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Revision: Seeing It Again

A workshop day for revising a draft four ways, one station at a time, from rethinking the whole piece down to how its sentences sound.

Added

Process: Directed draftingFirst draft

When
First-year writing · a workshop day
Length
One class, 50 or 75 minutes
Slides
9, each with its notes below it

Or press P. Arrow keys or a clicker move between slides, F goes full screen, and Esc comes back here.

First-year writing · a workshop day

Revision

Seeing your draft again, four ways

Today is a revising day, but not a sit-and-stare one. The class moves through stations, each a different way of looking at the same draft, timed so nobody stays stuck on one kind of change. Have the draft open, and save a copy first, so there’s always a version to go back to.

Revision isn’t editing. Re-vision means seeing it again.

Global
What it says, what’s in it, and in what order: ideas, structure, evidence.

Local
How it sounds: sentences, words, commas.

Today
Global first, local last. Fixing commas in a paragraph you’ll cut is time lost.

Most of us treat revision as cleanup: a word swapped here, a comma fixed there. That’s editing, and it matters, but it comes last. Revision is going back to the whole piece and asking whether it says what you mean, has what it needs, and is in the right order.

What experienced writers do

“I rewrite as I write. It is hard to tell what is a first draft” (Sommers 383).

Nancy Sommers (1980) found that students revised by changing words. Experienced writers changed the whole piece: adding, cutting, and moving until they found its shape.

Sommers studied first-year students and experienced adult writers: journalists, editors, academics. The students mostly changed words and left the essay as a whole alone. The experienced writers revised with the whole piece in mind, and they had trouble even saying where one draft ended and the next began. Today’s stations push toward that kind of revision first.

How today works

  1. Save a copy of your draft, then work in the new one.
  2. Four stations, each a different way to revise. When the timer ends, finish your sentence and move on.
  3. Change something real at every station. A change you undo later still counts.
  4. I’ll come around. Flag me when you’re stuck or proud of something.

In a 50-minute class we do three stations; in 75, all four.

Plan the time before class. In 75 minutes: about 10 minutes for these opening slides, four stations of 12 to 15 minutes, and 5 for the wrap-up. In 50: three stations of 10 to 12, usually skipping “Say more” or “Read it aloud,” depending on the drafts. Every station has its own timer: set its length, start it by pressing the time, and switch it to Untimed on a day when the room needs longer. Untimed and the chime apply to every station at once. The same stations work in a faculty or organization workshop with any draft people bring: a grant proposal, a report, an article. Anyone working alone, or catching up after a missed class, can take a draft through all four on the revision bench.

Station 1 · global

Reverse outline

  1. Number your paragraphs.
  2. Beside each one, write one sentence: what it says, and what it does (gives evidence, tells a story, turns the argument).
  3. Read the outline alone, without the essay. Where’s a repeat, a gap, a paragraph in the wrong place?
  4. Fix one of them in the draft.

Done early?Write the whole essay’s point in one sentence. Does every paragraph serve it?

Untimed: take the time you need.

A reverse outline is an outline made from the draft instead of before it, so it shows the essay that’s actually there. The second half of each sentence, what the paragraph does, is the part students skip. Walking around, look for outlines that only summarize, and ask, “And what is that paragraph doing for the essay?” Two paragraphs with the same job is a sign one of them can go, or that they belong together.

Station 2 · global

Cut and move

  1. Find your strongest paragraph, the center of gravity. Try starting the essay there.
  2. Move one more paragraph to where it works better.
  3. Cut the paragraph you’d miss least. Paste it in a “cuts” file; nothing’s lost.
  4. Reread the new order. Keep it or put it back: either way, you know more about your draft.

Done early?Write a new last sentence that does more than repeat the first.

Untimed: take the time you need.

This is the station people resist most, because cutting feels like losing work. The “cuts” file makes it safe: everything cut is still there to bring back. Starting from the strongest paragraph comes from freewriting, where the reread at the end looks for the center of gravity. Look for students who move a paragraph and then put it right back without rereading. The point is to read the new version once before deciding.

Station 3 · in between

Say more

  1. Find your thinnest paragraph: a claim with nothing under it.
  2. Ask it what a reader would: Like what? How do you know? Why does it matter?
  3. Answer in the draft with an example, a detail, a source, or a moment.
  4. Do it again for one more paragraph.

Done early?Trade with a neighbor. Each of you marks one spot that needs “say more.”

Untimed: take the time you need.

After two stations of moving and cutting, this one grows the draft. Thin paragraphs usually make a claim and move on, leaving the reader to supply the proof. The three questions are a reader’s questions, and answering them in the draft does that work for the reader. Look for students adding a sentence that repeats the claim in other words, and ask for the example instead.

Station 4 · local

Read it aloud

  1. Read your draft out loud, under your breath or to a partner.
  2. Mark every place you stumble, run out of breath, or get bored.
  3. Fix those sentences: split them, combine them, cut words, choose a sharper one.
  4. Last, the proofreading pass: spelling and commas.

Done early?Read only your first and last paragraphs aloud. Do they sound like the same writer?

Untimed: take the time you need.

Local revision comes last, now that the paragraphs that survived are the ones worth polishing. The ear catches what the eye skips: a sentence that’s hard to say is usually hard to read. The room will get a little noisy, and that’s the point. Look for students reading silently, and ask them to try it aloud for one paragraph.

What changed?

Mark your path through today: how much each station changed your draft, and what you did. Then save it.

Reverse outline
Cut and move
Say more
Read it aloud

Used AI at a station? Cite it and say how. At a workshop for teachers or organizations, you can email me your path for From the rooms.

This is the exit ticket, before anyone leaves. Each station gets not much, a little, or a lot, with a line on what changed if there’s time, and a last line on what the draft needs next. Save image makes a card of it to keep or turn in, a record of the process the final draft won’t show, and the “next” line is where the next session starts. In a workshop for teachers or an organization, anyone who wants to can email theirs to me, and it goes up in the Revision paths room, which compares paths without anyone’s draft. Students’ paths aren’t posted. The page in the corner went through every station too: numbered, rearranged, cut, added to, and read aloud. That’s what a draft looks like after a day of revising.

Readings

  • Nancy Sommers, "Revision Strategies of Student Writers and Experienced Adult Writers" (1980)

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