What would you expect in a proofreading class?
February 17, 2016 6:19 PM Subscribe
I've recently been recruited to teach in a graphic design vocational program, and what they've given me to teach is a module on proofreading. Sixty hours on proofreading. I taught one class this evening and can see that I'm going to have to pad this out – but with what?
Adding to the fun is that these are all international students from one country, the teaching is in English about proofreading English, and I don't know their language. They all speak some English but very much as a second language.
The program is intensive so I will be with them two hours a day pretty much every weekday till early April. The school gives us a broad outline of the module's intentions, but no lesson plans or structure. I have access to printers and photocopiers, and can use a computer with a projector so the class can follow me on screen. There are no textbooks.
Had the first class tonight. I handed out some sheets showing proofreading markup and gave them an "author's manuscript" and a "typeset galley" of the same fairly simple text, with deliberate mistakes in it. I thought this would give them a sense of what proofreading is, and how to do it, and I was able to see that most of them are super diligent. I walked around and explained things to anyone who seemed at sea. In general this worked out pretty well, I think.
So, supposing you're an international student whose native language doesn't use Roman letters, and you're in a graphic design program – what do you want to learn?
Adding to the fun is that these are all international students from one country, the teaching is in English about proofreading English, and I don't know their language. They all speak some English but very much as a second language.
The program is intensive so I will be with them two hours a day pretty much every weekday till early April. The school gives us a broad outline of the module's intentions, but no lesson plans or structure. I have access to printers and photocopiers, and can use a computer with a projector so the class can follow me on screen. There are no textbooks.
Had the first class tonight. I handed out some sheets showing proofreading markup and gave them an "author's manuscript" and a "typeset galley" of the same fairly simple text, with deliberate mistakes in it. I thought this would give them a sense of what proofreading is, and how to do it, and I was able to see that most of them are super diligent. I walked around and explained things to anyone who seemed at sea. In general this worked out pretty well, I think.
So, supposing you're an international student whose native language doesn't use Roman letters, and you're in a graphic design program – what do you want to learn?
Maybe it would be appropriate to have them practice on something like an annual report or strategic plan that has a number of header levels, fine print, special characters, etc. I could envision discussions of text hierarchies and how to check for header consistency across a large doc ( a big problem).
posted by Miko at 6:37 PM on February 17, 2016 [7 favorites]
posted by Miko at 6:37 PM on February 17, 2016 [7 favorites]
Assume you have a wide remit here because even in my sister's graduate publishing class at Columbia, they did not do 60 hours on proof reading. And she left and became a professional proofreader.
So, make it relevant to graphic design. You could do weekly modules, maybe having them develop a fake business in the first week. Have them do print layouts. Have them do slogans. Have them make social media assets. Have them do brochures. Include visual proofreading. Study fonts. Have them do ads. Infographics! Charts!
posted by DarlingBri at 6:48 PM on February 17, 2016 [10 favorites]
So, make it relevant to graphic design. You could do weekly modules, maybe having them develop a fake business in the first week. Have them do print layouts. Have them do slogans. Have them make social media assets. Have them do brochures. Include visual proofreading. Study fonts. Have them do ads. Infographics! Charts!
posted by DarlingBri at 6:48 PM on February 17, 2016 [10 favorites]
Have them work on recognizing bad typesetting. Not just spelling errors, but ladders, orphans, widows, that kind of thing.
posted by ocherdraco at 7:10 PM on February 17, 2016 [11 favorites]
posted by ocherdraco at 7:10 PM on February 17, 2016 [11 favorites]
I like the idea of adding production editing (layout) in, but you can also start with a sort of intro to good business writing. Talk about common errors--misused words, subject verb agreement, use of texting abbreviations, jargon, and so on.
posted by emjaybee at 7:11 PM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by emjaybee at 7:11 PM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]
To get my journalism degree, I had to take two semesters of copy editing. The prof was a working copy editor at the local paper. What we covered:
1) Parts of speech and diagramming sentences.
