{"id":1148,"date":"2013-11-22T22:15:14","date_gmt":"2013-11-23T04:15:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/writeherewritenowwriteon.wordpress.com\/?p=44"},"modified":"2016-02-04T11:38:46","modified_gmt":"2016-02-04T17:38:46","slug":"put-it-in-reverse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/put-it-in-reverse\/","title":{"rendered":"Put it in reverse"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Haley Morton<\/p>\n

So the last word is written on your paper. How do you feel? Satisfied? Tired? Ready for some chocolate? If you\u2019re at all like me, you probably a combination of all of those. But sometimes\u2026you still think your paper is a complete mess. Ok, I\u2019ll admit it\u2014that\u2019s me all the time. The good news is I have an answer for all of your first draft messy writing problems: reverse outlines! Get a blank sheet of paper, grab a hard copy of your paper, and let\u2019s get started!<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what you do:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Read your paper all the way through with your intended thesis in mind.\u00a0 Ask yourself: Does my intended thesis match the big idea I\u2019m finding in my paper?<\/li>\n
  2. Go back to the introduction. Have a friend read your introduction and ask him what he thinks your thesis is. If it matches yours, jot it down at the top of the blank sheet of paper.<\/li>\n
  3. Move on to the next paragraph. Write down the big idea of this paragraph under your paraphrased thesis. Be honest with yourself, if the paragraph has two main ideas instead of one, write them both down. If you can\u2019t figure out the main idea, you\u2019ll need revise the paragraph to have one, or perhaps you\u2019ll find that the ideas belong in other paragraphs and have just been misplaced.<\/li>\n
  4. Repeat step three for the rest of your body paragraphs.<\/li>\n
  5. When you get to the conclusion, watch out for ideas you haven\u2019t introduced in the rest of your paper. You don\u2019t want these. Also, do you find anything in your conclusion that might make a better thesis for your paper than the one you already have? If so, take note.<\/li>\n
  6. Now take a step back. Look at what your reverse outline (everything you wrote on that blank piece of paper) is telling you. Does anything need to be moved around for logical reasoning\u2019s sake? Do you need more evidence for some of your ideas? Should you refine your thesis to match the development of your ideas (rather than how you thought they would develop before you got to the conclusion)?<\/li>\n
  7. Make the necessary changes according to your outline. Your paper will make a lot more sense to your reader now that you\u2019ve approached your revision this way.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Reverse outlines shouldn\u2019t be frustrating, so be sure to be patient with yourself. Revising takes a little extra time, but it\u2019s worth it\u2019s worth the better grade. Plus, you\u2019ll feel even more accomplished! Happy revising!<\/p>\n

    Haley is a senior at Principia College and a political science and history double major. She has spent the last four years writing, studying, and running cross country and track. Currently, she is working on her capstone about Title IX and women in athletics.\u00a0 <\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    by Haley Morton So the last word is written on your paper. How do you feel? Satisfied? Tired? Ready for some chocolate? […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,21,109],"tags":[46,20,47,44],"class_list":["post-1148","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-outline","category-revision","category-writeherewritenowwriteon","tag-organization","tag-paragraph","tag-reverse-outline","tag-writing-process"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5DI6r-iw","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1148","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1148"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1148\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1201,"href":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1148\/revisions\/1201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/content.principia.edu\/teaching-excellence\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}