One thing that we know for certain about writing is that writing is a process, not a single, isolated action. What this means is that what we call “writing” is really a broad, overarching term for a number of closely related actions that culminate in the creation of an essay, book, story, report, or other piece of written communication. It’s also a process that may look different depending on the complexity of the end result. Think of it like cooking: we might think of cooking as a single action, but even making something as simple as a microwave dinner involves several steps. We have to decide what we want to eat, ensure we have all of the ingredients, oftentimes go through several stages of preparation, and plate and serve the dish. Writing is a process in much the same way.

Another thing we know for certain is that no two people have the same writing process. Some writers might need complete silence to work, while others work best with music. Some may need periodic breaks, while others might prefer to get everything done in one, uninterrupted sitting. You can see the variability of the writing process rather easily by simply doing a Google search for “writing process.” You’ll see that many of the results have a different number of steps; for instance, the University of Lynchburg lists five steps, the University of Kansas has a graphic detailing eight, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology outlines four steps. With all of that variance, how are we to possibly know what the writing process actually looks like?

The short answer is that you should view these different conceptions of the writing process, and the one that we will outline in this chapter, as tools for helping you develop your own process. The point here is not to provide you with a one-size-fits-all approach that everyone can apply with the same level of success. Rather, you should think of this chapter as outlining what some parts of a successful writing process might be,and incorporate them into your own process in a way that makes sense to you. Ultimately, your goal should be to develop an individual process that is flexible and that you will be able to use not just in this class but in any writing that you do in the future. Developing and understanding your writing process allows you to efficiently plan the amount of time it will take you to complete a project, or how you can compress the project into a short period of time if you have a quick deadline. Writers who know their process will go through the same steps to complete a project whether they have a month or an hour to do so.

While every writer’s process is different, there are some basic steps that are common for almost all writers, though they might be called different things, combined, divided, etc. The steps of the writing process that will be outlined in this chapter are:

• Invention
• Research
• Drafting
• Feedback
• Revision
• Editing

While we have presented these in their most common order, and the order in which they’ll be presented to you in class, keep in mind that the writing process is recursive. This means that most writers will revisit various stages throughout their process, bouncing between them out of order and sometimes blending them together. For instance, you might do all of your research, then get to drafting and realize halfway through that you could really use one more source – and that’s totally normal! In that case, you should revisit the research stage. In any case, don’t feel like you need to follow these steps in a one-by-one, linear fashion. Rather, work them into your process in a way that makes sense to you.

Invention

The invention stage is when you begin the process of trying to form and develop an argument, paper, or other piece of communication. We call this stage “invention” as a broad catch-all that includes a number of different actions that take place throughout the writing process, and we can think of it simply as how we generate ideas.

Invention is a stage that will likely look different for everyone, because we all generate ideas differently. It is also a stage that can occur at many places throughout the writing process – after all, while invention often encompasses the very early stages of finding a topic to write about, we generate ideas throughout the writing process. We are continually trying to find the best way to say something, trying to decide which idea should come next, and trying to find new ways to express our ideas to avoid repetition.

We will discuss invention more in Chapter Two: Topic Selection.

Research

The next step of the writing process is research. The research stage might look different depending on the type of project that you are doing, but most writing involves research of some form or another. Perhaps that research consists of finding examples of an unfamiliar genre of writing to help you understand how to approach it – or it might include finding a number of sources to learn more about your topic, use as evidence, and support your points.

Research also does not just have to include simply looking things up online. Depending on the type of project you are doing, your research might include interviews, experiments, surveys, or a number of other methods. These are all valid forms of research.

As noted above, research is a recursive stage of the writing process. You’ll usually do most of your research early, but you may need to continue researching throughout the writing process. For instance, you might start writing and realize that you need more evidence for one of your points. That is completely normal, and you should feel free to dive back into research at any point in your writing process.

We will discuss research in depth in Chapter Three: Research.

Drafting

There is a lot of writing that occurs throughout the writing process – for instance, freewriting during the drafting stage, writing summaries to help you understand difficult sources in the research stage – but drafting is when you actually start to write what will end up as your final product.

Drafting can be a complex step and will look different for everybody. Usually, it will be a step that you return to multiple times as you get feedback and complete various different drafts of a project. We recommend completing at least two drafts of any one project: a first draft that you get feedback on, and a final, revised draft.

