Revising, Editing & Proofreading
This Resource Page Will Help You:
- Understand the differences between revising, editing, and proofreading.
- Apply these different techniques to your writing process.
Introduction
After drafting your paper, you need to review it carefully. The review process is divided into three steps: revise, edit and proofread. Contrary to what many people assume, these are not synonyms – they involve different goals, procedures, and outcomes – but each one is integral to a quality written product.
Step 1: Revising
What is Revising?
Revising involves focusing on the content and organization of the overall text and considering sections, passages, or paragraphs that need to be changed, added, or removed.
Think about whether your writing
- contributes to the overall purpose of the paper
- flows logically and smoothly from one section to another
- contains all the important information
avoids unnecessary information.
How to Revise your Paper: Reverse outlining
This is helpful after you’ve written a rough draft and especially when you want to check the logical flow of ideas within a section or paragraph.
- Re-read each section of your paper and create an outline of the key points and evidence therein.
- Analyze the structure and flow of the paragraphs within a section
- If needed, re-organize the paragraph into a more logical order, or recognize points that need to be added or removed.
This example with annotations shows how a student revised a paper section by identifying the key points to make sure they flow logically.
Tip: Take a break/ask a friend
After completing a rough draft, take some time away from your paper so that you can revise it with a fresh set of eyes or more objectively. You can also ask a friend or classmate to read it over, asking them to pay attention to the clarity of ideas.
Step 2: Editing
What is Editing?
Editing involves focusing on clarity and accuracy of language at the sentence level.
Editing considerations include
How to Edit your Paper
1. Sentence Structure
Using a variety of different sentence structures is most effective in creating a dynamic and readable text. As you edit, make sure that you aren’t using the same structure repeatedly.
One of the most common issues to look out for is the balance between passive and active voice. The passive voice is fine when used selectively but can make a text overly wordy, repetitive, and unclear when overused.
Examples below are taken from: https://academicguides.waldenu.edu/formandstyle/writing/scholarlyvoice/activepassive
A survey was administered. Using a convenience sample, 68 teachers were invited to participate in the survey by emailing them an invitation. Email addresses of teachers who fit the requirements for participation were provided by the principal of the school. The teachers were emailed an information sheet and a consent form. Responses were collected from 45 teachers…
In this study, I administered a survey. I created a convenience sample of 68 teachers. I invited them to participate in the survey by emailing them an invitation. I obtained email addresses from the principal of the school…
In this study, I administered a survey using a convenience sample. Sixty-eight teachers were invited to participate in the survey. The principal of the school provided me with the email addresses of teachers who fit the requirements for participation. I emailed the teachers an information sheet and a consent form. A total of 45 teachers responded…
2. Clarity
There are numerous considerations when focusing on clarity, such as providing ample explanations of your points (rather than assuming the reader will understand) or using technical terminology appropriately (see point 7 below).
Here is an example of how to use language effectively for clarity by avoiding unclear pronoun references.
The income gap between rich and poor has continued to widen over the past decade, contrary to mainstream economists’ predictions. This indicates that new models are required to understand this.
The income gap between rich and poor has continued to widen over the past decade, contrary to mainstream economists’ predictions. This disparity between theory and reality indicates that new models are required to understand this trend.
3. Concision
In the field of Education, the audience for our scholarly works consists of other researchers but also practitioners like school administrators and teachers, sometimes even parents. As such, it is important to use concise and direct language rather than long and complex explanations. Concision makes your writing easier to read and thus more accessible to a wider audience.
Below are eight strategies you can follow to make your text more concise.
Career growth was an important factor in why participants chose to enroll in continuing education. -> Participants enrolled in continuing education for career purposes.
TOO REPETITIVE: In my opinion, I think that...
CORRECT: In my opinion...
TOO LONG: This point is further supported by the fact that…
CORRECT: Furthermore
TOO LONG: For all intents and purposes, this project will…
CORRECT: This project will
UNNECESSARY FILLER: This reveals that the approach is clearly qualitative…
CORRECT: This reveals that the approach is qualitative…
PASSIVE: The error message was written by robots.
ACTIVE AND CONCISE: Robots wrote the error message.
A majority of… -> most
Due to the fact that… -> because
At all times… -> always
At the present time… -> currently
Educators face issues that are very serious -> educators face serious issues
A course that focuses on language methodologies -> a course on language methodologies OR a language methodologies course
It is important that teachers attend professional development courses -> teachers should/must attend professional development courses
It seems that students prefer constructive feedback -> students seem to prefer constructive feedback
This example shows how to use concision strategies in a paragraph.
4. Vocabulary usage
There are many vocabulary issues to pay attention to. Examples include
- countable/uncountable nouns (Research vs. Studies)
- preposition combinations (Research in a field vs. Research on a topic)
- function of transition words (Although vs. However)
Here is an example combining all three issues:
Although, researches on the field of education argue that students’ social and emotional well-being is as important as their cognitive development.
However, research in the field of education argues that students’ social and emotional well-being is as important as their cognitive development.
