Editing Practice

Edit and rewrite the following paragraph. Pay particular attention to:

• important and unimportant details
• paragraph division
• simple past tense
• present perfect simple and continuous
• past perfect
• spelling
• capitalization

1		When I was only ten years old I learned one of the most important lessons of my life. My parents had taught me always to knock on the door or ring the bell before I went into someone's house. I had always follow that rule until the day Mrs. Wilson not answer the door. Mrs. Wilson was our next-door nieghbor. She was about 75 years old. Her husband had died of cancer or a heart attack two years before and her daughter had married and moved to California with her husband to work in a hospital, so Mrs. Wilson lived alone. Every Tuesday in the summer I had gone to Mrs. Wilson's house to cut her grass. After I finish, she always invited me in for lemonade and cookies. Usually she made peanut butter cookies but sometimes she made chocolate chip cookies. She was an excellent cook. However, one Tuesday she didn't come out after I had finished, I thought she was home because her car was in the driveway, so I went and looked in the window. I didn't see her and I didn't heard any noise. I knocked on the door and I rang the bell. There was no answer. I turn the doorknob and the door was unlocked. I began to get worried but I didn't know what to do. My parents weren't at home. My father was at work and my mother had gone to the grocery store to buy some things for lunch. I could hear my mother's voice telling me never to walk into anyone's home unless they had invited me. In the end, I had decided that I should go in. As soon as I open the door, I heard a weak voice calling from the living room. Mrs. Wilson fell down and hurt herself. She couldn't get up. She been there for many hours. I called 911 and an ambulance came for her. Everyone said I was a hero. That was the day I learned that sometimes it's better not to follow the rules.