Types of Feedback
Last week we talked about the levels of thinking while reading a piece in preparation to talk about constructive criticism.
If you have not read Writing Wednesday’s Levels of Thinking yet, please go read that first before you go any further!
When receiving or giving criticism, there are many ways to go about it. Let’s look at the list I put in my last journal:
There are many styles of criticism
Criticism for Editors
Criticism for Writers
Criticism for Readers
Criticism for Students
There is good or bad criticism.
There are different levels and topics
Surface
Characters
Plot
Metaphor
Big Ideas
Small Ideas
Details and Accuracy
Grammar
Today we will be talking about the different kinds of constructive criticism and feedback you can give and what to look for when you are trying to give such feedback, why it is helpful, and more.
Next week we will look at good versus bad crit. It’s easier to approach what kinds there are first before you start talking about which is good or bad. These following explanations and examples will give you a good idea of where to begin.
A little background: I worked for three years as a writing assistant in the classroom and as a private tutor while I was attending a four-year university for my Bachelor of Arts in creative writing. Most of my examples are pulling from how I would approach a student’s work—but this is applicable from any type, style, and level of writing.
Whether you are the one giving feedback, or you are looking at your own work, there are two main groups of feedback and topics: the big ideas and the small details. As tutors, we called these higher order concerns aka things you needed to pass the paper, and lower order concerns aka the small stuff that won’t make you fail the paper, but you won’t receive an A either. … Higher vs lower does not mean one was more important than the other, it was literally just survival at one point! I will call them the big ideas and little ideas.
In another journal, I will break down what types of feedback and methods match who you are and who you are asking to look at your piece. For example, a writing tutor or teacher will look at it one way, your parent or friend will read it another way—all are good, there are just a lot of things to know that are specific to each type of person giving feedback. This will help you decide who to ask for feedback too.
Big Ideas
Characters
The theme
The Plot
Flow and Direction
Small Details:
Grammar
Punctuation
Sentence Level Edits
Word Level Edits
If you are familiar with my editing and reading commissions, my editing commissions work on both the big and small level. This is an in-depth look. If it is only a reading commission which is purely feedback based with no editing, I am looking at only the big ideas.
For each big idea, I am listing questions you can ask while reading. These are good points to observe in the story and to give feedback to the writer. These ideas can each have a whole write up on their own, so I am trying to keep it brief. If you would like me to explain any of the questions, comment below!
Big Idea #1 Characters
This is probably the easiest to approach first from the readers’ point of view. The character is presented to us, so it is easy to focus on.
Good questions to ask while reading:
Is this character believable?
Do I like this character/ am I supposed to like this character?
What does this character want/ do I know what they want?
Why can this character not have what they want?
Big Idea #2 The Theme
Sometimes stories or especially essays have a theme. I wrote an essay about English scones once and my theme while it was all related to scones, I also tied everything together by the idea of cultural appropriation.
When there is an underlying theme to a piece, it is important to make sure it is working and the details in the story are working for it.
Good questions to ask while reading:
Does this theme relate to the other elements of the story?
Does the theme make sense, or can it be written in a different way?
Is the theme too obvious/ does the writer need to be more discrete?
Big Idea #3 The Plot
Plot is what happens in a story. There is a balance between what parts of the plot add to your story, and what parts seems to get in the way.
Good Questions to ask while reading:
Does this scene make sense? Can I see it?
Does this part add to the overall plot of the story?
If this scene were removed from the story, would it affect it or not?
Big Idea #4 Flow
Both a story and an essay need to have a good flow throughout the piece. This means all scenes, events, or ideas, go from one to the other without a hitch. Very random events, something that is not well explained/ is explained too quickly, or a lack of transition can disrupt the flow of a story.
Good Questions to ask while reading:
Does every part of the story connect?
Does any part of the story feel rushed?
Do I know how the character got here?
Does the writer’s idea come out clearly or am I lost?
The Small Ideas
The small ideas operate on a more technical level so I will be listing techniques while proofreading or editing a piece instead of questions to ask.
Usually, you want to approach the small ideas after all the big ones have been handled. If the story is out of order, the character doesn’t make sense, and you are not sure what is happening, you have bigger problems then if your commas are in the wrong place. Fix and deal with the big stuff first and then get down and dirty for the grammar, words, and punctuation.
Small Idea #1 Grammar and #2 Punctuation
Grammar! It’s that thing many of us hate—or love! If your story is full of grammatical mistakes, you will lose your reader. Mistakes in the text stick out like a sore thumb and disrupt the reading, so it is important to sort them out! If you are struggling with grammar or punctuation, a fantastic resource is Purdue Owl—this is an online writing lab that lists pages of explanations for almost any writing issue you may have. It has examples, sources, and explanations to make sure every writing issue is digestible and easy to understand.
Tips for proofreading grammar and edits:
Proofreading, by nature is not as in depth as a real editor’s work. So, if you are reading something for someone, it’s good to pay attention to these mistakes, but if something is repeated many times, you don’t have to mark it every single time.
As a writing assistant, my goal was to make my students better writers. If one student made a mistake in their paper, after the second or third time, I would circle it one last time and say that I saw this mistake multiple times. I would explain how to correct it and would advise them to do a readthrough to catch all of those mistakes.
If you are editing, you kind of have to point it out every time.
Small Idea #3 Sentence Level Edits and #4 Word Level Edits
Sentence level and word level have similar tactics. I’m listing a bunch of common mistakes to look out for when you are reading a piece too.
Sentence level edits are when you look at a sentence specifically. When you write a story, every single detail and line must contribute to the overall idea and journey of the story. If you can take a sentence and remove it from the story and the meaning/ scene does not change, take it out! Do not write fluff, that will only bore yourself and your reader.
The same goes for a word in a sentence. This is when you look at each word and think, “Does this really need to be here? Does this matter?”
Here are some things to look out for and are great to point out:
Wordiness is something to avoid. Wordy words: Like, that, of, so, therefore…. These are all words that I see overused, sometimes in almost every other sentence! It doesn’t really create a stylistic sound; it just becomes clunky and interrupts the reading.
On repetition, keep an eye out for words that are repeated. Do not use the same word to describe something more than once.
Using the word “very” is another one:
“She was very tired”= “She was exhausted”
“She was very sad”= “She was devastated”
“She was very hungry”= “She was starving”
Using a better word such as exhausted, is much more impactful then just plugging “very.”
Note: I have a strong dislike for the term “starving” – were they really starving? Dying of hunger? If no, use something else. If the character is being purposefully dramatic, then use it—if you are being serious about normal hunger, don’t use it.
Another good edit can be redundant explanations.
“She saw the door open” = “The door opened”
“She heard the birds singing” = “The birds were singing”
“The donut tasted sweet” = “The donut was sweet”
If there is a sound, a sight, a taste—you don’t have to tell us your character saw, heard, or tasted it, if it is being mentioned, it is assumed and already known by the reader that the character experienced this. If you say saw, tasted, heard, etc. this is wordy.
… and I’ll stop there with the examples.
Conclusion
The next time you are reading a friend’s work or are proofreading your own, keep all these little tidbits in your mind as you do so. Next week we will continue this discussion with what is bad critique, and what is good!
As always, there is so much more I can say but I will stop here. Feel free to let me know or ask any questions! What are some good explanations or examples you have on this topic? What are some lessons you have learned about this?