However, use as many drafts as you need and have time for! You should also feel free to write in whatever order feels right to you – drafting does not always need to be a linear process where you start with your introduction and write your way to your conclusion. Sometimes, it can be best to start in the middle and write a body paragraph or point that you are very confident in and comfortable with first – this can be a great way to get over writer’s block. Some writers even prefer to write their introduction last – this helps them ensure that the introduction lines up with what they actually wrote in the rest of the draft.

However you approach drafting, here is where you will want to focus on things like rhetoric (Chapter 5), the parts of an essay (Chapter 6), organization (Chapter 6), and Style (Appendix). For more on each of these, see the appropriate chapter.

Feedback

Feedback is an incredibly important step of the writing process for any writing project – academic, professional, or otherwise. That feedback might come from a variety of places – instructors, friends, mentors, co-workers, supervisors, and even yourself! All of these are important sources for improving your writing. In this section, we will focus on self feedback, peer feedback, and instructor feedback.

Self Feedback

Self feedback can be very difficult for many writers. Often times, it’s difficult to step back and take an objective look at our own writing. However, it’s very important to develop the ability to do so. Sometimes you won’t have the opportunity or time to have an outside reader, and the only feedback that you will get will be from yourself!

Writers struggle with reviewing their own writing for a variety of reasons. First, it’s difficult for many people to get into the minds of their audience and understand how they might read a piece. You might think that the connections between your ideas are obvious, for instance, but it might not be so obvious to your reader, and it’s difficult to know when that’s the case.

 

It can also be difficult to see errors in your own writing such as typos. Oftentimes, your brain will trick you as you read your own writing. Your brain knows what it meant to write, so it will see it as that regardless of what you actually wrote! This can also cause you to simply skim through some parts of your paper too quickly and not give them enough attention since, again, you know what it should be saying. Of course, what you actually wrote might be a different story entirely.

Finally, the other side of self feedback is that some writers are too critical of their own writing. While it is important to be able to analyze your own work, for many writers the maxim that “you are your own worst critic” holds true. These writers may be too harsh on their own writing, which can lead to issues of confidence and self-doubt. Sometimes this can manifest in the writing itself or cause writers not to turn in their work because they fear that it’s not good enough. If this is you, the most important thing to do is to avoid negative self-talk. Try to practice constructive criticism with yourself, as you would with a friend. Compliment yourself for what you do well along with working to find areas for improvement. And finally, use outside feedback sources – if they tell you that something looks good, don’t let your own negative thoughts negate that positive feedback!

Peer Feedback

Peer review is an incredibly helpful form of feedback – in fact, academic journals use it to determine what counts as acceptable, rigorous work! However, whereas the peer review that academic journals use involves experts reviewing the work of other experts, in your classes peer review will involve students giving feedback to other students. And it’s never a bad idea to practice peer review even when it’s not set up for you by making study groups in other classes, asking your friends and fellow students for peer review, and making use of peer tutors in the Student Success Center.

Peer review helps you develop the skills of providing feedback, analyzing writing, and assessing and incorporating the feedback of others, which are all valuable, lifelong skills. It also has the benefit of letting you see what your classmates are doing, which can help give you ideas if you’re struggling with your own work. Your peers’ feedback is a valuable source to draw on, as well – they will often see things from a different perspective or focus on different areas than your instructor might, which will help strengthen your writing overall. For this reason, the first step of successful peer review is simply being open to receiving feedback from your classmates. Keep in mind that everyone is in the same position, doing the same assignment, and we are all simply trying to help one another succeed.

The other crucial part of peer review is learning how to give effective feedback yourself. The first step of doing so is reflecting on feedback you’ve gotten in the past. What feedback has been most useful to you? What do you think good feedback looks like? How would you want your peers to give you feedback? The answers to these questions will help you model your own peer review style.

Here are some other tips for developing effective feedback:

Always give explanations for your feedback, in as much detail as you can. It’s okay if you don’t know the exact wording of a specific grammar or writing rule, but you want your feedback to be a little more than just “I like this paragraph” or “This sentence is confusing.” Those are not particularly helpful comments because they don’t give the other writer anything to actually work on – that writer does not know what you like about the paragraph or why you find the sentence confusing. So, try to articulate the why as much as possible in your peer reviews.

For example, you might write that the thesis “9/11 was a tragic day for many Americans” isn’t argumentative – and you’d be correct! However, simply stating that doesn’t give the writer any ideas about how to make the thesis argumentative – they might not understand what an argumentative thesis is or how to write one, which would make this comment difficult for them to use. So, instead, you might write “This thesis could be more argumentative if you add a because statement to the end of the thesis.” This gives the writer a concrete suggestion that can help them improve their work.

