Chapter 20: Revising and Editing

What should I focus on when I revise?

What strategies can I use to revise?

What should I focus on when I edit?

What strategies can I use to edit?

  • Consider your writing situation

  • Consider your argument and ideas

  • Consider your use, integration, and documentation of sources

  • Consider the structure and organization of your document

  • Consider genre and design

  • Save multiple drafts

  • Highlight your main point, reasons, and evidence

  • Challenge your assumptions

  • Scan, outline, and map your document

  • Ask for feedback

  • Focus on accuracy

  • Focus on economy

  • Focus on consistency

  • Focus on style

  • Focus on spelling, grammar, and punctuation

  • Read carefully

  • Mark and search your document

  • Use spelling, grammar, and style tools with caution

  • Ask for feedback

image When writers revise and edit, they evaluate the effectiveness of their drafts and work to improve them. Although the two processes are related, they focus on different aspects of a document. Revising involves assessing how well a document responds to a specific writing situation, presents a main point and reasons to accept that point, and uses evidence. Editing includes evaluating and improving the expression — at the sentence and word levels — of the information, ideas, and arguments in the document.