Writing to Think. National Writing Project Occasional Paper No. 4.

Intended for writing teachers, from middle-elementary level through college, this booklet describes a teaching method that lets students write their own way into ideas, merging personal experience with intellectual thought in expository writing. The booklet first describes in greater detail the concept of writing to think as focused free writing--required but not graded or revised--that allows students to bring vague perceptions to a verbal level explicit enough for them to reconsider or extend. It then presents four examples, writing samples from two students who write easily and two who have difficulty, to illustrate different kinds of mindwork made possible by this kind of thinking on paper. Discussion of the examples focuses on the personal and intellectual qualities present in the writings. (HTH)