Hi Abdul, the first thing NOT to do is panic! Collect your thoughts and analyze the problem. A huge component to architecture is learning how to problem-solve. Try doing some bubble diagrams to get a feel for what types of spaces you need to design. You don't necessarily have to know what they are going to look like yet. Just get a feel for what needs to be accounted for and programmed (i.e. number of rooms, lobby space, laundry room, housekeeping space, front of house, back of house, etc.) Next, I'm not sure what your concepts are or what year you're in, but try keeping the form simple if you're having trouble with it physically. If you have problems sketching ideas out, take what you think is your strongest concept and build some sketch models out of chipboard or something cheap and that you can work with quickly. This helped me out tremendously when I was in school. Remember that the site and context of the project should always be in the back of your mind when thinking about the concept for your design. Is it located in a city or the country? Does it overlook a lake or body of water? Does it sit on a hill or is the site flat? These are some of the questions to think about that could impact your design. Finally, nobody is going to really be able to tell you exactly what to do. Many architects have differing opinions, philosophies, and styles when it comes to design; so there isn't going to be a "right" answer. Whatever you decide to come up with, make sure you believe in it, and pursue it with passion! Hope this helps you out a little bit and best of luck!

Did your professor give you more instructions than just "low rise apartment?" Short of any other ideas, I can tell you that I lived in Paris for years where everyone lives in apartments and the problem is always storage - and especially storage for a couple of things - laundry, bikes/strollers and garbage. If you could figure out a good way to get those things in a decent apartment space, you're a genius.

What's the site like? What sort of community is it part of? What's the target market? How many units is your imaginary developer looking for? There are lots of questions to think about before you get to the detailed design.
Will the bldg be (more or less) rectangular, with a double loaded corridor? Is there a street that will orient the front entrance? What about parking? Garbage and recycling? What about materials? Do you want the building to fit in - to be polite to its neighbours?
Whoever is teaching your studio should be much more helpful in discussion...
- an architect

Agree that the professor must give more parameters. The architect's job is not to design the floor plan, it's all these other questions - first and foremost is the market and price range of the building and it's environment, ,which determines the range of materials and then locating it in it's site. Etc., Etc.

Unless the professor wants you to invent the site and go from there - I mean, is this a senior project?

nononanna...disagree. Architect's job is most certainly to figure out the floor plan as a response to answering the rest of the questions. I agree you don't just draw a floor plan out of thin air, but if the architect isn't responsible for the floor plan...who is?

We like to think the architect is responsible for ALL of it - but we do tend to have clients with budgets, markets to cater to and municipalities with regulations....

nFORMAL - I don't mean that they DON'T worry about that, but that there's a ton of stuff they do BEFORE that., much of which the public doesn't really see. If a new building goes up and it looks good in it's spot, nobody thinks of the work that went into placing it properly, etc. they just see that it looks right.