The Bedford Researcher
Mike Palmquist
www.bedfordresearcher.com
My Research Project: Generate Ideas about a Topic
In your research log, use brainstorming, freewriting, looping, and clustering to generate ideas
for a topic.
Brainstorm responses to the following questions.

What do I want to accomplish with this project?

What interests me personally about this project?

What interests me academically about this project?

Who are my readers?

What topics do my readers need to read about?

What topics would my readers like to read about?
Freewrite in response to one of the following prompts, replacing the Xs with the ideas for topics
that you generated during your brainstorming session. Before you begin, set a goal of a certain
number of minutes or a set amount of pages you will write.

Writing about X will help me accomplish the following purposes:

I am personally interested in X because . . .

I am academically interested in X because . . .

My readers need or would like to know about X because . . .
Select a response from your freewriting activity and carry out the following looping exercise.
1. Paste the response at the top of your word processing file or write it at the top of a page
in your notebook. Then freewrite for five more minutes about the response.
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The Bedford Researcher
Mike Palmquist
www.bedfordresearcher.com
2. Identify the best idea in this freewriting.
3. Freewrite for five more minutes about the idea you’ve identified.
4. Repeat the process until you’ve refined your idea into a potential topic.
Generate additional ideas about your potential topic by using a clustering exercise.
1. In the middle of a sheet of paper, or in the center of a digital document (word
processing file or graphics file), write your potential topic.
2. Identify ideas that are related to your central topic and list them near it. Think about the
importance and relevance of each related idea, and draw lines and circles to show the
relationships among your ideas.
3. Write additional ideas related to the ideas in Step 2. In turn, draw lines and circles to
show their relationships to the other ideas in your cluster.
4. Repeat the process until you’ve created a cluster of ideas that represents your current
understanding of the topic you are considering.
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