Revision Plan for an Essay
Task: Choose the Multi-Source Literature Review, and write a revision plan which outlines the changes
you will make and the reasons why you will make those changes. This document will be finished prior to
turning in the final draft. Please incorporate feedback from the instructor and one other reader.
Length: 500 words (2 double-spaced pages)
Format: APA 7
Point of View: The revision plan will use the first-person point of view.
One of the mistakes that new writers make is rushing to the end of the writing process. There is a reason
that writers turn in drafts of their work. There is a reason that writers revise. Writing is a recursive
process. A writer may return to a draft more than once to add, refine, eliminate, and polish it.
Furthermore, a revision is more than an editing process. It is more than addressing sentence-level errors,
typos, and awkward sentences. Revising asks a writer to “re-see” the work on the page, to think about it
critically, and to alter the work in a substantial way. Having a plan to revise can streamline the process of
revising the essay. Here are some suggestions to help a writer to develop a revision plan:
1. When developing a revision plan, a writer should develop detailed notes on the feedback received on
the initial draft. A writer might develop a plan based on revising multiple specific aspects of the essay,
including, for example, the thesis statement. So, deciding to revise a thesis statement might involve a
discussion of the feedback given to the writer about the thesis, a description of what the thesis says and
does in the current draft, and how the thesis might improve. A good plan might involve all those ideas. It
is a good idea to look at as many aspects of the current draft as possible when developing a revision plan.
2. A writer should carefully evaluate the feedback on the first draft. The paper is the creation of the
writer. While targeted feedback is often essential to developing drafts, it is a writer’s choice which
feedback is useful. Discerning which feedback will be incorporated into a new draft is part of developing
as a writer.
3. A writer should create specific solutions for problems with the draft. So, if a draft receives feedback
that the thesis of the draft was unclear, that more evidence was necessary, and that the draft was
disorganized, the writer will create a detailed plan about the steps needed to correct these issues.
Helpful Resources:
The Writing Center. (2020). Rewriting. University of Maryland Global
Campus.https://www.umgc.edu/current-students/learning-resources/writing-center/online-guide-to
writing/tutorial/chapter2/ch2-15.
Sweetland Center for Writing. How to write a revision plan. The University of
Michigan. https://lsa.umich.edu/content/dam/sweetland-assets/sweetland
documents/teachingresources/SequencingandScaffoldingAssignments/Supplement3_HowtoWriteaRevis
ionPlan