When you have completed your brainstorming, freewriting, blindwriting or dictating, looping, clustering, or mapping activities, review what you’ve written. In all likelihood, these idea-generating techniques have provided you with a useful list of ideas for a topic. You can select the strongest candidate and generate additional ideas by asking questions. Writers often ask questions to

Each of the chapters in Part Two provides a series of questions that will help you narrow your focus and explore ideas for a particular kind of writing project. You can create your own exploratory questions by pairing question words — what, why, when, where, who, how, would, could, should — with words and phrases that focus on different aspects of a topic.

For example, Bob generated the following questions to explore and focus his topic on what helps veterans readjust to civilian life:

What are the biggest challenges facing veterans?

What has been helpful to me as I adjust to life back home?

What kinds of support can families, friends, schools, and communities give to veterans?

Which situations have helped and which have hurt my readjustment?

When and where do veterans have success readjusting to civilian life?

How can we minimize the emotional and physical effects of being at war?

Is it possible for workplaces to be sensitive to veterans’ needs?

Should the state be involved in encouraging employment opportunities for veterans?

Are there jobs that would allow veterans to work but still get the benefits of being outdoors?

As you ask questions, be aware of the role you are adopting as a writer. If you are writing an informative essay, for example, the words what, when, and where are appropriate. If you are conducting an analysis, you might use the words why and how. If you are interested in goals and outcomes, try the words would and could. If you want to determine an appropriate course of action, ask questions using the word should.

The questions you ask will probably change as you learn more about a topic, so it’s best to think of them as flexible and open-ended. By continuing to ask questions that reflect your growing understanding of a topic, you can build a solid foundation for your own contribution to the conversation.