Importance of Editing and Proofreading
All writers have experienced the pain and frustration of trying to express themselves clearly and efficiently, only to discover that their work is filled with errors and is unclearly structured. Whether it is a first-year composition student, a PhD candidate in astrophysics, or an engineer working on a project proposal, the writing process is rarely without its problems. And although many undergraduate students might not be aware of the professional standards in academic and technical writing, they can be sure that faculty members often encounter more instances of poor writing than professional, polished work. At the heart of all writing is a knowledge that writing will be read and judged by other people. It is something that the writer cannot escape, but it is also something that is very hard to accept. Creative control of the pieces of your paper and the desire for maximum efficiency can be strong, especially when you are working under pressure. However, an essential part of providing high-quality professional work is proofreading and editing, and it should never be overlooked.
Also, it is about the style or the context of it. Nowadays, plenty of people like to give up proofreading because they just use the word document, click on summarizing that gives the brief idea of their work so that they can have a tremendous time to relax. However, the importance of proofreading is significant everywhere. From typing a blog, email to a complete novel, everything needs to be checked. Because more and more work is done and stored on a computer. And if students, in order to avoid writing so much as much as possible, then the skill of proofreading has to be applied in almost every written form. Did you know that every time when we hit the spell check, it is actually the computer scanning the completed work and making sure the words are spelled correctly?
Nowadays, plenty of people like to give up proofreading because they just use the word document, click on summarizing that gives the brief idea of their work so that they can have a tremendous time to relax. However, the importance of proofreading is significant everywhere. From typing a blog, email to a complete novel, everything needs to be checked. Because more and more work is done and stored on a computer. And if students, in order to avoid writing so much as much as possible, then the skill of proofreading has to be applied in almost every written form. Did you know that every time when we hit the spell check, it is actually the computer scanning the completed work and making sure the words are spelled correctly?
While proofreading is about looking for errors, either grammatical, typographical, or spelling errors that are not picked up or fixed in the process of editing. Proofreading is not something that an isolated student should do as he might be too tired to recognize an unforgivable error which a good sleep the night before can fix. It is a good idea to get someone else to have a look at it because another set of eyes can catch errors that a student may have missed.
Editing is more involved in making sure the piece of writing is effective in communicating the ideas. There are many things one cannot just check in auto-checking or word checking. For instance, the content seems choppy and perhaps the wording is not the best. Or the main character in the story may act in a way that does not seem to fit with his description or background. A good editor can guide an individual to think about new ideas and move over the revision of a work. And when we do intensive editing, we are more likely to build up good critical thinking as we constantly think if a sentence is well written or makes sense, etc.
Editing and proofreading are essential for written work. It is the final step in the writing process. The process of editing and proofreading ensures that a piece of work is consistently formatted, that language is clear, and that any mistakes are corrected. I believe that editing and proofreading are not just important steps, they are two important steps. If you are going to do your best work, these two actions must be done in separate steps.
To begin with, the most effective way to be precise and to minimize word count is to read the document slowly many times, as each pass will reveal new errors. Next, it is critical to create space between the editing and proofreading processes. We can focus in turn on the big picture, and then on the details in the proofreading stage. Similarly, try not to do too much in one go. It can be difficult to focus at all levels of the writing in one go, so it is sometimes a good idea to just concentrate on paragraphs at a time. Lists can also be very helpful in getting the most out of proofreading. We could start with the smallest ‘lower end’ punctuation mark, and work up the lists to the longest ‘upper end’ punctuation. Proofread from a printout and not the computer screen. Sometimes, to read it from a new medium is the most effective way of spotting mistakes. By the time we have finished the final stage, it should be a good feeling to be able to hand something over that we are confident in. Also, as part of this, never just rely on spell checking. It is a first step in the proofreading process, not the only step. Always check for yourself as well because reliance on a spell checker can lead to costly mistakes. It is also very helpful to get someone else involved in the process. They may spot an obvious flaw that we have missed, or they may just bring a new perspective. And finally, don’t forget to allow enough time for the last stage – do not leave it to the last minute because it takes longer than we might think. Allowing plenty of time to proofread means we can have a break and come back to it with a quite fresh outlook. These tips can benefit effectively from having someone else look over our work to really help to identify and correct errors. It is important to remember that spell checks are useful, but they cannot detect all mistakes and do not provide explanations for the corrections. However, these general techniques and approaches towards editing and proofreading can be applied to all writing, whatever the subject matter, length and method of work. Ultimately, they are the key to a successful and professional piece of writing.
