An Editing Checklist

Here are some of the sites I visited in developing this checklist:

Create a personal checklist based on your areas of weakness. Then edit for one problem at a time. Proofread for sentence problems only after you are satisfied with your content, structure, and style.

Be willing to change everything!

Content

Does the draft have a single, clear focus?
Have I delivered on my promise to the readers?
Is every bit of information relevant, or have I left in information that was of interest to me but won’t be to my readers?
Have I accounted for my readers’ attitudes and emotions toward me and my topic? Have I accounted for my attitudes and emotions toward my readers and my topic?
Does the beginning encourage readers to read on? Does it state a purpose or grab attention?
Will each point be clear to the readers?
Have I used concrete details relevant to my readers to support my points?
Have I used diverse/appropriate sources and quotes that will be credible to my readers? * Am I being fair and balanced?
Have I accounted for any legal or ethical issues?

Structure

Is there a clear beginning, middle, and end?
Is the information delivered in a logical order for the readers?
Do my sentences take the reader through a clear line of thought? Is each connected to the one before and the one after?
Do I have clear transitions that lead the reader from one idea to the next?

Style

Is my language appropriate for my readers and my discipline or area of writing?
Have I relied too much on jargon, bureaucratic language, acronyms, clichés?
Do my readers already have to know what I’m writing about in order to understand how I’ve written about it?
Are my sentences clear and direct?
Is my language concrete and specific?
Have I eliminated unnecessary which/that clauses and other unnecessary words and phrases?
Have I used active voice and active verbs wherever possible?
Are my metaphor and similes appropriate for the context and drawn from sources that my readers know?
Can I read the draft aloud without stumbling?

Sentencing

Can I track who does what (subject/verb) in every sentence?
Does my punctuation follow the conventions of my discipline or area of writing?
Are my sentences too long and complicated? Do I have too many long sentences grouped together?
Are my sentences short and choppy? Do I have too many short sentences grouped together?
Are my sentences tangled and broken up with clauses and too many prepositional phrases?
Do all my sentences tend to start the same way? (“The,” “There,” “I,” etc.)
Do my sentences seem dull or flat from being built on too many "to be" verbs?
Am I being repetitious in phrasing? Am I using redundant constructions?