Tips in Effective Editing
Tips in Effective Editing
The following tips in effective editing would be helpful in times you might need some when things get a little tough doing your editing task.
To be able to edit effectively, you are required to have a lot of training, experience, and practice. Editing is an important skill in writing which does not come easily nor automatically even if you are a good and experienced writer.
Aside from being comfortable with the copy writing symbols or proofreading symbols, and with an appropriate style guide book (e.g. APA style guide), here are some helpful tips for you to edit effectively:
1. When you edit, it is best when you work with or come in constant contact with the writer of the essay or story you are working on. It is like an architect-engineer relationship. You may have both similar and different skills and roles, but you work together. You are a team. Never finalize without having a word or two with the writer.
2. Consider the target readers of the writer of the piece you are editing; in this way you will get an idea behind the ideas, facts, and writing style presented. If you know who are his intended readers then you will have a strong basis whether or not you will alter some of the ideas, facts, or the writing style used.
3. Do not hastily change a sentence or paragraph’s ideas solely based upon your own standard of writing or preference. If you feel a whole sentence or paragraph needs a major rewriting, you need to carefully find out why, and ask the writer what he meant by what he has written.
4. Do not do a major revising or rewriting unless you have fully understood the essay or story’s main topic, sub topics, and arguments. These are also your bases in improving such write up.
5. Every writer is different and therefore writes in various styles. It is important to try to think as the writer thinks so you could have a virtual piece of him while editing his write-up. Your own standard of writing are also necessary and helpful when you use them while considering the writer’s point of view. This best applies in articles with free styles like feature stories, and to those which the writer’s views and opinions are needed, stories like editorials and columns. If you are editing a news story, this tip would not apply at all times since your main basis for editing are the rules in news writing.
Among these tips in effective editing, this is the most challenging one because you need to get acquainted if not know completely the different writers you work with. It takes time and effort to know someone, more with a group of totally different people.
Since editing skills are a huge plus for a writer, work hard, train yourself, and get some significant experiences to gain such valuable knacks; surely these tips in effective editing will help you.
What is proofreading?
What is proofreading?
The simplest way to define “proofreading” is to break up the word into two: proof and read/reading. Proofreading is giving a “proof” that one has actually “read” an essay, article, or story after writing it. And one of the proofs that one has gone through such write-ups are corrections to minor errors like spelling, punctuation, capitalization, abbreviation, word breaks, spacing, paragraphing, indention, fonts, misplaced words or figures, and some slight mistakes on grammar.
Proofreading is another term for copy editing which has designated symbols for each correction.
Why is proofreading a must?
Never submit your essay, article, or story without proofreading it first. Once you have finished writing your final draft, go through it, read from beginning to end because for sure you will spot some mistakes which you did not notice while you were writing. This is so because while you are writing, your mind is mainly concentrating on what to write and how to write and arrange the ideas you have in mind. It does not really focus on small mistakes like the aforementioned. But these small mistakes count big time.
I have always emphasized to my feature writing student to be very careful with mistakes which seem very little in value. They actually have huge impact once you have committed and failed to correct those tiny errors. I told her those are manifestations of carelessness and simply not knowing the small things which she is supposed to and expected of her to know.
Proofreading is like cleaning up after you write. If you forgot or simply do not do it, or if you poorly do it, your essay or story will be as no good as a nicely and meticulously carved wooden statue without the finishing touches — varnishing.
At times, I feel so lazy to proofread. But I know it is an essential part of effective writing. The small errors left uncorrected which to some degree may be intolerable to your target readers, will sadly outweigh the thoughts, style, messages, and the time and effort put into writing. So do not underestimate the importance of proofreading. Usually, depending on the length of your essay or story, it would just take you few minutes to finish the task.
To be a good writer, you need to learn and develop the skill of proofreading even your own essay or story. It takes practice to have a keen eye for small mistakes while proofreading, so study how it works, get comfortable with the proofreading symbols and you will be many steps ahead!
Writing with Clarity
Writing with Clarity
Writing with clarity is fundamental. It is a must, otherwise you as a writer will fail in the initial objective in writing, and that is to bring the message across and be understood.
There are some important rules to follow to achieve writing with clarity.
- Provide proper antecedent for pronouns.
Example: My father’s black car was purchased a year ago from my uncle who owns a car dealer shop. Whenever he sees it, he remembers how thrilled he was with the car.
Who is referred to by the “he”? My father? Or my uncle?
The antecedent of pronouns should be stated out clearly specially when nouns used are the same in gender.
The sentence could be made clear when it is written this way:
My father’s black car was purchased a year ago from my uncle who owns a car dealer shop. Whenever father sees it, he remembers how thrilled he was with the car.
