“I can’t think of anything to write at all.”
We’ll show you how to break down any assignment and give you strategies for coming up with ideas. You’ll never sit down at your desk and tap your pencil for three hours again. What we’re going to do is give you a set of tools that will enable you to be productive whenever you sit down to do your writing.
“I have ideas but I don’t know where to start.”
The snarky answer is always, “Start anywhere.” But really, we’ll sit down together to pull the ideas out of your head so you can see them clearly. Then we’ll work on strategies for organizing your ideas and getting them in the right words, so you can clarify where to start–and how to get from there to where you want to finish.
“I can’t seem to find a good thesis/main idea.”
We’ll help you understand what thesis needs to do and how you can explore your ideas to identify your own. Coming up with a thesis is hard; it isn’t just you! But there are a lot of methods and strategies for developing one, and making sure it’s strong enough to make your whole paper hold together.
I can’t write enough without rambling or repeating myself.
We all have more ideas than we think we have, but a lot of writers don’t understand the difference between repeating ourselves (not good) and reinforcing a point (excellent). Also, some ideas seem weak at first until you explore them more fully; suddenly you find you have a lot more to say than you thought.
I don’t know how to write a good conclusion.
Like thesis statements, conclusions are really hard–but again, we know how to help you get there. But a good conclusion can make your whole essay stronger so your readers will sit up and take notice. We’ll help you understand strategies for good conclusions and how to recognize the ways your ideas lead to one.
I don’t know what the problem is: I just know my papers come back with low grades.
We’ll look at the assignments you’ve gotten and clarify what’s going wrong. You may not understand the feedback you’re getting from your teacher, or your teacher may not be giving much feedback. We’ll talk with you about what your teacher wants—and give you strategies to fix the problems.