English 363 Conference Preparation Sheet #1

All conferences will be held in our usual classroom

What to Bring:

● All prewriting you’ve conducted to write your review (work conducted so far)
● Your team’s Review of Literature Grid (one per group)
● This sheet, completed BY YOUR GROUP (in other words, one per group; an incomplete
sheet can only receive a “C” grade).

Questions:

1. Review the prewriting you’ve collected. What strategies are you currently using? We call
these techniques “prewriting” whether you do them before or during the drafting process. Circle
the processes you currently use, and/or describe alternate processes you’ve used.

Idea generation or inscription:

Freewriting Brainstorming Listing Rhetorical Triangle

Other:

Idea organization:

Outlines Points-to-Make List Storyboard Clustering

Rough Plan Venn Diagram

Other: We have also participated in a “laying out” method. This involves analyzing which
source will go within what paragraph, and then indicating the placement by writing
“background,” “cause,” or “solution” on the front page of the source. It is very similar to
the literature grid, but it is a more physical representation and allows for more team
participation.
 Research:

Reading published texts Interviewing Conducting experiments

about your subject

(videos, articles, books, Reviewing model reviews

webpages, etc.)

Other:

2. Did you create a work schedule for your group’s project? If so, list the milestone deadlines
you have met so far. List any milestone deadlines you’ve missed and explain what you can do
in the coming weeks to meet future due dates.

We have agreed that we will fully complete, or almost complete, our work the day before
the deadline in order to review any possible errors before submission. In order to leave room for
any further revisions, we also plan to do a check-in with one another a week before the due date
to make sure that we are all on the right track towards meeting our goal. So far, our team has
met all of our milestone deadlines, such as researching journal guidelines, finding evidence for
our review, the group charter, and review of literature grid.

3. Each student should write a paragraph to answer this question. Using bullet points or a
numbered list, describe your usual writing process below (just list the actions you take to
complete a writing assignment). Which prewriting, drafting, or revision strategies do you wish
you were using? Which strategies would you like to discuss and practice in a future class?

Student #1 (Name: Ashley Roach):

Usually when I am writing, I reference this process…

1. Bullet point ideas on paper.

2. Develop an outline of my ideas, usually a bulleted list on my computer.
3. Transfer bulleted list into paragraph organization.
4. Create a “in progress” title.
5. Develop Work Cited page.
6. Begin with Introduction for the first day of writing.
7. Complete body paragraphs the following day.
8. Finish the next day or the same day with my conclusion.
 9. Go through and revise. I usually take this time to check grammar, possibly delete any
excess paragraphs or verbage, fix verb tense, and use the thesaurus tool on Word to
avoid using the same word.
10. Change my title to fit the subject of my paper.

I am hoping to use more clustering and free-writing in my future classes. I usually tend to
take a more structured approach when I write, but I feel adding this idea generation and
organization into my regime could potentially reduce my stress of creating the “perfect” outline
and allow me to enjoy my overall experience.

Student #2 (Name: Xavier Blanks):

My system of writing is not organized nor it is it efficient. This is my outline:

1. List out the main ideas of my research

2. Bullet point the main objectives that I’m trying to write about for my main ideas
3. Go through my articles and such to find the necessary info I need for each main idea
4. Directly highlight the information for main ideas from my articles
5. List out that information underneath each main idea
6. Formulate my research into comprehensive paragraphs
7. Write out each paragraph making sure that my research supports a specific main idea
8. Once I’m done with each paragraph I then go back to write the introduction and the
conclusion
9. I then go through what I’ve written and reread to look for any mistakes in grammar and
to make sure that my ideas are properly support my main ideas
10. Ask someone else to read through my paper to ensure that there are no other mistakes

I would really like to better go through my research better through annotation. One of the
biggest problems that I've had writing research papers is not finding proper information to best
support my ideas. By being involved in this group project, I would really like to better grow in my
writing skill by effectively formulating my research better on paper.

Student #3 (Name: Madison Lavecchia):

My usual writing style isn’t the most organized. I roughly follow this outline:

1. Start writing a list of ideas on a blank Word Document.

2. Add quotes from my literature to the document.
3. Determine audience/writing style needed.
4. Add a working title.
5. Start to form those ideas into paragraphs.
6. I tend to jump around between the paragraphs as I get new ideas.
 7. Scan through and determine which paragraphs still need more information.
8. Read through and determine which sentences need rephrasing or even paragraphs
would flow better in a different order.
9. Look for any grammatical errors and maybe change words if a certain word in repeated
often in one paragraph.
10. If possible, have someone review my work before I submit it.
11. Finish up all revisions and update title if needed.

I’m hoping that throughout this class my writing style can become more honed. I would like
to apply more into my pre-writing process like clustering. I tend to just start writing and see what
happens but I feel this doesn’t always allow me to set an intention for my writing and determine
everything I need/want to touch on.