My children were periodically infested with what I like to call Exaggerated Composition Revulsion (ECR). If you’ve experienced this anti-writing phenomenon, take courage. There are remedies! Parts 1 and 2 of this series discussed some initial methods to combat this dreaded writing “disease”:

  1. Get ideas flowing: brainstorm, free-write, research, discuss. Use other techniques to get ideas out before you. (See Part 1)
  2. Find your Audience: WHO is reading? What are their needs? What do they want from your writing? (See Part 2)
  3. Plan your Purpose: WHY do you want your audience to read? What will they gain from reading? (See Part 2)

The last major cause of ECR comes from trying to do too many tasks too fast and in the wrong order. (I act this way in other areas of life—and I do it in writing, too!)

Writing involves multiple skills that interweave with and depend on each other. Particularly when learning to manage these tasks, we need to follow a strategic plan.

When we ask our children to write without a plan, we might as well ask them to walk in the kitchen and make Crème Brûlée. I know I couldn’t make this dish without guidance—or even pronounce it correctly. The ingredients and the recipe are fairly simple. The individual steps aren’t that hard, but they have to be done in the correct order, carefully and slowly. First, heat milk to the proper temperature. Then beat egg yolks, adding them in slowly and carefully to the milk. If you do this step too quickly or in the wrong order, you’ll have scrambled eggs in hot milk instead of a nice cream. Gross! Blech, Blech!

When it comes to composing, there is also a necessary progression. After you’ve determined your audience and purpose, you first get the ideas out. Your goal, then is to shape your message: improve, refine, and tweak: first the “big picture” goals, then the key points and supporting details, and then the refinements.

But instead, we tend to edit as we write. We jot down a sentence and before we can write more, our brain starts analyzing what we’ve just put on the page. We examine the phrases; we try to remember if the spelling is their, there or they’re. We wonder if that last sentence should really come before the previous one. An endless list of potential changes! We start focusing on what is not quite right. We lose direction. Then we lose motivation. And all of a sudden, we have scrambled eggs in hot milk. Gross! Blech, Blech! Multitasking is a leading cause of death to the writing process.

And all the more, for a young apprentice writer!

Here are some tips to help your student stay away from Blech:

Tip 1: Determine if you have the right amount of ideas.

  • Is your key point explained?
  • Do you have enough ideas (supporting points) to prove your key and supporting points (main paragraphs)?
  • Will the meaning be clear to your audience?

Tip 2: Wait until after you’ve written your key points to write your introduction and conclusion. It’s hard to introduce something (or conclude it) when you don’t know where you’re going or where you’ve been.

Tip 3: After you have written a significant amount of ideas on the page, start the REAP-ing process.

REAP will help you remember the proper order in the evaluating process. Imagine working through these steps as though the parts of your writing are placed in a funnel: change larger portions first, and then change to smaller and smaller aspects. (The following questions aren’t all-inclusive, but should provide a guideline to help you understand each step—and even to evaluate whether your student has succeeded.)

Revise: Make improvements on your main ideas and place them in the proper order.

  • Content. Have you included and expanded on all the ideas you need to explain or prove your purpose to your audience?
  • Ordering points and thoughts. Are these ideas in the most understandable order? Are there ideas that don’t belong? Have you duplicated ideas?
  • Transition from point to point. How well does the writing flow? (Add this step as students get more advanced. Provide at least one sentence to connect between main ideas and to guide your reader from one thought to the next.)

Edit: Sentence level changes. While both the revising and editing stages are ways to modify your writing, for our purposes, revising is idea- and objective-focused and editing is more sentence focused. These two steps can get intertwined and messy, but try to follow them in order.

  • Use the audience’s language. Are you sharing your ideas in a way that your specific audience will understand?
  • How well do each of the sentences connect with each other?
  • Select your words to communicate more precisely.
  • Are individual sentences clear and purposeful?

Add: Fill in any missing material: details, explanation, missed points and supporting details. This step may need to come after Revise and again after Edit. When you’ve revised and pruned, there may be additional substance that will help clarify and illustrate ideas.

Proofread: grammar, spelling, mistakes, and punctuation.

  • Focus on common mistakes.
  • Read your text backwards to look at each word’s spelling and grammar and to spot typos.

Refrain from doing the proofreading and correcting for your children. If they need help, you can try underlining the issue or making margin notes for what kind of problem needs to be fixed in that line. Give them some direction, but ultimately, give them the tools to do it themselves.

Repeat these steps as necessary; the more complicated the writing, the more you’ll repeat and work through.

Don’t forget your end goal: communication. Yes, it can be hard work and tedious, but you can give them the tools and the time it takes to rise to the challenge, succeed, and be effective communicators. Let’s get them writing!

To use all these ideas in your writing classes, print out this handy dandy handout.