Creative Writing Checklists

Student can evaluate a creative writing draft against a checklist covering paragraph count, character development, and story structure.

Student can proofread a draft for capitalization, sentence organization, punctuation, and spelling using the C.O.P.S. method.

Cut the single page into its four identical strips and hand one to each student or editing pair rather than photocopying a full page per student.

Introduce the C.O.P.S. acronym explicitly before first use, since the checklist assumes students already know what each letter checks for.

Peer and self-editing — students apply a yes/no checklist to check for paragraph count, character development, and story structure in a draft.

C.O.P.S. proofreading — students check their writing for capitalization, sentence organization (no run-ons or fragments), punctuation, and spelling.