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Writing Skills: Revision 848 Views


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Description:

The process of revision involves editing, proofreading, writing multiple drafts, evaluating your evidence, clarifying your main point, and admitting to yourself that your first attempts are not always perfection. It's okay. Even Twain screwed up once in a while.

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:02

Revision......[mumbles]

00:22

It's hard out here for a pen these days all our jobs have been taken by dirty stinking computers those [Pen complaining about lack of jobs]

00:29

show-offs with their spellcheck and their copy and paste huh we used to be

00:35

kings I tell you if you ever had to revise something you'd have to turn to

00:40

us revision is when you take a piece of writing mess around with it and then

00:44

magically transform it into something better so basically like an ambush [Woman having her hair done]

00:49

makeover I guess your first shot at writing a paper is known as a first

00:53

draft but no one bats a thousand heck if you hit it out of the park half of the

00:58

time you'd be the greatest baseball player ever though you can't turn back

01:02

time and take another swing at the ball you can take a second shot at writing an [Girl receives essay back]

01:06

essay here's how you do it you take your first draft perform some linguistic

01:12

surgery and then produce a second draft which will most definitely be better

01:16

than the first if it's still not perfect you repeat the process again for a third [Third draft essay stamped better]

01:21

draft or a fourth or in case of my fantasy fanfic The Pens of Mordor a two

01:27

hundred and twenty seventh draft the exact number of drafts isn't all that

01:30

important though what is important is that revision was the tool you use to [Person picks up revision spanner from toolbox]

01:35

create your masterpiece so how exactly do we get our toes wet with revision

01:41

before editing something it's helpful to wait a couple of days so you can look at

01:45

the piece with fresh eyes revision is like running into your ex at a coffee [Man and girl grab same cup of coffee]

01:50

shop things can get weird if you haven't taken enough space basically taking some

01:55

space between writing and revising allows you to look at the piece as if

01:59

you were a random reader looking at it for the first time now that you've taken

02:03

a break it's time to kick it into action your first step is to find your main [Woman in a swimming pool and dives in]

02:08

point which if you're looking to score brownie

02:11

points with your lit teacher is also known as a thesis so your main point

02:16

could be that literature is an important subject to study or on the contrary that

02:21

literature is the worst subject ever really a main point can be anything as

02:25

long as it's an argument you can even argue that Chris Hemsworth is the most [Photographer snaps Chris Hemsworth]

02:29

beautiful man of all time if you felt like it

02:31

well you might already have a precise idea of your main point before you start

02:36

for many people it doesn't come into clear focus until after they've started

02:40

writing or even revising for example you might know from the get-go that you're [Woman thinking of a whale]

02:45

writing a paper about killer whales but still be unsure about your specific main

02:49

point there are tons of options you could write about the way that killer

02:53

whales evolved over time or you could write about their high level of

02:57

intelligence or you could even discuss their mating habits if you want to go

03:01

there so as long as you look at your first draft pay attention to which parts [Girl assessing her first draft]

03:06

pop out the most which ones have the most compelling evidence as in

03:10

interesting citations from reliable sources like a chapter from a killer

03:14

whales biography if it existed and of course which parts of your papers

03:18

stimulate the most muscle growth second you want to identify your readers and [Man exercising in a gym]

03:23

your purpose many people don't think about their audience when writing but

03:27

it's one of the most important things you can do for example if you were

03:31

writing that paper on killer whales mating habits you'd write completely [Woman discussing essay on stage]

03:35

different if it was for an audience of professional scientists you'd use a lot

03:39

of high-end scientific lingo right if you were writing for elementary school

03:43

students on the other hand you'd keep the language much simpler and easy to

03:47

digest and if you were writing for a bunch of preteens well you might just

03:51

want to stick with emojis in each instance you'd use totally different

03:54

language to talk about the exact same subject matter related to this is the

03:58

purpose of your paper don't get purpose confused with main idea however also [Main idea and purpose sticky notes appear]

04:03

don't get it confused with porpoise which is a completely different animal

04:07

your purpose is what you want to achieve with your writing so with your paper on

04:12

killer whales your purpose might be to explain the distribution of their

04:16

population advocate for a better environmental policies or

04:20

show that killer whale exchange didn't that you're down for the cause despite [Man approaches a killer whale]

04:24

having the same idea these three papers would end up totally different based on

04:29

their respective purposes the third step in this revision process is to evaluate

04:33

your evidence does that citation claiming that killer whales listen to

04:38

the weekend while getting down come from a good source or is it coming from [Whales listening to radio]

04:42

someone untrustworthy a good source is like a good friend it'll always give you

04:47

support when you need it and a bad source well that's like mistaking your

04:51

worst enemy for your best friend so how do we know if a source is worthy of [Batman and Joker appear]

04:56

inclusion in a paper well first it's got to be true you don't want to find a

05:01

source that claims for example that killer whales are a type of bird thanks

05:04

a lot Wikipedia or that pencils are anywhere near as effective as pens just

05:09

ignorant it also must come from a reliable trustworthy source an

05:14

award-winning news publication like the nation, the National Review or NPR

05:18

probably trustworthy a conspiracy theory blog hosted by an unemployed dog walker [Woman appears in a small room with a dog]

05:23

from Kentucky hmm not so much now being reliable doesn't mean that these sources

05:29

are 100% accurate each of them is biased in their own way all reliability means

05:35

is that we doubt the source is going to straight-up lie to us you also want to [Man sitting on a couch and thunderstorm strikes]

05:39

make sure that your research gets along with the main point and purpose of your

05:44

paper which might force you to make some difficult cuts during the revision [Pieces of paper land in the trash]

