Style Checklist for English 101

1. Underline each verb with a double line. Whenever you have a weak, linking verb (is, are, were, was, be, seems), see if you can revise the sentence with an action verb. Note that you can’t simply replace the weak verb with an action verb, you’ll have to recast the entire sentence.

2. Underline each subject with a single line. Read your subject verb pairs. Are they in active voice (Jim throws the ball) rather than passive voice (The ball is thrown by Jim)? In other words, is some concrete subject doing something? If not, see if you can revise the sentence into active voice.

3. Read through your paper aloud slowly, writing an "x" in the margin next to each sentence that sounds "wordy." Then work with each "x" sentence to eliminate any repeated ideas and any unnecessary words (vague adjectives or adverbs, unnecessary expressions) and to rearrange the sentence so that it gets the same idea(s) across in fewer words. You may need to combine sentences.

4.a. Draw a circle around each this and that in your paper. Make sure that you haven’t used these words as pronouns. You can keep them if they are adjectives (that car, this century) or determiners (he said that she could go to the game); otherwise revise the sentence to eliminate them. Often, combining the sentence that begins with this or that with the sentence preceding it works to eliminate the vague pronoun.

4.b. Draw a circle around each pronoun. Then, to check your pronoun/antecedent agreement, draw a line from the pronoun back to the noun that it replaces. If you don’t have a noun to draw a line back to, you can’t use a pronoun. Also make sure that the correct pronoun replaces the noun. Plural pronouns should refer back to plural nouns and singular pronouns should refer to singular nouns. An example of a common error: "Everyone should correct their mistakes." Correct: "Everyone should correct his or her mistakes.

5. Is each sentence within the paragraph connected to the sentence before it (in other words, are there transitions between your sentences)? If not, add a transition. Sometimes creating transitions is as simple as adding a transitional expression (see page 118 for a list of possibilities); sometimes you’ll need to revise the entire sentence and/or combine sentences.

6. Highlight every reference to yourself (every sentence that includes I, my, etc.). If the sentence is employing personal experience to support your argument or is modeling reactions for your reader, move to the next highlighted sentence. If the sentence is using a tag phrase (I believe, in my opinion etc.), delete the phrase since it will qualify and weaken your argument.