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How to do a writing sprint

Writing sprint

Writing sprint is writing in a short time but at a full speed. It is completely shutting your editor’s eye and blazing through in writing.

There is the five thousand words in an hour

Types of writing sprints

We can classify writing sprint based on the genre of writing

Genre

Poetry sprint

This is the type you write a poem at a very short time and with full speed

I did a poetry sprint where I wrote a poem every five minutes for two hours . 

I wrote twenty poems.

Fiction Sprint

The genre of choice is fiction for this kind.

Writing a novel,shortstory,flash fiction

Nonfiction Sprint

It is writing nonfiction like articles, blogpost etc

Word count

This could be in any genre or type of writing. The aim is to write a specific number of words at a particular time.

1000 words

5000 words.

Most writing sprints outputs are judged based on the word count turn out.

Length of time

In this kind of writing sprint you set out to write for length of time with no particular word count mind.

You set the time and make sure you are always writing throughout the time .

One hour

Thirty minutes 

Three hours

Why do a writing sprint 

To launch you into the creative mode

Doing a writing sprint can launch you into that mode of writing where the words are just coming out and you do not have to think about it.

When you’re in this mode words do not seem a burden .

You are flying in writing rather than walking.

You feel the tossing of the wind .

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You soar like an eagle. With no works to show there is nothing to look back at when our makes us feel that we can’t create.

To stop procrastinating

We have writing projects that we put off . Doing a writing sprint forces you to get the writing done.

When we procrastinate we come up with our false reasons and there are true causes of our procrastination. 

One of the reasons is that we are scared that we will ever make progress.

Shut the editor’s eye

When we hold our pen to write .

We stare at the blank screen or paper

Turn out a lot of work in a short time 

Writing sprint can help write a lot in a short time for an urgent task or to quickly build your portfolio

How to do a writing Sprint

A writing Sprint consist of three stages the prewriting/planning stage ,writing and post writing stage.

Planning 

I used to make the mistake of taking planning,reading about writing as writing.

When doing a writing Sprint you have less time to think.

Planning beforehand or at least having a sense of what is to be done makes it easier.

You can also use hand to sketch what you will be writing about

You can use a tools like Asana or Trellohttps://Trello.com

Brainstorming

Outlining

Gather materials

Make sure all the things you will need are arranged so you won’t have to stop to get something.

It can offset the flow

Writing

This is the writing Sprint.

At this stage you would use your outline as a guide.

Ideas might come up later on 

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Use your voice 

If you’re not super fast at typing you can use your voice .

Voice typing 

You can use Google docs dictation tool for typing extra fast . You will need internet connection to do this.

The downside is that Google docs does not record your voice . Which means that if you forget what you said you might not be able correct the mistake.

Record

Perhaps you don’t want the internet distraction .

You can record yourself and upload to human transcription service like rev.com

You can also use AI powered transcription on happy scribe 

You can upload to https://otter.ai they give you ten hours free every month the system learns as you make corrections.

You get a free ten minutes trial . The tool underlines words that are not clear so you can correct them

Use the five minute technique

In this method you break the large time chunks into five or ten minutes that way you run blazing fast and breath every five minutes.

When we set our long writing sprints into chunks it helps to avoid waste of time .

That way you are able to track the actual time spent on writing.

Set a timer set a timer to track your writing 

Use writing sprint apps and websites

This is not necessary but if you want the stats and the help of a software to help you track your writing you can use writing apps like ohwrite.co and others. They give you the graph of your progress. Also keeping note of word count.

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You can also do writing sprints with others by creating a room.

Post writing

This is the editing and assembling of your writing.

Removing tendencies like just, really that are filler words.

Format your work to suite the purpose it was written.

I like to give my work distance of time before editing it.

By Onyemechi Nwakonam

Hi ,I write poetry and short prose. I am excited to help you organise your writing journey.

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