Intended For

This course is intended for all people who write business documents.  This includes professional and technical staff, writers, supervisors, and administrative support, as well as human resources, sales, and public relations staff.
 

Prerequisites

Participants are expected to be well experienced in basic grammar and writing skills, including sentence and paragraph development, spelling, and punctuation.
 

Primary Goal

The primary goal of this course is to master techniques for proofreading and editing quickly and to enhance the clarity, correctness, and professional image of written communications.
 

Learning Objectives

Review and use standard proofreader's marks to improve accuracy of instructions for correction.

• Check for content accuracy including incorrect or missing facts, sequencing errors, and inconsistencies.
• Proofread for accuracy of numbers.
• Correct faulty construction, such as wordiness, redundancy, clumsiness, and triteness.
• Make writing more readable with parallel structure, correct placement of modifiers, and appropriate use of active voice.
• Review current business document formats.
• Apply all the techniques in exercises to reinforce learning and to increase proofreading and editing proficiency.

Comprehensive, Professional Book Provided

Participants receive a 75-page instructional book that provides hands-on experience and serves as a comprehensive reference for future use.  The text reflects current business trends.

Contents for Text-Workbook
Professional Proofreading and Editing

STANDARD PROOFREADER’S MARKS

THREE-STEP PROOFREADING METHOD

BUSINESS LETTER, MEMO, E-MAIL, ENVELOPE FORMATS

KEYBOARDING ERRORS

SPELLING AND WORD USAGE

GRAMMATICAL AND PUNCTUATION POINTERS

• Quotation marks and bold to emphasize
• Italics for titles of publications
• Subject/Verb Agreement (one, each, every)
• Pronoun/antecedent agreement and clarity
• Dummy subjects

PROOFREADING PRECISION TECHNIQUES

PROFESSIONAL PROOFREADING POLISH

PROOFREADING WEB DOCUMENTS

EDITING FOR STRUCTURAL ACCURACY, CLARITY, CONCISENESS

• Use Active and Passive Construction Correctly
• Strive to Use Specific and Action Verbs; Avoid the Verb "To Be"
• Eliminate Camouflaged Verbs
• Use Parallel Grammatical Structure
• Use Correct Placement of Modifiers
• Cut Outdated Words and Expressions
• Cut Redundant Expressions Cut Excess Baggage
  • Edit to trim wordy content
  • Trim stacks of nouns
  • Dump clumps of prepositions

EDITING FOR SENTENCE AND PARAGRAPH STRUCTURE

• Beware the long, rambling sentence
• Use short sentences judiciously
• Break up paragraphs that are too long (headings, lists, and graphics)

EDITING TO IMPROVE TONE: MAKE IT POSITIVE

SUMMARY: EDITING FOR TONE, CLARITY, AND CONCISENESS

PROOFREADING AND EDITING FOR LOGIC AND COMPLETENESS

• Incomplete or Missing Information
• Incorrect Facts or Contradictions
• Inconsistencies and Sequencing Errors

GUIDELINES FOR PROOFREADING NUMBERS

APPENDIX ITEMS:

Appendix Item A: Word Division and Hyphenation 
Appendix Item B: Proofreader's Final Checklist 
Appendix Item C: Guidelines For Spacing 
Appendix Item D: Recommended References For Proofreading 
Appendix Item E: Tidbits: URLs, Special Date Formats, Ellipsis