Brief, but useful for later proofreading. Then a bit on subject-verb tense agreement, misplaced modifiers, unintentional ambiguity, subjective versus objective moods.
2) Proofreader marks
Know your STET from your /
3) Common mistakes, focusing on malaprops that spell check won't catch (homophones, etc.)
4) Each letter of the AP stylebook, e.g. every entry under "B"
We'd get a quiz on these each class to make sure we'd done the reading, and each example came from the copious files he kept of submitted mistakes that had been caught during editing.
5) Headline layouts on mockup pages
Basically, "You've got 14 ems to summarize this article," or "Fix this 12-inch story so it fits in eight inches."
Each of these took a couple weeks; often we'd practice with rough manuscripts.
For graphic design students, more emphasis should probably be put on Chicago, and knowing how to catch things like incorrect tracking or fix optical alignment for things like quotation marks, as well as their overall word usage, etc.
One of the things that I appreciate about those classes is that the prof recognized that the real skill of proofreading mostly comes from practice, not innate ability. To that end, every assignment was either one or zero points, so full or no credit, but you could submit each of them as many times as you liked over the course of the semester. He would tell you either what number (if a quiz or something) you got wrong or what line, but he wouldn't tell you what you got wrong — you had to figure it out. A lot of time in class was spent dealing with weird outliers that weren't explicitly addressed in the styleguide, but could be inferred from other general rules (i.e. when to hyphenate or capitalize, and this was back when it was the World Wide Web and the Internet, along with e-mail, all of which the AP clung to far longer than they should have).
At the end of the first semester, we all had to take and pass the Dow Jones copy editing test.
At the of your course, what should the students be able to do? They should know typographic marks, be able to proof a couple page manuscript without looking up more than one or two things in the stylebook, know how to distinguish Chicago and AP, the basic principles of type layouts and how to quickly check them, and not be afraid to learn to use a new styleguide, since a whole bunch of places have their own arbitrary conventions.
Something else that sounds like it would be worthwhile is to address the differences in international norms — conventions on things like quotation marks, comma placement and pluralization vary subtly across borders (UK and American copy editing rules are just different enough to trip people up. If these are international students, being able to proof in international styles can help them get access to more jobs.
posted by klangklangston at 7:14 PM on February 17, 2016 [17 favorites]
1) Parts of speech and diagramming sentences.
Brief, but useful for later proofreading. Then a bit on subject-verb tense agreement, misplaced modifiers, unintentional ambiguity, subjective versus objective moods.
2) Proofreader marks
Know your STET from your /
3) Common mistakes, focusing on malaprops that spell check won't catch (homophones, etc.)
4) Each letter of the AP stylebook, e.g. every entry under "B"
We'd get a quiz on these each class to make sure we'd done the reading, and each example came from the copious files he kept of submitted mistakes that had been caught during editing.
5) Headline layouts on mockup pages
Basically, "You've got 14 ems to summarize this article," or "Fix this 12-inch story so it fits in eight inches."
Each of these took a couple weeks; often we'd practice with rough manuscripts.
For graphic design students, more emphasis should probably be put on Chicago, and knowing how to catch things like incorrect tracking or fix optical alignment for things like quotation marks, as well as their overall word usage, etc.
One of the things that I appreciate about those classes is that the prof recognized that the real skill of proofreading mostly comes from practice, not innate ability. To that end, every assignment was either one or zero points, so full or no credit, but you could submit each of them as many times as you liked over the course of the semester. He would tell you either what number (if a quiz or something) you got wrong or what line, but he wouldn't tell you what you got wrong — you had to figure it out. A lot of time in class was spent dealing with weird outliers that weren't explicitly addressed in the styleguide, but could be inferred from other general rules (i.e. when to hyphenate or capitalize, and this was back when it was the World Wide Web and the Internet, along with e-mail, all of which the AP clung to far longer than they should have).
At the end of the first semester, we all had to take and pass the Dow Jones copy editing test.
