Download Nonnegotiable Editing Check List for 2009-2010 Year

Editing Check List
o Capitalization rules
o Beginning of sentence
o Titles (and should be underlined), “short stories”
o Proper Nouns
o Check homophones (there, their, they’re, to, too, which, witch, weather,
whether, through, threw, were, where, *are/our, etc.)
o Watch apostrophes: they show possession--Mary’s dog, the book’s spine
(single possessive), those flowers’ leaves are wilted (plural possessive)
or make contractions--(you’re vs. your, it’s vs. its)
o Check sentences (do you have a subject (noun/pronoun) AND a predicate
(verb), if you’re missing one of those parts it is a fragment)
o Commas (in a series: ex. I had to blow dry my hair, brush my teeth, and wash
my face before catching the bus.
Yes there is a comma before the and in a series)
o Verbs (varying word choice in dialogue tags, so not always using SAID)
o Verbs (varying action verbs word choice—more sophisticated word choice—
try to use the vocabulary words you learned from reading last year. Specific verb
examples: blasted, blotted, bolted, crawled, demolished, devoured, glowered, yelped,
crept, and a million more)
o Paragraphs: Start a new paragraph when…
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o
o
o
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Change in time
Change in topic or new idea
Change in place or setting
Change in perspective
In short stories and other works of fiction a new paragraph should also be started
whenever the speaker changes.
o For dramatic effect
o Ending punctuation (is always present, clear, and appropriate for the type of
sentence and the tone of the sentence)
o Sentence variety
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o
o
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o
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No fragments (subject/verb in ALL sentences)
No run-ons (all compound sentences have a COMMA & FANBOYS)
3 compound
5 complex
2 appositive
1 short phrase