Brainstorming Strategy: The List of 10
Generating lots of ideas to get a few good ones.
Chances are, at some point in teaching, you have or will have a student say, “I don’t know what to write about.” When students told me that, I always responded that I knew that couldn’t be true.
The truth about writing is, most of us and our students don’t love doing the work of coming up with ideas. We want them to magically come to us, and then we write a first draft and it’s perfect and voila! Sadly, though, that’s not how the writing process or life in general works.
To remedy this I made my students brainstorm “Lists of 10.” Why 10?
It forces them to keep going after they’d come up with their most obvious, least interesting ideas.
It shows them that when you come up with a surplus of ideas, you’re bound to come up with a few good ones.
For this activity specifically, I have students brainstorming something they like. Incredibly low-stakes, and a great way to get them started on using this “list of 10” process in their writing in general. Once they’ve gotten familiar with this tactic you can use it all throughout the year in various ways—for creative writing, coming up with topic ideas, or preparing for a project.
I created this as an editable PDF so you can share it with you students and have them save their own copy with their ideas. Or, print out the handout for some device-free time. It can also just as easily be done with plain ol’ notebook paper. Whatever works best for you!
Click here to access the teacher instructions and student handout.
If you teach a subject that isn’t English, a great way to use this strategy is to check student’s prior knowledge before teaching a unit or concept. For example, if you’re teaching about weather in a science class, you could have them brainstorm 10 things they have learned about weather before. Then, have them write about the thing they know most about and share. It can lead to some great conversations, help you gauge where they are at, and validate their previous learning on the topic.
May brainstorming lead your students to some creative places this year!
-Jonda