Be Your Own Editor 01

Question: How can I learn to edit and revise my own writing?

Answer: While I think you would learn to recognize your own mistakes from my showing you how to edit and revise your personal ten-minute essays, maybe the next best assistance is to try to edit other students’ 10-minute essays. Following is a 10-minute essay from a college English class. Try to correct it yourself. Then check the next day’s blog to see how I corrected it. Compare. Did we agree? Note that my revisions are merely suggestions. If you think I have improved the expression, try to figure out how I did it. I will give you some clues about what I am looking for by putting problems in the original essay in bold-face print.

And do not hesitate to send your own 10-minute essays to raystop2@comcast.net. I believe that if you do so for 5 days a week for 3 weeks, you will learn to recognize and correct the problems I have been discussing in this blog.

Original Ten-Minute Essay
..........This weekend I went to the University of Delaware with a couple of friends to visit some of our former classmates. All of us had a great time. We walked all over Newark, we visited all of the dorms, and met numerous people.
..........The campus was great it was kind of big but well worth the effort to walk around. I think that I might transfer to "U of D" because it's only 15 to 20 minutes away from my home, the campus setting was great, and the people seemed very nice.
..........I asked the students I met questions about classes and they said that, the only aspect they did not like about the university was the size of the classes. They said that they were really big and that the professor did not get to know you because there are so many students to a class room.

All the best. RayS.