- Avoid the common sentence errors.
1. Sentence Fragment. This is basically an incomplete sentence. The thought is hanging or insufficient. This is only composed of the subject and it usually lack a predicate. This is a common mistake because it looks correct at first glace, but when you study it well, you will notice that there is something missing.
Example: Early in the morning, a man standing in front of my house with a bunch of flowers in her hand.
This sentence seems like a sentence with complete thought but look closely and carefully, the complete predicate carrying the verb is missing. It is only a “fragment” or a part of a sentence. If it was written in another way, it would’ve been a complete sentence.
Early in the morning, a man is standing in front of my house with a bunch of flowers in her hand.
The verb is makes it clear and correct. I only edited it. Since it is a “fragment of a sentence” it is not the verb is that is missing. Here is a complete version of the above sentence fragment.
Early in the morning, a man standing in front of my house with a bunch of flowers in her hand was run over by a car.
The “was run over by a car.” is the sentence’s complete predicate with “was” as the main verb.
2. Sentence Run-on
A sentence run-on is an error where two or more thoughts are inappropriately merged into one sentence.
Example: Last night as the rain poured so hard, a lightning struck an old, red car was parked next to a tree.
One way to achieve writing with clarity in this particular sentence is to split the two sentences:
Sentence 1: Last night as the rain poured so hard, a lightning struck an old, red car.
Sentence 2: An old, red car was parked next to a tree.
Omitting the main verb was would also make the sentence clear.
Last night as the rain poured so hard, a lightning struck an old, red car parked next to a tree.
- Take note of diction or the choice of words. Writing with clarity could be crashed all at once by words used inappropriately. If you are unsure on the meaning of a word, do not use it or refer to the dictionary first.
I watched “Gnomeo and Juliet” There was a dialogue between two characters who are enemies. It’s quite funny!
Gnomeo’s Mother: …you illiterate.
Juliet’s Father: I am not illiterate; my parents were married!
Juliet’s Father confused the word “illiterate” with “illegitimate.” They may sound alike but they are different words with way too different meanings. So be careful with your choice of words, or on how you use words. Otherwise you will sound silly to your readers, aside from fail in writing with clarity.
Writing with clarity could be a huge challenge to you as a writer because you might commit mistakes unawarely since these errors are common so study harder and practice more.
Keep browsing our website if you want to learn more on writing with clarity.
Challenges of a Writer
Challenges of a Writer
Like in any other fields, there are challenges of a writer as well. If an endeavor is not taken with a challenge or simply done with pure ease, it will be less than fulfilling. One should one way or another, shed sweat and tears in order to feel the genuine essence of achievement.
1. The Topic. The first challenge a writer must face is the topic itself, specially if it is an assigned topic in school or at work. If you fail in surmounting this first challenge, these is no way you will finish your story or essay with success.
2. The Moods. If you do not train your self to write in whatever situation, you will just be controlled by these so called “moods.” If you are not “in the mood” to write, then you couldn’t write. But this is not how a good writer must be. You should beat those moods. Whether the writer “feels like” writing or not about the topic, he must come up with a well written piece.
3. The Motivation. Writing could be boring at times — that is if you are not motivated. The challenge a writer must likewise face is where and how to get the right and sufficient motivation he needs to go on with writing. Your motivation or inspiration could be your family, friends, kids, fulfillment, or even the monetary satisfaction.
4. The Readers. Among these challenges of a writer, I believe this is the toughest because you need to satisfy, enlighten, educate, entertain, persuade, or convince your intended readers. And those six verbs are very hard to successfully accomplish, specially when your target readers are a group of hard-to-please people or a bunch of folks with their cups already full.
5. The Focus. In any subject matter, not just in writing, uniting fragments or making things in harmony with each other is such a tough challenge. It is challenging to unite a community, more with a whole mankind. In writing, one of the hardest challenges of a writer is sticking with the core topic, weaving all gathered details and facts, presenting ideas or thoughts in one accord. A good analogy: a spider meticulously and laboriously knitting its delicate thread to produce a stunning work of art — its cob web.
These could be your stumbling blocks if you do not consider and study them, that is why it is essential to understand and learn to overcome these challenges of a writer.
Why Writing Skills are Important
Why Writing Skills are Important
Why writing skills are important? Unlike any other skills, writing skills are important universally. They are needed in any field, or endeavor one is. And since there are only two way (speaking and writing) by which can express one’s feelings, thoughts, desires, and intentions undoubtedly these skills are essential. Everyone should aim and strive to possess and develop these skills.
