WEEK

ELEVEN

116
 Academic Skills
BRAINSTORMING
How Can I Come Brainstorming is a technique to

up with Ideas for

come up with spontaneous ideas
for a specific problem.

a Composition? Individual brainstorming normally

includes free writing, word association,
mind maps, and saying ideas to yourself
out loud. Individual brainstorming also
01  Read the lesson question and the responses stimulates creative thought.
below. Do you agree with them? Share your ideas with
the rest of the class. There are four basic rules for brainstorming
›› Do not judge an idea.
“My classmates “I generally repeat some ›› The wilder the idea, the better.
and I ask things in my writing because ›› Aim for quantity, not quality.
many teachers I don’t have many ideas.” ›› Combine and improve ideas once you’re finished.
and peers for
feedback before An individual brainstorming usually
writing.” ›› defines the problem or topic.
“I usually ›› comes up with as many ideas as possible.
read a lot before ›› defines the best idea or solution.
“This is my problem: I start writing. It ›› starts writing the text.
I don’t know what always helps.”
else to write.”
03  Look at the situation and the diagram below. Make a diagram in
your notebook and brainstorm ideas for your text.

02  Read the text “Brainstorming.” Answer

the following questions. Your teacher has asked you to write an article in which you
recommend which apps to download to your smartphone. You need
1. How can you use brainstorming when you to mention four, mention their advantages and disadvantages, and
prepare to write? say who would like each one of them the most.

2. Which rule for brainstorming is the most

difficult? Why?

04  Work in groups of three. Read each other’s texts and

answer the following questions.

›› Do you think you could have gotten more ideas if you had done
the brainstorming together?
›› Did you have problems thinking about new ideas? Why or
why not?
›› How often do you stop and think before writing something?

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