At the of your course, what should the students be able to do? They should know typographic marks, be able to proof a couple page manuscript without looking up more than one or two things in the stylebook, know how to distinguish Chicago and AP, the basic principles of type layouts and how to quickly check them, and not be afraid to learn to use a new styleguide, since a whole bunch of places have their own arbitrary conventions.
Something else that sounds like it would be worthwhile is to address the differences in international norms — conventions on things like quotation marks, comma placement and pluralization vary subtly across borders (UK and American copy editing rules are just different enough to trip people up. If these are international students, being able to proof in international styles can help them get access to more jobs.
posted by klangklangston at 7:14 PM on February 17, 2016 [17 favorites]
(Oh God. Also signage. And headlines!)
posted by DarlingBri at 7:22 PM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by DarlingBri at 7:22 PM on February 17, 2016 [1 favorite]
Have you been given guidance on what the program expects of the students? Sixty hours is a lot of time to spend on proofreading, which is not the same as copy editing. Do the students take a copy editing class as well? I've got to wonder if there's some particular reason they are requiring so many hours for this. What are the goals of the program as a whole, and how does this class fit into those goals?
posted by FencingGal at 7:36 PM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]
posted by FencingGal at 7:36 PM on February 17, 2016 [2 favorites]
For activities, you can have them write a few pages. They can edit each other's writing and their own. You can do this in multiple styles and after various great lessons as recommended above. Writing activities baby, they're helpful and take up so much time.
posted by Kalmya at 7:42 PM on February 17, 2016
posted by Kalmya at 7:42 PM on February 17, 2016
How to:
* Find acronyms to add to list at front (each acronym should be explained the first time and follow the term in brackets, and then used consistently afterwards)
* Split references in Excel in to relevant parts (text to columns etc) such as author(s) this makes it easier to crosscheck references in text (and according to the style my clients use, these should appear in alphabetic order in brackets in text).
* Keeping a stylesheet of words that have alternate spellings, and finding and replacing those words (commonly UK/US spelling, but could also be hyphenated "co-operate", or "cooperate")
* Numbers under ten spelled out. Numbers over ten as digits unless they start a sentence.
* Spacing around punctuation marks (i.e., no space before %)
* Process - keeping different versions of your document as you work on it, and having a separate document where you record the things you've done to each version so that if your system crashes, you know how much you've lost and have to redo.
(I'd love to see your course plan when you've finished it).
posted by b33j at 7:50 PM on February 17, 2016
* Find acronyms to add to list at front (each acronym should be explained the first time and follow the term in brackets, and then used consistently afterwards)
* Split references in Excel in to relevant parts (text to columns etc) such as author(s) this makes it easier to crosscheck references in text (and according to the style my clients use, these should appear in alphabetic order in brackets in text).
* Keeping a stylesheet of words that have alternate spellings, and finding and replacing those words (commonly UK/US spelling, but could also be hyphenated "co-operate", or "cooperate")
* Numbers under ten spelled out. Numbers over ten as digits unless they start a sentence.
* Spacing around punctuation marks (i.e., no space before %)
* Process - keeping different versions of your document as you work on it, and having a separate document where you record the things you've done to each version so that if your system crashes, you know how much you've lost and have to redo.
(I'd love to see your course plan when you've finished it).
posted by b33j at 7:50 PM on February 17, 2016
Have them proofread graphic materials, such as ads and infographics. Besides the content, consider the type, layout, etc. Does the design support the information? Is the text legible, clear, appropriate to the message? What about the foreground and background? What about the hierarchy of text? Is the text, color and other elements appropriate to the audience? (Such as big enough for older eyes, or more busy for younger minds.)
posted by maurreen at 9:43 PM on February 17, 2016
posted by maurreen at 9:43 PM on February 17, 2016
Best answer: Sixty hours is too much teaching. Break the two hours up into
- Review of last $TOPIC (10 min)
- Teaching short exercises, $TOPIC introduced, examples given (30-45 min)
- Handout for practice where there are some normal and some tricky examples of $TOPIC (15 min)
- Students exchange papers and grade each other's work (15 min)
- Back together for class discussion, questions (20 min)
Every week or so you have students do a one minute explanation of $TOPIC for the class. Every other week you do a small quiz.
