Revise your paper!

1. Revise your paper!

2. Step 1: Transitions • Look at your transitions handout. • Revise your essay to have meaningful transitions at the beginning of each paragraph. • Revise your paper to have meaningful transitions throughout your paragraphs. • Highlight your transition words.

3. Step 2: compound sentences • Revise your essay to include at least one compound sentence using a semicolon. • To do this, look for two simple sentences next to each other. Do they discuss the same topic? If you combine them, will it make sense? • If combining doesn’t work for you, look for a simple sentence that you can elaborate. Turn that into a compound sentence using a semicolon. • Check your work! Make sure you really do have two independent clauses! • Highlight your compound sentence in your final paper.

4. Step 3: complex Sentences • Look for a part in your essay where you can add a complex sentence. • Remember if you start with a dependent clause, use a comma. • For example: When Beneatha discussed becoming a doctor, Walter told her to just get married instead. • If I put the dependent clause in the middle of the sentence, no comma is needed. Walter told her to just get married when Beneatha discussed becoming a doctor. • Highlight at least one complex sentence in your final copy.

5. Step 4: diction • Instead of using diction that is dull, one should enrich his/her diction by using vocabulary terms or a thesaurus. • Get a vocabulary book or thesaurus. • Replace at least 3 of your words with interesting words. • Highlight your new words in your final copy. • While you are doing this, if you have used any form of second-person (you, your, yourself etc.) take it out and replace with third-person (one, a person, people, oneself etc.)