Strategies for Writing TREE To help me stay on topic when writing. Topic identif

Strategies for Writing
TREE
To help me stay on topic when writing.
Topic identification.
• Clearly identify the topic of the paper you are writing. Make sure that your title clearly
reflects this topic.
• If you are selecting a topic for a paper, then make sure that it is a topic that is wide
enough to get information on and not too wide that there will be too much information.
• If you are given a topic on which to write, then make sure that you understand it. If not,
ask the teacher to fully explain it.
React to each paragraph.
• Examine each paragraph of the paper in relationship to the topic. Either do this as you
write the paper, or do it after you have written the paper.
• Ask yourself why this paragraph is included in the paper and how the paper would be
without this paragraph.
• If a paragraph does not seem to be related to the topic of the paper, then either drop it or
change the content so it is more closely matched to the topic.
Examine each sentence in each paragraph.
• As you write each paragraph or after you have written a paragraph, read it and ask
yourself if each sentence is related to the topic sentence of the paragraph.
• If a sentence does not seem to be related to the topic of the paragraph, then either drop it
or try to change it so that it is related to the topic.
End.
• Write a concluding paragraph or read the one that you have already written, and ask
yourself if it summarizes the main ideas of the paper or comes to a conclusion based on
the information presented in the paper.
• Make sure that you do not introduce any new information that has not been covered
before.
• If the ending includes information that is not relevant, drop it to make it relevant.
Learning Toolbox. Steppingstone Technology Grant. James Madison University, MSC 1903, Harrisonburg, VA
22807.