Peer Editing & Academic Essays
In class today, we were taught the importance of peer editing, as well as a few other things about academic writings. First of all, Mr.Paterson talked to us about the process his piece of writing went under before becoming a part of a book. After having finished writing it, it was first peer edited in August, 2009. The following month, it was revised again by someone from a different area of expertise. On top of that, another person made suggestions in November, 2009, which he accepted 70~80% of. Like this, we must keep in mind that we do not have to change something if we feel that it’s correct and doesn’t need to be fixed. Back to the peer editing process, Mr.Paterson presented his academic essay at a conference in March. Despite the many improvements he’s made in the past several months, the publisher’s team still had more suggestions. According to the teacher himself, he took in about 40% of the suggestions, so over half when you look at the whole picture. He expressed that peer editing is CRUCIAL when doing an academic essay, because you are most blind to your mistakes and it allows people with different perspectives analyze your writing. Also, he referred to this as a completed cake. No matter what the finished product looks like, dirty hands and an untidy kitchen is unappealing for sure. For this reason, we must value the process and how the writing was made.
Second, we talked about plagiarism. It is quite a big problem in Japan, so Mr.Paterson taught us the two big rules of paraphrasing. The first of is that in your paraphrasing, you can’t have three or more of the same words in a row. It is slightly different when using proper nouns like someone name, but a part from that, this is the general requirement. Additionally, your paraphrasing must convey the exact same message as the original. If it doesn’t contain the same meaning, it is improper and inaccurate.
Lastly, with the time we had left, we talked about “Rab’s 5A’s”. It stands for Academic, Achievable, Access, Attractive, and Arguable. Our topic must be academic by nature, an achievable amount of writing, something we have access to information on, intrigue people, and must have an argument. With all of this in mind, our homework was to think of a topic we are passionate about.
Second, we talked about plagiarism. It is quite a big problem in Japan, so Mr.Paterson taught us the two big rules of paraphrasing. The first of is that in your paraphrasing, you can’t have three or more of the same words in a row. It is slightly different when using proper nouns like someone name, but a part from that, this is the general requirement. Additionally, your paraphrasing must convey the exact same message as the original. If it doesn’t contain the same meaning, it is improper and inaccurate.
Lastly, with the time we had left, we talked about “Rab’s 5A’s”. It stands for Academic, Achievable, Access, Attractive, and Arguable. Our topic must be academic by nature, an achievable amount of writing, something we have access to information on, intrigue people, and must have an argument. With all of this in mind, our homework was to think of a topic we are passionate about.
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