Writing: Selecting a Topic
The first step in writing an effective paragraph is to select a topic that you are
knowledgeable and comfortable writing about. It is worth spending time to
think of possible topics and to discover what you know about each before making
a selection and beginning to write. Chapter 2, pages 47–49 describes four
techniques—freewriting, brainstorming, branching , and questioning—for generating
ideas about a topic.
The student writer we will follow in this chapter, Kate Atkinson, was given
an assignment to write an essay in response to an article about the US and
Russian
education systems. Once she had determined the main point of her
essay,
she worked on developing topics—main ideas—for each of her supporting
paragraphs.