Transcript Lesson 11 Essentials Video: Brainstorming

NICOLE: My approach to writing a college assignment paper is lots of free writing, a lot of free writing. Literally I dump my thoughts onto the page. I don't worry about grammar. I don't worry about mechanics. I don't worry about logic, clarity, comprehension, nothing.

CATHERINE: Some people work differently. Where they're like, no, no, I'm not going to put it down on the computer until I know it's right. I mean, it's a computer, and it has a backspace key. Get everything out that you can. Get it out of your brain. Well that's what I did. I got it out of my brain. And I was like, OK, well, cool. I have three pages of this.

BILLY: I have a paper due next week, and I just wrote three pages of nonsense. And I know that I'm going to be able to pick it apart and use sections of it. But it got me started on it, and now it's marinating in my brain.

CRISOSTO: It sort of sets up the scope in which I'm going to develop a paper. And then from there—I then start to question a lot of what I've written. And start to answer some of those questions so that I can start to formulate a thesis about what I want to address.

ERIENNE: The first part, I think, was being alert. Being aware of all the resources and pieces that the professor is already giving you before you've had to write anything down.

HYESU: I found I brainstorm better when I have a paper and a pencil. I can't brainstorm on a computer. So, I mean, I'll just start by making lists.

ANGELA: I like to make a bubble. I like to have my main topic and then draw the lines off it trying to get the ideas.

DAN: My brainstorming process for everything now is, more or less, a storyboard. And when I'm writing even. When I'm designing a website. Call them wireframes. Call them what you will. Now I'm using these storyboarding techniques. So scene one, what needs to appear? When does it need to appear? What does it need to look like? That's like paragraph one. That's like point one. And so you just get everything out on your storyboard, whether it's writing it on a computer or actually drawing it. Get that on your storyboard, and then I figure out the moves I need to make to transition between those storyboards. And that's my brainstorming process. It's now more of a storyboarding process for everything.

CHASE: Just have a purge from what's in your head onto the paper. And then after you have it there and it's concrete, it makes it a little bit more comfortable, as far as, finishing the rest of the paper because you feel like you have the puzzle pieces. Now you've just got to put the puzzle together.