Practice constructive criticism. Having your work reviewed by others is a vulnerable position to be in, so be sure to provide the writer with both things that you like about their writing and things that you think can be improved. A great strategy for doing this is using the compliment sandwich – identify one thing you like, then one thing that you think could use work, then one more thing you like.

Along similar lines, avoid wholly negative criticism. Don’t simply point out everything that you think is wrong with an essay, and avoid using a negative, insulting, condescending, or brash tone. You may think that it’s better to be direct, but overly negative feedback often simply does not get incorporated at all – and it’s likely that those peers will not be thrilled to work with you in the future.

Also avoid wholly positive feedback. You may have the impulse to simply tell a peer that their writing is great because you want to be nice, you’re not sure how to give feedback, or you fear that criticism could lead to confrontation. However, while it’s great to be nice to others and tell them positive things about their writing, the problem with only providing positive feedback is that it is not helpful. It gives the writer nothing to improve on, which defeats the purpose of feedback. No one’s writing is perfect on the first try (the authors of this book included!), and everybody has room for improvement.

Consider the assignment prompt and rubric. If you’re not sure where to start with your feedback, look at the assignment prompt and any rubric that you have been given. Don’t be afraid to simply use language directly from these to help jump-start your feedback. In peer review, think of these items as resources to help guide your feedback.

Read the entire paper before commenting. Doing this can help you to think in big-picture terms rather than getting bogged down in sentence-level issues like spelling or grammar. Instead of going line by line and commenting as you go, consider reading the whole essay and considering how well it’s organized, if the points make sense, and how the piece works as a whole.

Remember that simply by being a peer writer you are completely qualified to write a helpful peer review! You are familiar with the assignment, have written your own draft, and understand some of the challenges your peer might have faced while writing. You’ve heard what your instructor has to say about the assignment and have the rubric and assignment prompt. All of this knowledge about this particular writing process can be used to write a helpful peer review.

Instructor Feedback

In writing classes, your instructor will usually have you turn in a first draft that they will give you formative feedback on. At the draft stage, this feedback is not meant to point out things that are “wrong” in your paper – it is meant to help you improve your paper so that you can submit a strong final draft. However, even when you don’t have a draft process set up in a class, you should still feel free to ask your instructors for feedback on early drafts of any writing assignment.

Instructor feedback can sometimes be difficult for students to understand. Instructors are experts in a field, and sometimes use advanced or expert language or concepts without even realizing they’ve done so. After all, these concepts may seem so standard to them that they take them for granted. The most important thing about reviewing feedback from your instructor is to ask them if there is anything that you don’t understand. Most instructors will be more than happy to explain, or even to offer more feedback if you need it!

Your instructors’ office hours are a great resource if you need an explanation of any feedback or need more feedback. Office hours are time that the instructor has set aside to be available to you outside of class – it’s not time that the instructor has set aside to work on other things, write, grade, attend meetings, etc. Office hours are a resource for you, and as such you should make use of them! An added benefit of doing so is that instructors remember students who regularly attend office hours – this shows engagement and that you take your learning seriously. This could be important when grading rolls around, or when you need to secure recommendations from instructors.

Revision

 

Once you’ve received all of the feedback that you can, it’s time to revise your draft. Revision is the step of the writing process when we make changes to things that we have already written. When professional writers are asked to describe their writing process, many emphasize how important revision is. For many, writing is revision.

You may notice that we have listed revision and editing as distinct steps – that is because they are, in fact, distinct processes. Revision involves making global, substantive changes in the content and organization of your writing. Revision is an opportunity to polish your ideas, develop your thinking, and re-envision your project in light of new information. The first step, then, of successful revision is figuring out how to incorporate the feedback that you received in the pervious step.

Approaching feedback

Making large, global changes can be hard, especially when you have a full, finished draft sitting in front of you! Feedback can help give you a starting point for revision. However, it’s certainly possible that you’ve received so much feedback that it can be difficult to untangle all of it and know where to start. Because of this, it’s important to keep in mind that you don’t necessarily need to respond to every single piece of feedback you’ve received. Maybe a point doesn’t seem as important, or maybe you even disagree with a criticism. That’s fine! What’s important is to prioritize the most effective feedback in a way that will help you approach revision strategically.

