Guide to Editing a Composition

Editing Your Composition
(Anne Mueller)

In the final stage of editing your rough draft, read it several times through, paying close attention to the following points:

Content, Organization, Development, and Style
• Have you expressed clearly the thesis at the beginning of your composition?
• Have you demonstrated the relationship between the main idea of each paragraph and the thesis?
• Have you included sufficient facts to illustrate your ideas?
• Do your examples and explanations contain sufficient descriptive details?
• Do you follow a logical organizational plan?
• Is the construction of your sentences animated and varied?
• Is the tone appropriate to the occasion, reader and theme?
• Have you chosen the most precise terms possible? Have you used a dictionary to clarify any words about which you are in doubt?

Grammar
• Subject/verb agreement
• Correct form of the verb
• Correct use of time frame
• Correct word order
• Correct pronoun usage
• Correct use of prepositions
• Correct pluralization

Spelling and Punctuation
• Spelling
• Capitalization
• Underlining
• Punctuation