An excellent pre-writing activity is to do a formal outline of your paper before you begin writing. Once you have your thoughts organized in outline form, you will be able to follow your outline as your draft your paper.

There are several good explanations of how to write a formal outline available online. Following are several representative examples. You do not need to read all of the material on these pages. Just pick the page(s) that makes the most sense to you and learn from it. Although the authors take different approaches, they all end with the same result.

• "Creating an Outline." The Writing Center. 26 February 2006. American University in Cairo.

• Fessler, Suzanna. "How to Write an Outline." [Course web site for] Japan: Its Culture and Heritage. nd. State Univeristy of New York at Albany.

• Johnson, Tom. "Creating an Outline." Step 5: Outline . May 2004. American University in Cairo.

• "Organizing Your Paper." Student Guides. nd. Lakewood Public Library.

• "The Structure Of The Essay Outline." The UVic Writer's Guide. 11 May 1995. The Department of English, University of Victoria.