Yanking Weeds

Every heard the saying, “Can’t see the garden for the weeds?” Revising a story is a lot like pulling weeds:

• Not fun to think about
• Easy to put off
• Necessary
• Not to be taken lightly—mustn’t yank carelessly or you could pull out something good.
• Hard work—gotta dig down and get to the roots, or the problem will persist
• And like pulling weeds, once you get started, ripping out all those unwanted/unnecessary weeds/words is satisfying—even fun, sort of... And, the end results make it all worthwhile!

The International Reading Association’s “Engage/Teacher to Teacher blog”  declared September 5-9th Revision Week. The postings are all there, ready and waiting for you to read and be inspired. Click back through postings from that week you'll find teaching tips from Newbery Honor winner Cynthia Lord, a podcast from Kate Messner (Real Revision), "5 Questions With” by Ruth Ayres and Stacey Shubitz (a.k.a. the Two Writing Teachers), among other revision-themed features.”

Now pull on those gardening gloves and let's get after it!