Before enrolling in college, most students have not been encouraged to write using their own views on a subject. Students are usually given a topic and taught how to adhere to it. Free writing exercises allow students full control over the topic. Without this element, students may come to see writing as a formal and distant process that they have little or no interest in.
The removal of guidelines pertaining to grammar and organization can allow students to write without worrying about adhering to strict rules outside of the topic. This can allow students to write without anxiety or pressure, putting them in full control of the content they are writing about. This can allow their expressive capacity to grow in ways that they have never experienced before.
Most students are taught in high school that all essays must be divided into five paragraphs; lifting that organizational restriction will encourage students to decide which ideas should be used, how much space should be given to each idea and how those ideas should be organized. All of these are essential critical thinking skills.
In whatever major a student will choose in college, he will more than likely be faced with lengthy and challenging writing assignments in senior-level courses. These assignments would be more difficult if the students didn't have the experience with a personalized, emotional perspective and organizational demands of free writing exercises.