By avoiding the mistakes above, it can help to improve the accuracy and effectiveness of the writing.
Last but not least, another common mistake is beginning a sentence with “with” or “because.” These phrases cannot stand alone and make the sentence fragments. For instance, the sentence “Because the weather was cold” is not a complete sentence but part of a sentence. Writers should be cautious of such errors.
Fourthly, writers should avoid overusing adverbs. Adverbs, which are descriptive words that modify verbs, are helpful but not if they are used in every context. For example, “the patient quickly recovered” and “the doctor gently spoke” are better without “quickly” and “gently.”
Thirdly, “useful” makes the words preceded by “very” superfluous. For example, when writers use “very useful,” they can change it to “instrumental.” As for “very important,” writers can change it to “crucial.” And “very necessary” can be changed to “essential.” By doing this, it can help to improve the sentence and avoid repetitions.
Secondly, writers should not use “thing” when they refer to nouns; instead, they should be specific. For example, “I like things that are sweet” can be improved by “I like food that is sweet.”
Firstly, writers should avoid colloquialisms. Informal expressions, such as “well, you know, basically,” are not suitable in written work. Such slangs are accepted in speech but not in formal writing.
Editing and proofreading are essential for professional and effective writing. While the research and writing of a paper may be days or weeks away, the good work almost ends if editing and proofreading not done properly and this is considered as vital and crucial step in the process of writing a paper. Whether writing a business document, an academic essay or a personal email, the golden rule is to take time, put the best effort and care in producing a quality piece of writing. Slick write is a powerful, free application that makes it easy to check your writing for grammar errors, potential stylistic mistakes and other features of interest. It also provides a quick analysis of your writing and it calculating average sentence length, readability, and writing style in your text. Also, it is free to use and it is easily accessible by using online and it can be found any kind of search engines. Grammarly is a leading and a popular tool in term of writing that can be used for the purpose of proofreading. Grammarly is not only finding and highlighted the mistakes and errors but also it provides detail explanation about each mistake and give a very good suggestions for possible corrections. It checks for grammar, punctuation errors, spelling and it also helps in enhancing vocabulary by making the writing more concise. It required a payment before using the advanced algorithms and certain features but the cost worth for what a writer can benefits from using it. By using a Grammarly, a teaching statement can be easily cleaned up and shared by engaging in the posts to express the interests and simply overview one’s thoughts in the writing. Hemingway app is an app designed to help in a way of checking the writing work. It will help to highlight (adverbs and passive words in the text) and it gives us an idea how well each sentence is. Also, it shows a write colour such as green, yellow and red to indicate the sentence’s complexity and various mistakes and now it becomes easier to amend the errors. With this app, a writer can keep a write-up as simple as possible so that everyone can understand it. From the technology point of view, Hemingway app is an offline app where it can be downloaded and perform the proofreading work fastly and efficiency without wasting so much of time. In a conclusion, proofreading is an important skill even if an individual is not a writer. A well written paper can be taken and can be graded and can make which is a large different and also proofreading helps to fix the grammatical errors that’s overlooked the work. It is so important to run a little of the spell check and then to go back start from the each grammar error because those simple errors can make the difference. Writing a clean and a clear piece of work, free from mistakes and errors, brings a more professional impression to an instructor.
