One of the many special uses for outlining is in the early Look stage of thinking and planning about a topic. This is sometimes referred to as brainstorming. As this initial creative activity continues, outlining can be used to give it further organization. Once a composition's organization is acceptable, one can proceed directly to the Evoke stage, turning elements of the outline into sentences and paragraphs. Assess stage automated tools such as spelling and grammar checking can be activated at any time. Switching back to normal view hides the outline structure, which instantly prepares the document for the Publishing stage through printing or conversion to HTML or Web format. This tutorial introduces the basic features of outlining in Appleworks or Clarisworks.
Writing practice can often be stimulated through the use of questions. This is simple enough that any age can participate by quickly jotting down ideas and then using outline features to organize the thoughts. It serves as a model for a wide range of brainstorming activities, whether as a group or committee activity, or as part of one individual preparing or planning to compose.
OPTIONAL (and extra credit).
There are two ways to obtain the practice file used in the videoclips above. If one does not work, use the other:
To complete the outlining exercise, open the outlining assignment file (outlinetutorial.cwwp). Read through it. Keep this file open while you work through the video clips. Step by step, play the videoclip, stop and start as needed and carry out the exercises in your outlining file.