Readers notice spelling errors. There is no way around that fact. Don’t fall victim to the notion that “spelling doesn’t count.” That may fly in some educational circles, but it is not the conventional wisdom in most academic and business situations. Some writers recommend composing text with automatic spell check turned off. They advise[…]
Whether you’re a student, a grant writer, a technical writer or producing web copy, editing is an essential skill you must have to be taken seriously. Grammatical errors, poorly worded sentences and inappropriate paragraph breaks will undo the integrity of a document, no matter how well written it is otherwise. A lot rides on grammar,[…]
Many bloggers see the writing of a blog post as a single (albeit very important) job. But you can write more efficiently if the job is divided into two tasks. This article explains how to write a better quality post by separating your ‘inner writer’ and ‘inner editor.’
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In spoken English, there is no difference at all between the pronunciation of “it’s” vs “its”. In written English, however, you are always faced with a decision between these two forms. Although the grammatical differences between the two forms are quite straightforward, learners of English and native speakers alike can sometimes make mistakes when using them.[…]
Great proofreading is important for polished and professional writing. It can help you fix typos, spelling errors, word usage, and punctuation problems. Unfortunately, many people have a hard time finding and fixing all the errors in their work. Remember that proofreading is not the only form of editing that your text should undergo. Before doing some[…]
Learning how to summarize a document or book can be a great skill to have. Whether you’re a writer, in business, studying or just want to be able to present written concepts quickly, summarizing can help you analyze, understand and share a document’s key points. The steps to summarizing a document are as follows: 1.[…]
One of the most common errors in English is to confuse the words “affect” and “effect”. These words have two completely different meanings. One is a verb while the other is a noun. If you mix them up, you will only confuse whomever you’re writing to. The Difference Between Affect and Effect “Affect”, with an[…]
It’s not uncommon for people who are new to speaking English to have problems with homonyms (words that sound the same but are spelled differently). Even those who are native English speakers often have trouble choosing which word they want to be using in their writing. Unfortunately, misusing these words will quickly lead to your[…]
Because human language is constantly in flux, evolving and reshaping with the times, many words and phrases change meaning over time. The field of linguistics was born of a need to keep track of, categorize, and catalog all of these changing nuances of language. Many terms currently used in daily conversation actually have archaic definitions which[…]
Every writer makes grammatical errors, no matter how careful they are when writing. Rewriting, editing, and proofreading are all necessary steps to polishing any written work, but often writers can’t see their mistakes. They may not understand the grammar principle behind it or they are too close to the project and their eyes skip over[…]