"Make Free-Writing More Productive." College Composition and Communication
39 (Feb. 1988):81-82.
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