- Writing skills are important in personality development since it says a lot of things about you. Your characters or behavior could be mirrored by the way you write, or how well you write.
- Writing skills are important in any field of business, wherein almost everything is recorded — transactions, inventory, daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly reports, marketing strategies, historical reports, operational system, SOP’s..everything.
- Writing skills are important in career building. Name a successful person in his respective career who do not have essential, appropriate, and sufficient writing skills. I bet there is none.
- Writing skills are important to students. Teachers and professors give tons of paper works to students. No one gets away with it; from kindergarten to elementary to secondary to tertiary levels to graduate studies. That is one essential way to assess a student’s performance, progress, and intelligence.
- Writing skills are important in job hunting, starting with writing an effective and believable resume or biodata to writing or essay tests after a job interview.
- Writing skills are important in being accepted in your ideal school or university. School or college admission essays are one vital basis of one’s acceptability.
- Writing skills are important in expressing one’s feelings and be understood. Some if not all are more comfortable conveying their emotions in writing rather than in speaking. Besides, one cause of depression is being misunderstood.
- And however cheesy it may sound, writing skills are important in winning a someone’s heart.
Writing skills are achieved through time and hard work, that is also one reason why writing skills are important. Just how gold is — it undergoes extensive, lengthy, and laborious refining process.
Characteristics of a Good Writer
Characteristics of a Good Writer
As promised,here are some characteristics of a good writer, a post similar to my previous one entitled Qualities of a Good Writer. But this one will give you additional ideas on what characteristics you need to attain to become a good and effective writer while is it enriched by great quotations from great writers.
There are a number of characteristics of a good writer, here are but a few of them:
1. Patient. Good and effective writing do not come overnight. You need to be patient. Good things happen when you wait and have an anticipating heart.
“Beginning writers must appreciate the prerequisites if they hope to become writers. You pay your dues—which takes years.”–Alex Haley
“Start early and word hard. A writer’s apprenticeship usually involves writing a million words (which are then discarded) before he’s almost ready to begin. That takes a while. –David Eddings
“However great a man’s natural talent may be, the act of writing cannot be learned all at once.” –Jean Jacques Rousseau
2. Hardworking. Every good thing one attains could be attributed to his hard work. If you work hard in your desire of being a good and effective writer, and not cheat or turn to undesirable shortcuts, you will have this feeling of fulfillment — one that money can’t buy…only through hard work.
Besides, writing is not always easy. It is challenging. It is not that easy to formulate ideas, convert ideas into words, construct good and comprehensible sentences and paragraphs, more so to create a strong and good influence to your readers.
“Writing is physical work. It’s sweaty work. You just can’t will yourself to become a good writer. You really have to work at it. –Will Haygood
“Easy reading is hard writing.” –Nathaniel Hawthrone
“When something can be read without effort, great effort has gone into its writing.” — Enrique Jardiel Poncela
2. Adaptable or Flexible. As a writer, specially if you’re still a student, you will not be able to choose all the topics you need to write about. Half of them if not all would be picked for or assigned to you. There could be negative moods that may prevent you from performing well in writing but you should beat and overcome those.
“I don’t wait for moods. You accomplish nothing when you do that. Your mind must know it has to get down to work.” –Pearl S. Buck
3. Inspired and Motivated. You need to have an inspiration in order to be motivated in writing. But you should not always depend on inspiration. Do not make this the only basis whether or not you can produce a good story or not.
“Inspiration is wonderful when it happens, but the writer must develop an approach for the rest of the time… The wait is simply too long.” –Leonard Bernstein
4. Passionate about writing. Just like what I have mentioned in my post Qualities of a Good Writer, you must have a passion in writing. Among these five characteristics of a good writer, this is the most important one because once you have this, a love and passion for writing, everything else comes with it — you will be willing to be patient, hardworking, adaptable or flexible, and inspired and motivated.
“Obsession led me to write. It’s been that way with every book I’ve ever written. I become completely consumed by a theme, by characters, by a desire to meet a challenge.–Anne Rice
“You may be able to take a break from writing, but you won’t be able to take a break from being a writer.” –Stephen Leigh
“Only write from your own passion, your own truth. That’s the only thing you really know about, and anything else leads you away from the pulse.” — Marianne Williamson
You really can’t tell the exact time, day, or moment when you can exclaim “Tadah! I’m already a good and effective writer!” For me, becoming one is a continued and never-ending process, as there is always room for improvement and learning never ends.
So continue on learning, continue on writing, continue on gaining and enhancing the characteristics of a good writer!
Qualities of a Good Writer
Qualities of a Good Writer
There are qualities of a good writer which you should learn to possess and develop.
