Brainstorming paper topics in class

To encourage students to develop good topics for their final project paper, and to help them help each other develop those topics, I devote part of one class session to topic brainstorming. Students divide into groups of 2-4 (depending on class size) and are instructed to come up with one final project idea. I usually give them a few sample topics before they begin this exercise, along with my criteria for the paper. The groups take about 15 minutes to work up a topic, a thesis statement for the topic, and a broad outline of how that thesis would be supported in the paper. The outline exercise helps them to determine if the topic would be feasible. Each group then shares its ideas with the rest of the class, and this discussion often generates even more ideas, or allows groups to fine tune their original topics, based on comments from other students. Students are not required to use these paper ideas (although they may), but the exercise does give them a sense of how choosing a topic is both a creative and an organizational process.

(Courtesy of Laura A. Salsini)