Describe The Revising Process

Murray (1917-2006) was a scholar, journalist, and author among many other things. Murray wrote the essay “The Maker’s Eye: Revising your own Manuscript”, which was published in a magazine called The Writer. “The Maker’s Eye” explains why it is beneficial to revise no matter if you are a beginner or experienced. “As a word is changed, cut, or added, as a construction is rearranged, all the words used before that moment and all those that follow that moment must be considered and reconsidered.” This means when you changed any word in your writing that is the time to look at previously written words, but also consider the new words you are

In Joseph Harris’s chapter “Revising” which was originally published in his book, Rewriting: How to Do Things with Texts in 2006, Harris emphasizes the importance of the revising process, how to revise and improve effectively, and informs us about the fact that revising is overlooked and rushed by writers today. He shares tips on how to effectively revise and demonstrates using excerpts within his chapters.

In “Reflective Writing and Revision Process”, Sandra Giles talks about the importance of reflective writing. She mentions that before she thought reflective writing was a waste of time and she just wrote her it to please her teacher, but it was not supposed to be like that. Reflective writing is supposed to talk about purpose of the essay, and then sets goals for revision. Through reflections, the students can change their audience if needed, make changes about the writing styles and the words choice, as well as figuring out the problems within their essays to improve them. The professors can also give feedbacks after reading their students’ memos and reflections. Throughout the whole essay, Giles includes several samples of reflective writings.

In his article "Coming to Terms", Joseph Harris takes the opportunity to share his knowledge with his readers and discuss things to keep in mind when drafting, revising, and editing assignments. In this specific chapter, Harris explains the revision process and suggest possible preliminary steps to take when formulating an essay. He emphasizes revision as a knowledge practice, in which there is a consistent set of questions you can ask yourself at any point while working on a draft (page 99). In addition, Harris refers the term "writer's project" throughout the section.

In “They Say I Say”, chapter 11 may perhaps be the most important chapter in the entire book. Chapter 11 emphases on how important it is to revise and edit your writing. Some students may say that reading over you essay and getting somebody to edit it is pointless but I think that it’s a vital step. It’s simple. Revision and editing could turn your awful essay into a superior essay. When I read over my work I always consider changing it to improve it, should I add more complex sentences? “What [do I] need to do to make it better” (Graff 139). In addition, I would constantly find grammar and punctuation errors that weakened my essay. After I guaranteed that there were no more grammar mistakes my student editor would find one.

The comparison of revising to sculpting relates to how I view my revision process to be. I like to make my rough draft as complete as I can and then go back to fix little things for my revision. This is like the sculpting metaphor because in sculpting you start with something as whole, like me making my rough draft as complete as it can be, then you go back and keep working on it until you have ended up with what you were looking for, in this case a sculpture or a complete paper. I find this way of revision to be beneficial because I think it is always best to get everything down the first time so you and your peers have more to work with later on and

Revision part of the outcome is that I write out all my essays for the class then revision of my essays at the end. The one essay that I revision was the concept essay because I wrote it out first for rough draft then I look through and look for any little items in my essay that I can change. Then we also did some peer editing in class with some classmates that also contribute to the revision of the concept essay.

Sommers explains to the reader the mindset of revision in the eyes of college freshman vs. experienced writers. Based on her research she was able to establish that the term “revision” has two drastic meanings when it comes to experienced vs. inexperienced writers. The college freshmen referred to revision as simply rewording the preexisting writing in their first draft. Sommers explains that the “scale of concern” for the college students was “deletion, substitution, addition, and rewording.” (380) In contrast, the experienced writers had a very different mindset when it came to their revision process. They explained when revising they focused on finding “shape” and “form” to their writing. To further explain, they do not have simply one rough daft that becomes a final draft, but rather they have numerous drafts that they continuously dig through to develop “structural patterns.” (384) In comparison to the college freshmen their revision process isn’t just rewording, it’s continuously reframing each draft. Through this research Sommers explains to the reader the way revisions should be, and the areas that people lack with misconceptions that the word “revising” simply means rewording but in Sommers’ opinion it’s a total revamping

Revising a paper literally means to “renew again”, to look for something fresh in critical perspective. Revision is an ongoing process of rethinking the paper: reconsidering the arguments, reviewing the evidence, refining the purpose, reorganizing the presentation, reviving the paper’s perspective. At first, I thought revision was just fixing commas, grammar and spelling, but no, fixing minor errors like grammar, spelling and punctuation are called, proofreading. Proofreading is an important step before turning in a paper, but if the ideas are predictable, the thesis is weak, and the organization of the paper is a mess, then proofreading will just act like a band aid to cover the little scars on the paper. Writing is a process of discovery, and writers don’t always produce the best stuff from the first draft they made. So revision is a chance to look at the paper once again and to analyze critically what a writer has written.