If you want to attain them, you need to be determined and committed in doing whatever it takes that would help you better your writing skills. It would take a lot of work and practice.
The qualities of a good writer do not come overnight, much more when you want to gain the qualities of a better writer. There are differences between a good writer and a better one.
You need to have lots of writing experiences, so you could hone your writing skills and learn from your experiences. A good writer’s teacher is also his personal experiences.
Here are some helpful tips in your quest of being a better writer:
- Have a passion in writing. Everyone gets good, better, and eventually best in whatever endeavor one chooses if he is but passionate about it. You should not write just because you needed to, but because you loved to. If you do not love writing, then learn to like it first. Forcing yourself to do something you do not like would not give you good outputs. When you force yourself to write, it will radiate into your writing, your readers will feel and notice it, and most probably, you will not be successful on being an effective and good writer.
- Learn some simple writing styles and then apply in into your writing. Browse the internet, do some researches. There are tons of tips on the internet on how to attain and hone writing skills and be a good writer. And they are mostly for free! Take note of them, remember them then apply them into your writing.
- Learn from good writers. Read and study their stories or write-ups. Find out what writing styles they use, how they compose their sentences and paragraphs. You may also want to check out the words they use, check how they enrich their piece with appropriate vocabulary words. Take a close look at their diction, or their choice of words as well. Find out if they use other writing gems to improve their writing. Do they use Figures of Speech like metaphors? Similes? Personification? Hyperbole? How do they use them? You may adopt their style just for a guide, then later on if you have already mastered it, you could create your own writing style that is unique and ideal.
- You should be persistent and determined. Your stories or write-ups may not come out as you expected, but never give up. If you give up too early, too soon, then that’s the end of your progress. You will never reach your goal of being a good writer. Continue on writing. It does not come in a wink of an eye. Be patient.
These are but some of the qualities of a good writer. Study harder and find out more.
Watch out for more articles coming up on the subject: Qualities of a good writer.
Improving Writing Skills with Writing Exercises
Improving Writing Skills with Writing Exercises
Improving writing skills equals to doing a lot of practice; one way to achieve that is by performing writing exercises in a regular basis. Attaining good writing skills does not come overnight, so be patient. You may not do a great job in your first few attempts so be determined also. If improving writing skills is really one of your strong desires, have your will strengthened and be persistent. Never give up if you think your articles are not good enough when you think you have done your best. Try and try. Write and write. It takes a lot of draft papers to create a good writer. Write until you have successfully honed your writing skills.
Here are some simple yet fun and effective exercises that will help you in improving writing skills.
1. Watch a movie and relate it in your own words. Our brain clearly stores information in images than with any other forms of data. It is easier to put into words something that is seen, in this case a movie.
2. Pull out a line from a poem or song and elaborate it. A poem and a song are artistically written, so this will test your skill of interpreting literature. This is also a challenge to expound such a single and short line. The skill of explanation or elaboration is important in writing.
3. Grab a picture of anything, say your graduation photo, a framed picture of your sister’s wedding day, a family photo, or a picture of nature or pets; and then write about it. Who or what are in the picture? When and why was it taken? Look for a story behind the picture and write about it. You might as well plainly describe the picture. The skill of clear and effective description is vital in improving writing skills.
4. Write in your journal. Make it a daily habit to write an entry in your journal or diary. This is a good habit in improving writing skills. If something is done correctly, and in a daily basis, the task will become easier and faster to execute. Same goes with writing. It is important that your write everyday, even a short write-up will do. Never let days go by, worst, weeks or even months go by without writing anything. This will blunt your writing skills.
5. Write about your favorites – favorite food, fruit, sports, show, place, song, movie, cartoon character, gadget etc. Human interest is an element of writing which a good writer needs to take note of. Besides, it is easier to write about something that interests you. It is more fun as well.
6. Pick a famous personality and write about him. Popularity is an element of writing that triggers writers’ and readers’ interest. Take advantage of this in writing a good write-up and improving writing skills. You may relay how and why he is popular. If it is a rags-to-riches story, then it is more fun and interesting to write about.
7. Pick an ordinary person and write about him. Improving writing skills may also account for writing about ordinary people or things. He may be a neighbor, a person you meet on the street, a bystander, a vendor, or a complete stranger. There is something interesting about ordinary people. Write about one ordinary person in an extraordinary way.
8. Write how-to articles – how to operate a cellular phone, how to ride a bicycle, how to upload photos in facebook, etc. Possibilities are endless. This is a fun writing exercise since what you are writing about is something you are doing regularly, if not daily. If so, you are knowledgeable about the topic, and this will give you the edge in writing about such.
