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Alexis Siefert
Note:
The original version of this post can be found at on 4/12/01 Denny (dennywNOSPAM@zipcon.net) wrote:
A base canard.
I have never been, nor would I be (nor play on TV) an elementary-school
teacher. Me? Deal with a roomful of small children? Not happening. ('twould
be unfair to the children as well.) Ah, if t'were only the days when we could apply rulers to knuckles... Now, having been the teacher-sponsor for spelling bees on more than on occasion I can let you all in on a little secret - they have the words in front of them. Okay, perhaps that's not really a secret, but it should be known that once we get into the higher rounds of the spelling bees, very few adults (teachers included) can spell the winning words correctly on a consistent basis. That's the beauty of knowing how to look things up. Now, about the simple misspelling and homonym issue (those words that get through the proofreading of our own works), this is why teachers encourage their students to have someone else look at their writing before turning it in. I know that I have to be extra careful reading my own stuff - after all I know what I intended to say, and oftentimes our brains will read what we meant, not what we actually put on paper. For catching basic spelling, structure, and grammatical errors, one good technique is to read your work backwards (sentence-by-sentence). That way you're seeing only the sentence structure and spelling, and you aren't getting fooled by concentrating on the content. Additionally, letting a work 'rest' for several days before proofing it is another good idea. That way you're usually more able to be objective. Alexis
"All of us are in
the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." |
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