One of my biggest challenges was accepting the fact that I had numerous habits that I developed in high school which were restricting my creativity. After reading Revising Attitudes by Brock Dethier, I now know that your first draft isn’t meant to be perfect. While writing drafts you need to let it go and not try to perfect anything. A rough draft is called rough for a reason. As a perfectionist, it was hard for me to comprehend the fact that I need to let go. I quickly found out that this would end up being one of my biggest weaknesses. I became frustrated with myself since I couldn’t figure out ways to revise my essay that had obvious problems. I was able to learn from my mistakes from the last assignment and avoid them. I now know to start narrowing your topic down when brainstorming your topic. Then you would continue to be more specific as you do your initial research. This helped me be crystal clear with what I wanted to write about and in the end helped me figure out which claims

The first essay that I revised was Essay 2, Analyzing an Unsustainable Practice which dealt with cell phone addiction. The main reason why I chose to revise this essay is because I feel like it is a topic that could be expanded on and many people could relate to it. Moreover, when I received the feedback on this essay, I noticed a few major and minor adjustments I could make to build on my essay. So, the major improvements I made in this essay were rearranging my paragraphs to make the essay flow smoothly, adding another paragraph explaining the development of poor communication skills, and providing examples to expand on my points that were unclear. I also made minor improvements to this essay which was making a small tweak to my thesis to make the audience understand the point I am trying to make and fixing my incorrect grammar.

The two words fell under the category of proof reading papers. This course helped me to recognize the differences between revising and editing. Revision is changes made at the macro level that include deleting words and phrases, moving paragraphs and sentences and add clarifying information Editing is done at the sentence level, including grammar. During my first draft, my paper was unorganized and jumped from pros and cons to causes and effects. I had to sit and restructure my paper to create a sense of flow and organization. Next, I looked into my individual sentence structure in which I had to reword some awkward phrasing and add punctuation that I had skipped. The entire process was aided by reviews. Allowing others to read my works, tremendously improved my paper. Getting feedback allowed me to understand my reader’s point of view. For my final portfolio, I did one last revision and editing. I reread all the comments my instructor and peers had written on my papers and ended up removing an entire paragraph and replacing it with information that was more relevant and crucial to my

One thing I really liked about my writing class this year was the fact that Professor Olufs had the class read each other’s essays. I think that was a huge step for me because I was always embarrassed by how I wrote my essays. But through this process of writing, it had taught me that it is very important to have your peers or your instructor to revise your essay before you turn it in. It honestly made a huge improvement in my writing because it is a great way to see what they think about your essay. Sometimes they can offer some good ideas on how to improve. Since it’s from a different perspective they are easily able to point my mistakes. Having someone revise your essay is a great technique to do even if you revised it yourself. For instance, in my essay #4 which was about on “how do you learn a new skill relating it to tai chi” I revised it so many times before I

A major area for development and improvement revolves around effective note taking and essay planning/writing. As a Higher Education student you will be required to plan and produce countless essays in relation to the course you are studying, and a key point of reference to help with this would come from “The Guide to Learning and Study Skills for Higher Education and at Work” who give the following advice and tips: ‘Identify the purpose of the essay and who the audience (reader) is and what is required for both – structure your work and develop your arguments/main points – proof read your work and improve language, spelling, punctuation, grammar and style – review what you did and use feedback to improve your essay writing for the future’ (Bingham, R. and Drew, S. 2012 The guide to learning and study skills: For higher Education and at work).

When starting this course I was first given a reading called, "Real Patriots Ask Questions." As I was reading this paper we were to analyze and take notes in the margin about our thoughts and reflections. This process was helpful because when we started our essays about the reading, we could look back at our notes and re-read our initial thoughts. Next, we started our essays and constructed a rough draft which contained the content, but I couldn't find the right groove when writing that first draft. This brings me to our next steps which were revising that first draft. We