9. Describe a dream you could remember. When you wake up in the morning, there are some dreams you could clearly remember and some that just totally vanished from your memory recall. Write about those that still stick in your head. This exercise will not only improve your writing skills but your memory as well. It is a huge advantage for good writers to have a good memory recall.
10. Describe yourself, from your physical appearance to your preferences, and inner thoughts. No one knows you better than yourself. Therefore no one could write any better article about you than yourself also. You know your likes and dislikes, your dreams and frustrations, your ideas and speculations. But it is a wise step to ask people who are close to you and gather additional data from them.
11. Imagine something unrealistic. You may create your own world, cartoon character, super hero, gadget, etc. Bring out the child in you and be creative, imaginative, and innovative. These are also skills a writer should possess.
Do more researches. Continue browsing our website and find out more ways in
improving writing skills
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Categories: CHIT-chats, Editorial Writing, Feature Writing, News Writing, Speech Writing, Writing Skills Tags: Improving Writing Skills
What are captions and catchlines?
Captions and catchlines definitely help in telling the story. It is true, according to a Chinese proverb that “a picture is worth a thousand words,” yet some pictures are not independent by themselves or are self-explanatory. Pictures that particularly lack background may not be capable of sending the message to the readers as they are. They need some words to put across the message intended for the readers. That’s why we need captions and catchlines.
What is a catchline? A catchline appears to be a subtitle for a caption which is usually printed in different size or point, type or style. Some catchlines form part of the captions sentence as they are necessary to complete its thought.
What is a caption? A caption is also called a cutline, constitutes the line or lines or text that basically describe, explain, or tell something about the picture. Captions should not be so long that they become as thick as or even thicker than the picture. The standard is at least four lines for a good caption.
Guidelines in writing captions:
1. As in newswriting, the basic 5w’s and 1h are used in presenting the facts.
2. The present tense is preferred to the past tense.
3. The news elements such as prominence, proximity, timeliness, human interest, and the like are also considered.
4. A caption must be written while the picture is being viewed. It is impossible to caption a picture appropriately without looking at it.
5. Captions are basically informative yet they can be written also in such a way that they tickle readers’ emotions and minds by making them a bit intriguing.
6. Describing the obvious in the picture should be avoided.
7. Expressions like “photo shows”, “not in picture are…” do not really help to arrest readers’ attention but may insult them instead.
8. Credit lines which indicate the name of the photographer or photojournalist may be placed right under or just at the side of the photograph.
Kinds of Editorials
Editorials can be categorized according to their functions. Basically, all editorials comment on a certain issue, topic, subject matter or news event, so editorials of comment are most common. The different types of editorials may interlap, as a single editorial may serve various purposes. Yet for the purpose of identifying some common types, we can have the following:
1. News editorial. This editorial is based on a news item; sometimes it is an interpretative news with subtle opinions.
2. Informative editorial. It presents more factual background on an issue which needs proper and probably immediate dissemination to the public while it interprets and explains the significance of such to readers.
3. Editorial of commemoration or tribute. This represents the views of the campus paper and the school, as they pay tribute to leaders, organizers, heroes or heroines, achievers and other persons or institutions particularly on certain anniversaries, celebrations, and dates to remember.
4. Editorial of argumentation. This presents both sides of an issue or may cling to one side then proves its stand.
5. Editorial of appreciation or commendation. This editorial praises or commends a worthy deed, an achievement, victory, or success.
6. Editorial or interpretation. This interprets and explains a particular situation or event and helps in some decisions to be made.
7. Editorial of criticism. This can be positive or negative yet costructive, for it comments on a wrongdoing, an evil act, or a futile action, yet it does not particularly attack the person/s involved.
8. Editorial of crusade. This seeks to obtain people’s support for a particular program or project.
9. Editorial of reputation. This is written in response to editorials of other papers contradicting their expressed opinions.
10. Editorial shorts. These are also called editorial liners, ten-second editorials, or one-punch editorials. These are short, meaty articles, usually of one to two sentences that appear below an editorial.
11. Picture editorial. This consists of a picture or group of pictures that exposes a wrongdoing and how it can be made right or be corrected.
12. Pooled editorial. This refers to a common editorial published by different papers which comes from a single source.
13. Editorial column. This is a personalized editorial since it is by-lined by the columnist.
14. Editorial cartoon. This is a caricature, sketch, or drawing that portrays a message, usually commenting on, reacting to, or even predicting some incidents of wide interest.
15. Editorial of analogy. This analyzes a situation and compares it with something else.
(Note: Some editorials defy classification.)
Categories: Editorial Writing Tags: editorial types, kinds of editorials, types of editorial writing