First, then, you need to organize the feedback you’ve received in order of importance. Thoughtfully consider all of the feedback that you’ve received and look for the feedback that appears to have the most impact. Perhaps there is an area of your paper that has received comments from several reviewers – that is likely an area that you should prioritize. Or, perhaps there is a major issue, like not meeting assignment requirements – you should focus on that before something like correcting typos.

Once you’ve organized your feedback, then you can strategize how to incorporate it. Think about what your feedback is asking you to do. Do you need to do new research? Write a lot of new material? Re-think your overall approach to a subject? Think about how intensive the tasks you have before you are, when your deadlines are, and come up with a strategy to complete the most important revisions in that time frame.

Revising

Once you have crafted a revision strategy, it’s time to get to your revisions. Again, revision is the process of fixing higher-order concerns, such as the focus and clarity of your thesis, the organization of your paper, or having the right amount of information. Revision deals with substantial changes to the ideas that make up your essay and can create a different direction for the paper entirely.

When you revise, look for opportunities to improve the clarity of your thesis, the organization of your arguments, and the strength of your evidence. Focus on making sure that your ideas connect, flow logically, and make sense. Ask yourself if someone who was less familiar with your topic would have enough information to understand. Here are some strategies that can be helpful in revision:

Write an outline of your paper without actually looking at the paper yourself (or any outlines you may have done early in the process). Then, compare it to your paper. Do the outline and the paper match? If not, you may have to work on organization, paragraph structure, and topic sentences.

Write your thesis on a separate sheet of paper and refer to it after reading each paragraph of your essay. Does the essay stay on track?

Put your essay on one half of your computer screen and feedback, rubrics, or the assignment prompt on the other half. Look at them together and see if you can find anything that needs changed.

Print your paper out, then use scissors to cut out each paragraph. Lay them out in front of you and ask yourself if they make sense in that order, and move them around to see if any new ideas come up and if any other organizational schemes make sense.

Last but not least, take a break. Step away from the paper for a bit – maybe even for a day or two, if you have time. Burnout is a real thing, and spending some time away from your paper may help you see it with fresh eyes when you come back to it.

Editing

Editing is the process of addressing lower-order concerns, such as grammar, punctuation, or spelling. Editing should always come at the very end of the writing process, and definitely after revision. This is especially true since revision might involve writing entirely new sentences or paragraphs – which you would then have to edit anyways! It is also important to save editing for last, though, because if you edit too early you risk missing the forest for the trees. That is, you might get so focused on the small, sentence-level issues in your paper that you don’t notice larger, over-arching issues that are more important. After all, issues with organization, evidence, etc. can cause an entire essay to fall apart, whereas a typo here and there isn’t actually going to impact your overall argument.

We can think of editing, then, as polishing an existing work. This might include correcting grammar and mechanical errors, such as spelling, citations, or formatting. This might also include stylistic changes that improve your flow, tone, diction, etc. And of course, while they are called lower-order concerns, these are still important – grammatical issues can cause readers to be distracted or confused, and thus can make it more difficult to accomplish your purpose. And having excellent grammar shows attention to detail and that you take your work seriously. So, while editing is the last step of the process, be sure to take it seriously and do your best with it!

Here are some strategies that might help you with editing:

Read a printed copy of your writing. The change in media from screen to print can give your eyes a break and improve your ability to skim. You might even try using your finger or a pen to trace your text as you read it – this will really help you catch small things.

Read your writing backwards. If you struggle with catching errors in sentence structure, review each sentence in isolation, backwards. Taking the sentences out of context helps spotlight which ones don’t make sense on their own.

Read your writing aloud. As mentioned earlier, reading aloud can help us to catch mistakes that our eyes might not catch on the screen or page. For many folks, it can be difficult to register issues with wordiness or awkward phrasing by reading silently. In those cases, reading aloud is very helpful. This also helps you judge if your sentences would be logical if you actually spoke them in conversation or if you were presenting your paper.

As always, be sure to research any questions you have about grammar, and refer to the Style Appendix for anything that you’re unsure about as you edit.

Conclusion

Let’s recap! In this chapter, we learned about the writing process. While that process looks different for everybody, there are a few stages that are common to most writing situations: Invention, Research, Drafting, Feedback, Revision, and Editing. Learning how to incorporate these stages effectively into your own writing process and in a way that works for you is the first step to becoming the best writer that you can be. While these stages are built into your composition classes at LSUS for you, that will not always be the case. Keep in mind that in the future, you may need to incorporate and plan these steps on your own – and any experienced writer will tell you that doing so will lead to a greatly increased likelihood of success.