Thursday, January 26, 2012

Assigned to Edit, So I Must Edit

Let me just start off by saying how hard it is for me to find grammatical errors within my own papers. It's the weirdest thing: I only catch them while reading other people's papers, but I'm oblivious to my mistakes. It stinks. But I digress...

Error 1:
"I soon learned I was unable to sign up for any classes, the reason being that Freshman Mentoring requires you pick at least one bundle before signing up for any other classes."
I'm saying this is a run on sentence (hard to catch), as well as just a down-right confusing sentence. Here is my solution:
"I soon learned that I was unable to sign up for any classes, because Freshman Mentoring requires you to pick at least one bundle before signing up for other classes."

Error 2:
"Fixing this could be as simple as making bundles optional but recommended."
This appears to be a comma error, specifically because I did not set off the coordinating conjunction with a comma. Here is the revised sentence:
"Fixing this could be as simple as making bundles optional, but recommended."

Error 3:
"Along with requiring students to sign up for bundles comes problems with classes that some freshman don't want to sign up for intentionally, but end up up doing it anyway."
I believe this is an error similar to Error Two. It's missing a comma. And it also does not set off the introductory element with a comma Here is my revision:
"Along with requiring students to sign up for bundles, problems arise when some freshman enroll in classes that they don't want to register for, but end up registering anyway."

Error 4:
"The problem begins when these classes that would be best saved become freshman bundle."
This sentence isn't technically a grammatical error, since the word "that" makes the next phrase "would best be saved" an essential phrase. Problem is, it's a confusing sentence, so I counted it as an error regardless. Let's make the essential phrase non-essential, and then offset it with a comma:
"The problem begins when these classes, which are best saved for after a mission, become freshman bundles."

Error 5:
"This could be changed by not making the one visit to a Freshman mentor required,..."
The error here is capitalization; The word, "mentor" needs to be capitalized. This is really just because I have been throughout my entire paper, and not capitalizing it would be inconsistent. The error is obvious, so I feel the need to type the revision is a bit counter-intuitive, since we all have eyes.

Peer Mentoring:
I won't lie, when I heard that we would be reviewing each others papers, I became a bit worried. I was worried that I would be no help to everyone, I worried that my paper would be torn to shreds with how horrible it was, and I thought it was a lot of work (I'm lazy). After the whole experience, however, I found it to be quite enjoyable. The process has helped me edit my paper tremendously, for there are things that I would have never caught before. And I also felt pretty darn cool reviewing the other papers. It was like being an editor for a newspaper business, or a publisher. The only thing I didn't like was the work. It felt a little short-noticed, and it was quite a bit of reviewing. Overall, though, I enjoyed myself.

Good night everyone!

2 comments:

  1. I agree with the fact that there was short notice but in all honesty, I felt like it prevented procrastination. I also really enjoyed your paper and I am glad you found peer reviewing enjoyable! I think it is also funny how you said "Peer Mentoring" instead of "Peer Reviewing", funny play on words or funny mistake? I guess we will never know. ;)

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  2. I feel the same way about peer reviewing. I like getting feedback but I don't really want to put in the work to fix other people's papers. And nice job on fixing the errors in your paper

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