Many students struggle to narrow their topics. Perhaps they feel that only
big topics are important, they fail to recognize the importance of depth, or
they have only a limited understanding of the concept they are supposed to explore.
However, the following activities can help them narrow their topics down to
something more manageable.
Clouse (2001) recommends looping because it allows
for multiple freewrites that eventually may help students see possible topics
that emerge and could be explored with more depth. Students "loop"
by freewriting on a topic for 10 minutes, rereading the freewriting, and then
freewriting on one idea that emerged in the original freewriting. This process
can continue until the student has a topic that is specific enough for the assignment.
Through conversation and careful probing, teachers
can help students think through their topics and possibly narrow them down.
For example, a teacher may ask questions such as the following to help the student
think through the topic: What is the most important thing about this topic?
If you could only write one page about this topic, what would you focus on?
What are three things that are smaller parts of this topic?
Dornan, Rosen, and Wilson (2003) suggest that some
students may feel more comfortable when writing if they can come up with a "game
plan" of what they hope to include in the writing. Students can lay out
what they hope to cover in the writing and then go through the plan with a teacher
or peer to determine whether or not the plan is realistic. If not, with guidance
they can determine which smaller part could be developed into the topic for
an entire essay.
Students write down 10 questions they would
like to answer about their topic, each on a separate note card or sticky note.
Then, they group together questions that are related in some way. Finally, they
select one question or group of questions to use as a more specific topic.
Students state the topic they want to write
about in the form of a question (for example, the topic of "global warming"
may become "What causes global warming?"). Underneath this question,
the student writes several "sub-questions" about different aspects
of the topic (such as "What is global warming?", "What effect
do automobiles have on global warming?" or "How can we solve global
warming?"). They then select one of these questions and write sub-questions
for it until the topic becomes manageable.
Example
In World History, students prepare to explore the causes of a major historical
event in an essay by starting with a large question such as "How does
genocide become acceptable to some members of a society?" or "What
role has technology played in the spread of terrorism?" and then generating
subquestions as a way of making the topic more manageable.
Example
In Theatre Arts IV, students use looping as a way of narrowing down a topic
for an essay analyzing some aspect of American theatre in the fifties.
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