6-D Writing Tips

The students in 6-D contributed the following suggestions for good writing:

1. Re-read what you have written. Read it perhaps three times. Read it several different ways: silently, or saying it out loud.
2. Don't try to be serious all the time. Have some fun.
3. Express yourself. Don't be intimidated by others or compare yourself too much to others. If you express yourself rather than imitating someone else, it will be better writing. Then you know that it comes from you, not from others. You can take some things from other people, but not everything.
4. Vary your writing ideas. Make it interesting by writing about different things.
5. Choose whether you're going to be funny or serious, and stick with it.
6. Put some pizzazz in your writing. Emotion.
7. Plan out what you're going to write before you write it. You don't have to plan out every sentence, but plan out the topic and the tone.
8. Write what you can, not what you can't. Don't force yourself.
9. Be creative. Don't be afraid to be bizarre.
10. Try different genres. Don't limit yourself to one.
11. Write something that sounds like you, if it is read out loud.
12. Don't rush your writing. Don't try to be the first one finished every time. Your writing will be better if you do it nice and slow.
13. If you're writing a true story, write from the heart and not the mind. Don't make things up.
14. If you have feelings that you express yourself, don't be scared to put them out there in the poem. No one is going to know who is expressing himself.
15. Don't write the first thing that pops into your head. Don't settle for the easy, obvious idea.
16. Feel free to use more than one idea.
17. Watch out for spelling mistakes. Spell is check is one tool you can use. Get a partner to correct it. Use a dictionary.
18. Lean back and read so you don't miss anything. Read things upside down. Read from a distance.
19. Watch out for run-on sentences and fragments. Read it aloud.
20. Give details. Make your description richer.
21. Be specific in your writing.
22. Placement: Sometimes things might not make sense where you put it, and you might want to put it somewhere else in the story.
23. Start in the middle of the action. (in medias res)
24. Know how to use your words. Know what big words mean if you want to use them.
25. Don't use boring or over-used words.
26. Use adjectives carefully. Use adverbs carefully.
27. Take a different approach to writing. Don't always start in the beginning. You can start in the end, you can start in the middle.
28. Write a rough draft.
29. Brainstorm.
30. Don't write what someone tells you to write. Write what you think yourself.
31. It's important, if you're writing a factual piece of information, to use examples and tell the source you got it from.