Back when I was in high school, I took two writing seminars regarding writing centers and the role of a writing “tutor.” During that class, I learned the difference between higher order of concerns and lower order of concerns, which are parallel to the global and local editing techniques we are using now. We were taught to use global editing when drafting/revising and local editing when editing. So, I have gotten used to prioritizing this when looking over drafts. However, I still do find this to be difficult. It’s hard to resist fixing or pointing out things like sentence structure, grammar, or punctuation. It feels like it would make sense to attack both head on when reading over a draft, however things like organization, idea development, and audience awareness are much more important that any grammatical error. This also holds true to the writer. Making suggestions or praising their ideas is a lot more helpful and beneficial than slashing out some commas here and there. This allows them to see from a reader’s/the audience’s perspective.
