Choose a strategy that works for you

• Revise as you write .or not. If revising gives you writer's block, force yourself to wait until you have a strong, close-to-done draft.
• Revise section by section , paragraph by paragraph, and sentence by sentence (usually in that order).
• Whatever you do: evaluate the situation before you make a change, make your changes , and then re-evaluate to see if the paper has improved.

Stage One: Rediscovering your main idea

During this stage, your goal is to rediscover and clarify the paper's focus and scope.

• Review the assignment and its different components. Reread your draft to determine the extent to which you have addressed all of these components. List what you have left out and make time to add them to your paper.
• Reread your draft to find out if what you intended to write about is in fact what you wrote about.
• Underline or highlight the one sentence that expresses your main idea or thesis. If you cannot find such a sentence, write one. If you find several sentences, consider combining them into one, well-worded sentence.
• Questions to consider : What is the thesis of this paper? Does it appear toward the beginning? Is there a competing thesis? If so, where does it appear? Could it confuse the reader? Which thesis seems more consistent with the body of the paper and why?
• Look with a reader's eye to see if you have fully supported your points.
• Questions to consider: Have I assumed my readers know too much? Is my logic valid? Have I fully supported my claims? Is my research relevant? Do I need to do more?
• Using your thesis and/or main ideas, devise a title for the paper.

Stage Two: Bringing your main idea into focus

During this stage, your goal is to make any changes that will make your ideas more clear to the reader. Many of the revisions at this stage involve organization or "flow."

• Unity is a principle that applies to the whole paper, to different sections, and to individual paragraphs. A paper is unified when the writer discusses only those elements implied by the paper's thesis, the section's main point/s, and the paragraph's topic sentence.
• Balance is a principle that guides you in deciding what needs to be expanded, condensed or cut. A balanced paper gives appropriate weight (development) depending on the importance of each particular point. At times you will need to move, add, reduce, replace and/or cut writing in order to balance the paper. Look at the sections in your paper: Is any part noticeably longer than the others? Is that because it's more important? Have you explicitly told the reader that it's more important? Is any part noticeably shorter than the others? Is that because it's the least important? Have you explicitly told the reader that it's the least important? Do you need to include it at all if it's so unimportant?
• Coherence describes the clarity of the relationship among sections of a paper, among paragraphs within a section, and among sentences within a paragraph. A paper is coherent when things follow a sensible progression and fulfill the reader's expectations . Coherence is usually achieved through transitions, which may be a word, a phrase, a sentence, or a paragraph devoted to building a smooth, logical "bridge" between one idea and the next. Try constructing a detailed outline of your paper in order to make sure that every piece is relevant and in the best place. Looking at the outline, think about where you need transitions in order to let the reader know how what you just discussed relates to what you are about to discuss.

Stage Three: Editing your sentences

•  Word Choice . Check for redundant word choices, as well as uncommon words that may not be properly used . In nearly all cases, you should simply say what you mean. If your words become redundant-appearing more than a couple of times in a single paragraph, for instance-think of a related word. Use a thesaurus sparingly! Be sure you know what this new word means and that you have used it properly.

•  Circle the "be" verbs . "Is" and "are" constitute the weakest verbs in the English language; they lack verbal force, action and life. They just "are." Using these verbs also can necessitate strings of prepositions. To revise, look for the real action in the sentence and make that the verb.

Practice: The revisions to the document will be made in a timely fashion by a member of the development team.

•  Circle the prepositions . These are words that indicate where (direction or location), how (in what way), or when (at what time or how long), such as about, as, before, for, from, in, of, and to. Good writing avoids strings of prepositions and unnecessarily repeating the same preposition in the same sentence.

Practice: This sentence is in need of an active verb.

Practice: Satisfaction is the most obvious of the consequences of getting an "A" on an English paper.

•  Start fast-no slow windups . Slow motion openings delay and weaken the main action before the reader gets to it. Examples include: "My contention is that.," "The first reason is that.," and "The point I wish to make is that.." Try starting the sentence with whatever follows "is that."

Practice: What has surprised me most is that frog legs really do taste better dipped in chocolate.

•  Combine simple, choppy sentences .

Practice: Both models concern communication theories. Both models feature a speaker and a listener. Both talk about interference. One discusses third party interference. The other discusses the interference of internal thoughts.

•  Avoid Colloquialisms, Clichés. The meanings can be varied, which makes writing imprecise. Revise to state exactly what you mean.

Practice: The project was a wash

•  Avoid Vague References . Pronouns like it, this, their, they, and them all point to something, but sometimes what they point to isn't clear. Revise to make it clearer.

Practice: This is of vital importance.

•  Avoid comma errors with introductory clauses , which are any words at the beginning of a sentence that do not include the sentence's subject. Phrases longer than three words must be set off with a comma; shorter phrases may also need to be set off in order to help the reader understand the sentence. Specifically, the comma helps the reader find the subject , which usually comes shortly after the comma.

Practice: Moments after the room began to tilt sideways.

Practice: As far as I am concerned all phone calls are obscene.

Practice: Since the alien abduction my mother's sweet potato pie has greatly improved.

•  Combine independent clauses correctly . Independent clauses contain a complete subject and a complete predicate (i.e., they are a "complete sentence"). Between two independent clauses, three things may happen:

Option 1: I swam across the river. Jim swam back [Period]

Option 2: I swam across the river, and Jim swam back [Comma + Conjunction (for, and not, but, or, yet, so)]

Option 3: I swam across the river; Jim swam back [Semicolon]

Practice: You crossed my mind but you did not stay there long.

Practice: I have no idea what you are talking about, I cannot possibly defend myself!

Practice: Maria always wears purple on Fridays and Jim never wears yellow on Tuesdays.

Practice: We entered a large disreputable museum and were horrified by the soapstone sculptures.

•  Proofread line by line . Using a ruler or sheet of paper to work line by line, look for missing words or letters, indentation errors, words typed twice in a row, and so on. Some people start at the end of the paper, reading from the last sentence to the second to last sentence and so on, in order to de-familiarize themselves with the writing.

•  If you have a question about a word or punctuation mark, look it up ! Using the index in the back of your writing textbook, you can find the exact page number of different grammar and punctuation rules; each rule also features plenty of examples. If you would like a more user-friendly (and lightweight) writing guide, try Diane Hacker's A Writer's Reference or Jane Aaron's The Little, Brown Compact Handbook.

•  Keep a Personal Editing Checklist . We all have error patterns, mistakes we have a tendency to make from one paper to the next. You can help yourself edit for these errors if you keep track of what they are and how best to correct them.

Sample Entry: Introduce all quotes with my own words. Examples: 1) According to author's name, "quote" (page #). 2) In her book title, author's name argues that "quote" (page #). 3) Noted scholar author's name references this process when he states, "quote" (page #).

This handout was created by Amanda Granrud and Marcia Toms using Rosen and Behren's (1997) Allyn & Bacon Handbook , Troyka's (2002) Simon & Schuster Handbook for Writers , and Lanham's (2000) Revising Prose .