[Tea] Hand-holding tips for revision

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Cincinnati, October 31, 2020

Hi Friend,

When you hear the word "revision," do you picture a red pen? Perhaps you see in your mind's eye a teacher wearing half moon glasses scrutinizing your essay for spelling errors and format mistakes?

Most of us think of revision as the task of "correcting" the essay—getting rid of sentence fragments, adding appropriate punctuation, identifying typos. As a former copy-editor, however, I'm here to tell you that that idea of revision is what we call in the business: editing. Editing is the task of ensuring that the finished product is error-free.

In Brave Writer, we separate the ideas of revision and editing. Revision is “casting new vision” for the original piece of writing. It’s a “re-imagining” of the original content. You have what you want to say already committed to paper or screen; now you consider all the various ways that content can be said.

Your freewrite/draft is the jet stream of thought: all of it rushing out of the writer onto the page willy-nilly.

Revision is not, now, taking that freewrite/draft and fixing commas or identifying run-on sentences. It’s not addressing tone or spelling mistakes. Those practices fall under the category of “copy-editing.”

Revision is that drastic over-haul type work that literally changes the draft sometimes so completely, the original is hardly recognizable in it any more (except maybe some sentences or the germ of the idea). Revision is where you hunker down and look at specific thoughts expressed insufficiently in the draft, and then determine:

how to expand them,
how to enhance them,
how to deepen the content or insight or facts-basis.

Revision IS writing.

In fact, most writers would say that revision is the craft. Revision is the heart of being a writer.

What I find in parents (and even in those who claim to be writing instructors) is a tendency to skip this part of the process. They move right to editing and call it revision. The reason we skip revision is that it is harder to do—copy-edits spring to the eye and beg to be fixed.

Revision requires:

patience,
time,
curiosity,
and more writing.

When asked to give revision notes or support, weary teachers of a hundred or more students will draw a blank or praise what’s good or give general comments like, “Be sure you think about your audience” or “It’s a good idea to make sure your points are in a solid sequence.”

This kind of general feedback isn’t helpful to writers, even though I admire the teachers who put in the time to actually read their students' writing. What helps is to become a child’s creative partner—a job perfectly suited to homeschooling parents. What you want to do, what you need to learn how to do—is to create a dynamic partnership for idea generation.

For instance, you might see a flat-footed opening line (note: they are almost always flat-footed in the first draft – it’s completely rare that the first line stays the same in well-revised writing). Your job isn’t to point out that it is flat-footed or could be revised. It isn’t to assign the task of making it better to your child. It’s literally to brainstorm ideas for improvements.

Let’s say the child is writing about white water rafting, you might try something like this:

“I wonder how we can make this opening line grab the reader’s attention. Let me think, let me think. What if we start with the experience—Let’s get in the boat. Are you in it? What’s happening now? Close your eyes. What do you see? Blue? What shades? What's happening in your body? Can you hear the water roar?”

Jot down words and images as they come out of your child’s mouth. Then you say:

“How about the water? I can imagine there’s a spray. Is there? Yes? Where did it hit? What is a water spray like? Does it remind you of anything? Oh good one! The spray of a garden hose when your brother aims it at you. Good one! Yes! Let’s jot that down.”

You’re wool-gathering.

You are collecting:

images,
experiences,
thoughts,
curiosities,
comments,
ideas.

You aren’t telling your child what to do. You’re helping your child think freshly about what is already on the page. You are the dialog partner, just like you'd be in a conversation:

“Then what happened? Oh wait, how did you get there? That must have been amazing! What did your brother say?”

But now, you're focused on writing and you're providing the conversational partnership that your child needs. You're thinking in writing categories but having discussions about them (natural ones). You aren’t an English teacher. You are an interested friend, partner, ally.

See the difference?

Stop the generalizations and get into conversations. Help get those words out. Then rearrange them several times to find the right order, the right impact.

Read the fragments aloud.
Re-sequence them.
Read them again.
Ask more questions.
Add more words.
Read them again.

Like that.

Then, when you go back to that opening sentence, you have a selection of ideas and sentences to choose from that might grab the reader’s attention. Together, you can find the one that you like best, and write it in a way that makes magic.

Warmly,

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