5. Grammatical accuracy
Common grammatical errors to be aware of include subject-verb agreement, article usage, and appropriate verb tense among others. Let’s use the same example above to demonstrate:
However, research in field of education argue that students’ social and emotional well-being is as important as their cognitive development.
However, research in the field of education argues that students’ social and emotional well-being is as important as their cognitive development.
6. Tone and formality
For different assignments or text types, your academic tone and formality will change. For instance,
- traditional research paper: more formal with a “standard” academic style and language
- reflective writing: less formal with a more narrative style.
One of the most common strategies to use for a formal academic style is avoiding phrasal verbs and upgrade them to more formal sounding academic verbs.
Given our fast-paced society, academics must routinely put creative solutions to unexpected problems into practice.
Given our fast-paced society, academics must routinely implement creative solutions to unexpected problems.
7. Consider the audience
With a generalist audience, you need to communicate your thoughts more simply and directly. You can do this by defining key terms and/or avoiding too much jargon (technical terminology).
However, a lot of the writing we do in grad school is for a specialist audience who already know a lot about your topic. In this case, you need to avoid the definitions and explanations provided for generalists because specialists will already be aware of them. When editing your paper, for example, think about how much knowledge your professor (the reader) has about your topic and adjust your language accordingly.
In the following examples, the same sentence is written using specific vocabulary (appropriate for a specialist audience) and explanations of concepts (more appropriate for a generalist audience).
In the field of language teaching and learning, scholars in the plurilingualism and translanguaging traditions have been working to break down a monolingual approach that has been widely accepted for more than a century.
In the field of language teaching and learning, scholars who promote theories about using all of one’s languages for language learning have been working to break down a monolingual approach that believes in the strict separation of languages and has been widely accepted for more than a century.
Note: In the generalist example, you can use technical terminology as long as you explain what they mean (e.g., “monolingual”)
Step 3: Proofreading
What is Proofreading?
This process involves looking for smaller technical errors on the levels of spelling, punctuation, and capitalization.
Depending on the formatting style of your discipline or department (APA at OISE), proofreading also means making sure that you have correct citations, font style and size, references list, etc.
How to Proofread your Paper
1. Find a sample APA paper
There are many minor formatting considerations to take into account with APA and very little room for creativity. In addition to the list above, there are also specific requirements for your cover page, headings, and paragraph spacing. The best way to apply and learn all these specifications is to access a sample APA paper online and then format your paper accordingly.
Make sure it is the correct edition (APA 7th Edition at the time of writing), as the American Psychological Association changes its formatting requirements every few years.
For more information about APA, check our Resource Page on Citations and APA Style.
2. Upgrade your punctuation
Beyond the period/full stop, many students struggle with comma, semi-colon, and colon usage. Take some time to learn the different ways of using the above punctuation, which will contribute to more varied sentence structures and more advanced writing overall. Also, become acquainted with major sentence structure errors so that you can avoid them.
Below are some common punctuation issues with examples.
WRONG: Protests against immorality which became very strong by 1928.
Feedback: The use of ‘which’ means that another clause is needed after ‘1928’.
CORRECT: Protests against immorality became very strong by 1928,
CORRECT: Protests against immorality, which became very strong by 1928, divided the nation.
A run-on sentence combines two (or more) complete clauses without punctuation or linking words. This type of sentence is wrong and needs to be broken up.
Example: The results were tabulated they were statistically significant.
A comma splice combines two (or more) complete clauses with a comma. This type of sentence is wrong and needs to be broken up.
Example: The results were tabulated, they were statistically significant.
The sentences above need one of the following:
- a “stronger” punctuation mark to break the two clauses (e.g., period/full stop, or semi-colon)
- a conjunction (e.g., and) between ‘tabulated’ and ‘they’ to break up the two complete clauses
Correct Examples: The results were tabulated. They were statistically significant. (period / full stop)
The results were tabulated; they were statistically significant. (semi-colon)
The results were tabulated, and they were statistically significant. (conjunction)
Learn more about
Example Paper
This example with annotations shows how a student revised, edited and proofread the introduction paragraph of a paper on language policies in Beijing.
Our Tips
- Keep the three steps separate. It can be difficult to focus on a paper’s global elements (Revising) and local elements (Editing, Proofreading) at the same time. Review your paper multiple times focusing on these elements separately.
- Use technology for editing. AI applications or Grammarly are becoming increasingly effective in pointing out editing issues such as awkward wording, overly long or confusing sentences, or grammatical accuracy.
- Use technology for proofreading. Use the spell/punctuation checkers on Microsoft Word or Google Docs. Basic errors on these levels can leave a bad impression on professors during the marking process.
- Use vocabulary resources. On freecollocation.com you can search for collocations (i.e., high frequency word pairings), such as preposition combinations and noun-adjective combinations.
- Think before you submit. Before submitting, re-read your paper one last time, zoom out, and reflect on your revising, editing, and proofreading processes. Is there anything you missed? Is there anything that could be improved?
- Ask for help. Visit the OISE Student Success Center (OSSC) and book an appointment with an advisor to get help at any of the above stages. OSSC advisors don’t proofread your papers, but give you feedback on portions of it that you can apply to the rest of your written work.