Grammar and Editing

1. Grammar and Editing A presentation designed by Nikki Tata for the FOR-PD professionals

2. Editing • Interesting fact • The verb edit finds its etymology in the noun editor; it is a back-formed word. • “There is no great writing, only great rewriting.”-Louis D. Brandeis • “The writing itself is no big deal. The editing, and even more than that, the self-doubt, is excruciatingly impossible.”-Jonathan SafranFoer

3. Two Ways to Edit • By oneself • With others • Techniques from each method may be transferrable.

4. Editing Alone • Technique #1: Read the text aloud. • Why? • Sometimes we cannot perceive whether or not the writing is awkward, unclear, or wordy unless we hear it aloud. • Any other reasons?

5. Editing Alone • Technique #2: Read the text backwards. • How? • Sentence by sentence • Use for detecting errors at the syntactic level

6. Editing Alone • Technique #3: Zoom! • Two ways: • ZOOM OUT • ZOOM IN overall coherence, flow, thesis, effectiveness paragraph cohesion syntactic qualities lexical qualities mechanics

7. Editing Alone • Technique #4: Cut more. • Why? • We are generally more verbose than necessary. “Let the reader find that he cannot afford to omit any line of your writing because you have omitted every word that he can spare.”-Ralph Waldo Emerson

8. Editing Alone • Technique #5: Have an out-of-body experience. • Why? • Establish cognizance of pretentious language usages and eliminate such material. • Read from ALL prospective audiences’ perspectives.

9. Editing Alone • Technique #6: Sleep on it. • Why? • Obvious, but often ignored

10. Questions • Are there any questions about editing alone?

11. Editing in a Group • From the “Editing Alone” section, which techniques do you think you can use for group editing?

12. Editing in a Group • My suggestion: • Assign each person a writing point on which to focus. • Resembles the ZOOM technique • Essay level • Paragraph level • Syntactic level • Morphological level • Mechanical level

13. The Essay Level • Check for overall cohesion, focus, structure, and effectiveness. • Questions to ask: • Does the writing meet the needs and expectations of the readers? • Does each paragraph flow into the next? • What can be improved in terms of organization? • Is there a logical connection of ideas throughout? • What gaps in logic can be filled? How?

14. The Paragraph Level • Check for the cohesiveness of ideas within each paragraph. • Questions to ask: • Which sentences can be cut? • Are there any redundancies? • How is the length of each paragraph? • If a paragraph is too long, how can you shorten it? • If a paragraph is too short, how can you lengthen it? • Which sentences can be moved? • Does a sentence fit better somewhere else?

15. The Syntactic Level • Check for grammar. • There are MANY, MANY components to this level. • Two or three people should work on this if possible. • Possible points to consider: • Pronoun references • Subject-verb agreement • Passive/Active voice • Run-ons/fragments • Tense • Participle usage • Sentence variety (compound, complex, etc.) • Parallel structures

16. The Morphological Level • Check for anything that has to do with individual words. • Questions to ask: • Is the right word form used? • How is the choice of words? • Is there a better synonym for a word? • Does a word seem pretentious or pedantic? • Are there any misspelled words? • Check for hyphenation using APA standards. • I LOVE this website! It was compiled by a professor at Washington State University. http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/misspelled.html

17. The Mechanical Level • Check for all the little tiny details in punctuation, spacing, and formatting. • Questions to ask: • Does the writing follow APA formatting standards? • Are quotation marks used properly? • Is there an overabundance of exclamation points? • Is there proper comma and semicolon usage? • This is a great comma website. http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/grammar/g_comma.html

18. Questions • Are there any questions about the levels of group editing?

19. Editing Tips • Tip #1: Use the active voice. (APA likes it.) • The following example (from the FOR-PD website ) is written in PASSIVE voice. How do we make it ACTIVE? • The Newbery award is given annually by the Association for Library Services to Children (ALSC) to a children's book that provides quality literary merit. • http://forpd.ucf.edu/newsletter/FLN200901/index.html

20. Editing Tips • Tip #2: Keep all structures parallel. • A good example from the FOR-PD website. • FOR-PD is dedicated to providing excellent services, support, and products to Florida's teachers and improving reading instruction for all Florida students.

21. Editing Tips • Tip #3: Check the direct object/clause connectors. • Another example from the FOR-PD website. Which should we use here? • For those participants that will be beginning the spring course on January 20, welcome! • http://forpd.ucf.edu/newsletter/FLN200901/index.html

22. Editing Tips • Tip #4: When all else fails, turn to the APA manual. • (See handout for a quick reference.)

23. Questions • Are there any other questions about general editing? • (There are many other concepts that I’d be happy to attempt to explain for you!)

24. Fix it! • This is a little game I have created for you. • Your job is to fix the following grammar errors found on the FOR-PD website.

25. Fix it! • We believe that teachers will be motivated, and will become better equipped, to use technology in their classrooms to support literacy in new and innovative ways. • http://forpd.ucf.edu/facilitators/fff/2008fff04/index.html

26. Fix it! • As the spring 2008 FOR-PD course is coming to a close, the FOR-PD project would like to take time to congratulate our soon to be graduates. • http://forpd.ucf.edu/newsletter/FLN200804/index.html

27. Fix it! • If you are a new participant we want to send you a very special welcome. • http://forpd.ucf.edu/newsletter/FLN200801/index.html

28. Fix it! • The Randolph Caldecott Medal for the most distinguished American picture book for children was awareded to The Invention of Hugo Cabret, illustrated by Brian Selznick. • http://forpd.ucf.edu/newsletter/FLN200801/index.html

29. Fix it! • We are very excited to have you collaborate with us this semester and we are looking forward to getting to know you and serving your professional development needs. • http://forpd.ucf.edu/newsletter/FLN200809/index.html

30. Fix it! • Let teens know the possibilities that exist within your doors, and within the covers of books. • http://forpd.ucf.edu/newsletter/FLN200810/index.html

31. Fix it! • FOR-PD has implemented a new system so that participants may register for a course, change personal information, or download his/her certificate of completion. Participants must first sign up through MyFOR-PD. Once he/she has signed up, he/she will complete and submit a registration form which in turn will give us information about him/her. He/she will then be sent an e-mail with his/her MyFOR-PD log-in information. After receiving this information, the participant may log into MyFOR-PD at any time to edit information, download a certificate, or register for a course (when registration periods are open). • http://forpd.ucf.edu/newsletter/FLN200810/index.html

32. Any final questions? • Thank you VERY much for inviting me! • Call/email anytime: • 407-719-2196 • nicoletata@gmail.com Happy writing! 

33. References FOR-PD. (2009, January & February). FOR-PD’s literacy eNewsletter. Retrieved March 13, 2009, from http://forpd.ucf.edu/newsletter/index.aspx. Genn, R. (n.d.). Editing art quotations. Retrieved March 13, 2009, from http://quote.robertgenn.com/getquotes.php?catid=89&numcats=345. Purdue University Online Writing Lab. (2004). Dangling modifiers. Retrieved March 13, 2009, from http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/grammar/g_dangmod.html. Schuman, S. (n.d.). Ten tips for effective editing. Retrieved March 13, 2009, from http://www.uoregon.edu/~sschuman/tentips98.html. Wax, D. M. (2007). Improve your writing with these editing tips. Retrieved March 13, 2009, from http://www.lifehack.org/articles/communication/improve-your-writing-with-these-editing-tips.html.