Throughout my travels here at UMW, I’ve come across a lot of tools for school on the web.
But I have to say the one I’ve gotten the most use out of is 750words.
photo courtesy of feuillu
The basic concept is pretty simple, you use their nifty little interface to scribble out 750 words of your choosing. It can be gibberish but that kind of defeats the whole purpose.
What I really use it for is to get the juices flowing. Brainstorming. Freewriting is a great way to get started, simply just writing out your thoughts sometimes can help you clear your head to get on to the important stuff. Or use your words to jump start a project you weren’t sure about. Write a letter to your grandma or a poem about bagels, it really doesn’t matter.
The great thing about 750words is that you get awards for how you use the site, akin to the foil star stickers you used to get on your papers in kindergarten, called badges. There’s a Night Bat badge if you frequently write in the late evening, and the Albatross badge if you write for 30 days in a row. I’m the kind of person that excels with reward systems, and I’m sure some of you out there feel the same.
If you’ve got a paper to write, the clean, no-distractions window makes it easier. You wanna vent or solve world hunger, do it, it’s all anonymous so nobody can steal your brilliance.
Another cool feature is that you can get your writing evaluated into a little personality chart. It’ll tell you if, on average, your writing is affectionate or self-important, if you’re more concerned with death or money, and how many times you swear in an average post. I’m up to an average of 26 curse words per entry apparently.
750 words seems like a lot (3 pages double spaced, actually) but you’ll find that once you get into the groove you’ll fly past that amount.