Revising and Editing Strategies

To clarify and refine what you've written, you need a more detached perspective than you had as you wrote. You need to read your writing as if you were another person. This is the time to be a critic of your writing.

Ways to detach yourself
1. Wait. Wait at least an hour before trying to revise your draft. It's preferable to wait a day or more to "get distance."
2. Read your writing out loud.
3. Have someone read your paper to you or tape it. Then listen to your words and ideas.
4. Get feedback from another reader. Ask them which ideas are unclear, where they had trouble following your logic, etc.

Separate the revising/editing process into 3 separate stages: revising for content, revising for organization, and editing language for style and correctness.

Revising for Content

• Read over your paper to make sure it says what you want it to say and answers questions the t reader would have.
• Clarify meaning and develop sketchy ideas by elaborating and/or using examples.
• Make an "idea tree" or hierarchy of ideas in your paper to see if they connect logically. Eliminate tangents.
• Make a sentence outline of your paper (thesis + topic sentences of paragraphs) to see if this tells the "whole story."
• Ask yourself these questions:
  • Does your introduction include your thesis statement (1-2 specific sentences) and a preview of your main ideas?
  • Do you repeat key words from your preview as you introduce each main point in the body of your paper?
• -Does each paragraph make one point? Do you introduce the point in the first (topic) sentence of the paragraph?
• Is there convincing evidence and support for each point?
• Do you use transition words to show relationships of ideas between and within paragraphs?
• Does your conclusion echo your introduction (thesis and main points) and make the reader feel as if you have done what you promised?

Editing Language

• Listen as your read your paper outloud; find and correct long complicated sentences that you would never say unnatural sounding language unnecessary repetition of words, phrases or ideas errors such as subject-verb agreement omitted words
• Improve your Style by using active rather than passive verbs preferring verbs to nouns eliminating unnecessary adjectives and adverbs conforming to the conventions of the discipline
• Use resources to eliminate errors in spelling, grammar, punctuation: computer spell-check/grammar-check writers' handbooks dictionary friends or family
• Proofread your final draft. Don't let the teacher be the first one to read your finished paper! Allow time for revising and editing. Care enough to send the very best!

Student Learning Services, Concordia University