THE WRITING PROCESS: The Editing Process

Editing is an inevitable part of writing. Revise what you have written for its content, after careful revision, check for accuracy. It entails looking at each sentence cautiously, ensures it is what you have intended to write, that it is well-designed and serves its purpose.

The Editing Process

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Editing involves the checking for spelling mistakes, grammatical and punctuation oversights. Proofreading is the final step of the writing process. English grammar deal with a huge area and cannot be checked for everything separately.

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Verbs and Tenses

Concentrate first on verbs - tenses and forms - check that all verbs are in the time you have written. If you have written about something that happened in the past, check that all verbs are written in the past tense. Once you are satisfied that all the verbs are correct, check for those aspects of grammar that you personally found the most difficult.

Spelling and Other Mistakes

### Spelling
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Check for spelling mistakes, consult your dictionary or run a spell check if you used a computer.
When you read through your writing, you may stop at words that don’t look right. These are often the words that you have spelled incorrectly, and you should check them in the dictionary, or ask someone to check them for you.

Mistakes

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If you are writing on a computer, you should run the spell check. This will help you correct most of your mistakes. (How to use the spellcheck properly.) Punctuation must be checked for any run-on sentences or sentence fragments. Change the punctuation when correcting these mistakes. Have you used colons, commas, and semi-colons correctly? Ask someone to check with you. Your sentences must all start with capitalization.

CApital Letters

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A capital letter for all names of people, countries, cities, rivers etc. It is not easy to check everything at the same time, it is, therefore, better to check them one at a time and as you find a spelling mistake while checking when you are checking for punctuation or vice versa, make the necessary corrections. The next day after you finished your writing, is always better because you will find more mistakes.

Mistakes

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"Small mistakes of grammar or spelling will not spoil a good piece of writing, but some readers get distracted by them and it is best to try and correct as many as you can. Good luck!"

Source: EBH Joubert: English Grammar
http://esl.fis.edu/learners/advice/wp-edit.htm