And I agree, this should be proofreading and layout and you could also add writing for "accessibility" (for the web, for handouts, for flyers, whatever). I love this website on practical typography and talk it up any chance I get.
posted by jessamyn at 7:14 AM on February 18, 2016 [4 favorites]
- Review of last $TOPIC (10 min)
- Teaching short exercises, $TOPIC introduced, examples given (30-45 min)
- Handout for practice where there are some normal and some tricky examples of $TOPIC (15 min)
- Students exchange papers and grade each other's work (15 min)
- Back together for class discussion, questions (20 min)
Every week or so you have students do a one minute explanation of $TOPIC for the class. Every other week you do a small quiz.
And I agree, this should be proofreading and layout and you could also add writing for "accessibility" (for the web, for handouts, for flyers, whatever). I love this website on practical typography and talk it up any chance I get.
posted by jessamyn at 7:14 AM on February 18, 2016 [4 favorites]
Response by poster: Wanted to say all this gave me food for thought, but I've got a few comments:
These students really, really do not know English all that well. I don't have time nor materials to teach them grammar, and things like the distinction between AP and Chicago are way too arcane for them. In any case, I was recruited as a graphic design professional, not as a language or grammar teacher.
They are very, very diligent at finding mistakes if I give them the "good" copy for comparison. But they are not being taught to copyedit, nor would anyone give them English copyediting work at this stage of their knowledge of the language.
I think it's a great idea to show them bad ads and layouts and explain to them that proofreading goes beyond simply correcting spelling, and involves making sure a document presents the meaning of the content properly. Last week we designed a menu, and I talked with them about using font size and weight and text spacing to maximize legibility and convey the information effectively. Lots of emphasis on not relying too much on spell checkers, too.
We're going to get into editing documents in Acrobat this week. It's not specifically in the official description, but the course is about ten years out of date and it does mention "tools" for proofreading, and it's a way people are passing a lot of documents around, these days.
Thanks all.
posted by zadcat at 6:47 PM on March 6, 2016 [2 favorites]
These students really, really do not know English all that well. I don't have time nor materials to teach them grammar, and things like the distinction between AP and Chicago are way too arcane for them. In any case, I was recruited as a graphic design professional, not as a language or grammar teacher.
They are very, very diligent at finding mistakes if I give them the "good" copy for comparison. But they are not being taught to copyedit, nor would anyone give them English copyediting work at this stage of their knowledge of the language.
I think it's a great idea to show them bad ads and layouts and explain to them that proofreading goes beyond simply correcting spelling, and involves making sure a document presents the meaning of the content properly. Last week we designed a menu, and I talked with them about using font size and weight and text spacing to maximize legibility and convey the information effectively. Lots of emphasis on not relying too much on spell checkers, too.
We're going to get into editing documents in Acrobat this week. It's not specifically in the official description, but the course is about ten years out of date and it does mention "tools" for proofreading, and it's a way people are passing a lot of documents around, these days.
Thanks all.
posted by zadcat at 6:47 PM on March 6, 2016 [2 favorites]
Response by poster: In case anyone's curious: all my students passed the course. I still think it’s silly to try to stretch proofreading to 60 hours, so I took a wide view of what it means beyond mere spelling checks. We did various design exercises in which I stressed the importance of consistency of typography and spacing as one of the things a proofreader looks at, and how you don’t introduce changes or contrast unless they have meaning. I’m not sure most of them really got what I meant by watching for style drift within a document, but even the students I thought were dozing or totally goofing off on their phones passed the test with flying colours.
posted by zadcat at 3:52 PM on April 9, 2016 [1 favorite]
posted by zadcat at 3:52 PM on April 9, 2016 [1 favorite]
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