Revision Skills
What revision questions ask
Revision Skills tests your ability to improve sentences and paragraphs for clarity, coherence, organization, development, tone, and concision. Items may ask which revision best improves an underlined sentence, where a sentence should be placed, which sentence should be deleted, or how to combine sentences without losing meaning.
Revision priorities
Preserve the original claim; a smoother sentence that adds or drops information is wrong. Cut wordiness and redundancy: due to the fact that becomes because, and return back becomes return. Prefer active voice when the agent is known and important; use passive voice when the agent is unknown or irrelevant. Combine choppy sentences by subordinating minor ideas, and vary openings so the prose does not plod. Put the main idea in the main clause and place modifiers next to what they modify; the position of only changes meaning.
Paragraph unity and coherence
A unified paragraph develops one idea through a topic sentence and relevant support. Delete sentences that drift off-topic even if they are interesting. Coherence comes from logical order, clear transitions, consistent pronoun reference, and repetition of key terms. Transitions must match the relationship: however signals contrast, therefore signals causation, for example signals illustration.
Worked example
Original: The city opened a new bike lane. The lane runs along Main Street. It connects the park to the university. Residents have praised it. Revision: The city opened a new bike lane along Main Street that connects the park to the university, a change residents have praised. The main clause keeps the focus on the city's action. The relative clause combines location and connection without repeating lane. The appositive a change residents have praised merges the public reaction and implies a result relationship. The revision is tighter but still one controlled sentence, not a run-on.
Traps that cost marks
- Choosing a revision that sounds more formal but shifts the original meaning.
- Stringing every idea into one long sentence with unclear emphasis.
- Inserting therefore or moreover where no logical link exists.
- Deleting a sentence that supplies needed evidence, not just filler.
- Replacing plain use with utilize or very with exceedingly when the change adds no precision.