05:47

process for example you might be writing a paper on Abraham Lincoln's rarely

05:52

discussed wrestling career which isn't even a joke when you find an amazing

05:56

source that describes how Lincoln felt when writing the Gettysburg Address it's

06:00

a great source reliable and full of rich detail but there's a problem [Book appears open]

06:05

it doesn't have jack to do with Lincoln's career as the Hulk Hogan of

06:09

the 1800s so we have to cut it although it's sad to see such an awesome source

06:14

fall by the wayside and you'll ultimately have a better paper as a

06:17

result on a similar note it's important to only keep what's important to the

06:21

overall paper so even if you somehow wrote the best paragraph of all time [Man holding up a essay paper]

06:27

so beautiful that it causes anyone who reads it to weep uncontrollably you'd

06:31

still have to cut it from your paper if it wasn't integral to the argument being

06:35

made I'm not saying it's easy killing off your favorite paragraph is like

06:40

picking which one of your children you want to give away next up focus on [Hand points to daughters and son]

06:44

cleaning up your language and no I'm not just talking about removing cuss

06:48

words now that we've taken care of the big-picture stuff like the main idea and

06:53

purpose we can start focusing on the nitty-gritty details, revising sentences

06:57

to make them flow better

07:06

reorganizing your paragraphs to better deliver

07:09

information and making sure that all your transitions are as slick as a stick

07:14

of butter after you've tightened up the language

07:16

you want to focus on grammar spellcheck is great and all but it's not a silver [Theater production appears as curtains drawn back]

07:21

bullet that'll magically make your paper read like Shakespeare so don't just take

07:25

GoogleDocs word for it read through your paper one more time making sure that all

07:29

your sentences are grammatically correct sweeping the pages for misspellings and

07:33

typos and ensuring that the punctuation is as on point as the latest Drake

07:39

single feels like you've just run a marathon right well keep hustling [Man running a marathon]

07:42

because we're almost to the finish line our last revision step will be to read

07:47

through your paper one last time not as a writer but as a reader just like you

07:53

took some space between writing and revising you should take a quick [People sitting down watching TV]

07:56

breather before looking over the paper one last time this trick will help you

08:00

forget that you even wrote the paper helping you to see it as a new reader

08:04

might and guess what you're now done with your first round of revision most

08:08

essays require more than one draft before they're perfect [Fourth draft stamped perfect]

08:12

hey what are you gonna do even the iPhone needed a couple of revisions to

08:15

get right so maybe you'll have to repeat this revision process one more time or

08:20

two more times or a dozen though you might be getting a bit excessive at that

08:24

point if you follow these steps and stay focused we guarantee that you'll end up [Steps for revision list appears]

08:29

with a better paper than you ever thought possible another important part

08:33

of revision is peer feedback dealing with feedback can be frustrating

08:37

since it's easy to interpret constructive criticism as insult

08:41

especially when you've just poured your heart and soul into a piece of writing [Person empties trash can onto essay]

08:45

but take a second and breathe because feedback can turn out to be quite useful

08:50

during the revision process after all we've talked about how important it is

08:54

to read your writing as if you were a new reader approaching it for the first

08:57

time feedback is great because you can literally see how new readers feel

09:01

feedback can be harsh but the harsher the better like an upstart football [Man running with a football]

09:06

player you're not going to reach the big leagues without taking a few hits but

09:10

take any feedback you get with a grain of salt

09:13

sometimes a reader might just be trying to conform your writing to their

09:16

personal style at others they might simply hate the subject you're writing

09:21

about hence the important of evaluating

09:24

feedback you've got to make sure it's quality before putting it into practice [Person drops feedback notes into trash]

09:28

for example if someone gives you feedback that they didn't understand the

09:31

bit about how killer whales select their mates now it would be helpful feedback

09:35

while feedback that killer whales are dumb and you should write about sharks

09:38

instead is well not so helpful finally there's the implementation of feedback

09:44

when implementing feedback you don't necessarily want to do exactly what your [Pen discussing feedback]

09:48

peer suggested you can of course but it's sometimes better to think about the

09:53

ideas behind their feedback are they telling you to cut the section on killer

09:57

whale anatomy because it's confusing? well you might just need to clarify your

10:01

writing are they saying a fictional character should make a different [People watching Joker and Batman on TV]

10:04

decision maybe you just need to flesh them out

10:05

better in any case the key to using feedback to revise your writing is to

10:10

approach the situation with an open mind rather than feeling seething rage [Woman's head opens]

10:14

towards anyone who dare insult your masterpiece not that I've ever done that

10:18

while there are tons of resources for writing assistance the best might be

10:24

Purdue University's OWL site which is an acronym for the online Writing Lab not

10:29

an all knowledgeable bird..OWL can do it all it can serve as a style guide give

10:34

you tips for writing researching and revising your writing and even help you

10:39

write resumes and cover letters when applying for jobs so naturally I'd

10:42

highly recommend that you bookmark this sucker ASAP oh you can just get the [Woman having address tattooed on forehead]

10:46

address tattooed across your forehead that way

10:49

you'll always have revision on your mind okay so we've learned that revision is

10:55

all about polishing up a paper until it's shining like a gold grill and is in

11:00

some ways just as important if not more so than the writing process itself we also

11:05

learned that revision should be approached in an organized systematic

11:08

manner to create the best draft possible additionally it's important to think

11:12

like a reader when revising your work it will help you better understand what the [Woman reading a draft essay]

11:16

reader is expecting in our grand finale we learned about the importance of peer

11:20

feedback no matter how annoying it can be when it's happening ironic as it

11:25

sounds this lesson was so good that I wouldn't revise a thing if I had to do

11:30

it again now if you'll excuse me I think I figured out a way to get a job [Pen jumps into an apple]

11:34

realistic right?

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