Some of my favorite revision strategies include the trash bin technique and the reverse outline. From day one, I’ve been using the trash bin technique. It really helps to write out all of my thoughts for my free draft then go back after and recycle through everything I need to keep or throw away. Especially because then if I find that I am lacking evidence, I can go back and look in my trash bin to see if there’s anything I can use from there in my other paragraphs. Additionally, the reverse outline helps for pre and post writing. Before writing, I usually use the clustering technique just to get a feel for where my essay is going to take me. And in the middle of editing, if I find that I keep straying from what I want to say, the reverse outline helps me to sort my ideas to make sure they are fluid and support my claim. Overall, I do believe I am getting better at writing. I thought I would struggle through this ENG110 class because writing is really not my favorite. But the more I write, the better I get. In the future, I plan to use these strategies as I begin taking occupational therapy courses. After talking with upperclassmen, there are 10 page papers coming my way and several of them. I will use the clustering technique to begin my essays and a reverse outline throughout my essays. These I believe are the tools I used to excel in the last two essays I wrote for ENG110 so I hope to continue to use them as I write papers in the upcoming semesters. Additionally, this past semester I had used these revision strategies in my Sociology class. We had to write a critical reflection every week on an article so I had used the trash bin technique for every paper. I would sit down and summarize everything that I thought was important, then went back and took out sentences that were less important than the other points I was trying to make. Also, I had used the sandwich technique to be sure I introduced my quote and continued to explain why that quote was important in the following sentence. These strategies helped me to succeed in Sociology, improving every week in class. It is proven that these revision strategies do help me succeed inside and outside of my ENG110 class.
