Brainstorming and writing the rough article outline, and the general plan.

 
     “Brainstorming” means writing down the “stream-of-consciousness” ideas that come to you; you must write them down quickly, on paper, without worrying about the structure of these ideas.  Do not try to organize your thoughts!  You should just get them down on paper.  Use the blackboard, or some very old and dirty paper.  When you are brainstorming, use key words, not sentences, so as to record your thoughts, before they are forgotten and lost forever (which can happen very easily).  If it is necessary, write down some of these key words in Chinese.  You can look up the meaning in a dictionary, but do that later, and not now!  Using the dictionary to look up a word, while you are actively creating something, is the surest way to kill off creativity.  Again, use the blackboard, to “test out” all sorts of ideas.  Alternatively, you can use loose slips of paper, or scrap paper.  If other people embarrass you, then do the brainstorming alone.  Allow the process of brainstorming to go on for some time, and not under pressure–five minutes before some deadline.  When you have written down your ideas, let some time go by, to let your thinking mature and alter: this may be necessary, and is not a bad thing.  Some thoughts come at once, and you must catch them quickly, or lose them forever; other thoughts come slowly, and they must be shaped and re-shaped, and allowed to evolve into something which is unknown and invisible at the beginning.  Again, brainstorming over time is like well-aged French brandy; hasty brainstorming is like “rot-gut” and other cheap wine. 
 
     Soon, you will see there are so many ideas!  What do you do with them all, since you only need seven?  You need to “reduce” them to seven only (one Introduction paragraph, five “Body” paragraphs, and one Conclusion paragraph). 
 
     Sometimes, it is good to brainstorm on the blackboard, as you can erase, replace, move and change the words and short phrases you have written.  Or, you can take some scissors, and cut up a sheet of used paper into many small slips; you can write on these slips, and move them about over the table at will, like playing cards, re-arranging your ideas. 
 
     Look at the mass of information that is spread out before you.  Out of the “mass of ideas”, look for five main ideas: these will become the topics of the five “Body” paragraphs.  (The Introduction and the Conclusion will come later.)  Sometimes, you will see the five main ideas quickly, and you can quickly make them the topics for your Body paragraphs.  Sometimes, you will have many, many ideas.  What can you do?  You can (a) write them onto a list, rank them according to their importance, and cross off the ones after #5, or (b) you can seek to join some of them together, especially if they are somehow closely related.  Use a different-colored pen / chalk to link together the related words (if you are using a large sheet of scrap paper / the blackboard), or move the small slips of paper together (if you have cut up your paper into small pieces).  After thinking about the problem, and moving your ideas around, you will finally end up with five ideas.  You may have to throw away some ideas: that is alright.  Then, rank them, according to their order (i.e., #1, #2, #3, #4, #5).  Only after you have chosen your five “Body” paragraph main ideas can you do the Introduction and Conclusion paragraph main ideas.  Why so?  Most people find it difficult to start their thinking at the Introduction; they say, “How do I begin?”  This is a form of “writer’s block”.  One way to get around this problem is to ignore the beginning, and start at the middle.  Many people have found this to be a good way to start.  If you want to start at the beginning, that is also alright. 
 
     When you are choosing the five main ideas for the Body, you should consider the following:  (a) do they cover the topic?, (b) can each idea support seven sentences (that is, TS, S1, S2, S3, S4, S5, CS)?, (c) do I have enough research materials to back up what I am writing about (if you are doing a research paper)?  Remember, it is better to choose five main ideas that can lead to productive writing, not just five ideas that you happen to like.  Sometimes, the ideas that you like are bankrupt and can yield little information, and the ideas that you do not like are like a gold mine. 
 
     To see specific examples of the general plan, please refer to the next section, “Examples of Expository Article Plans”.