Download Things that Make Writing Teachers Cringe

Things that Make Writing Teachers Cringe
(or How to Lower Your Grade Without Even Trying)
1) Don’t use the wrong word two often; their’s nothing worse.
To/too/two:
 “to” is a preposition; it is used to show direction. (They’re going to class.)
 “two” is a number (2).
 “too” means “also” (I think grammar is annoying too) or indicates an excessive
amount (There are too many).
Their/there/they’re:
 “their” is a possessive pronoun. (That’s their car.)
 “there” is a place. (It’s parked over there.)
 “they’re” is a contraction for “they are.” (They are going to drive home too.)
Its/it’s:
 “its” is a possessive pronoun. (Its new paint job looks nice.)
 “it’s” is a contraction for “it is.” (It’s their car.)
Of/have: this one may look silly on the surface, but it’s a common error because the word
“of” sounds like the way we say the contraction “’ve” (“I would of done it” should
actually be “I would have done it.”)
 “of” is a preposition. (The screech of the brakes sounded like a flock of geese.)
 “have” is a verb. (I have to get a new book for class. They have a lot of choices.)
Who/whom: there is an easy pattern to remember when to use which of these two pronouns.
If the word can be replaced or the question answered with “he,” then use “who;” if it can
be replaced/answered with “him,” use “whom.” The parallel “m” at the end of “him” and
“whom” should remind you of the pattern.
 “who” (Who is at the door? A kid who wants to sell us candy.)
 “whom” (Whom did you expect? He’s the one whom you called.)
2) Dont forget or misplace apostrophe’s.
Apostrophes show possession:
 Mike’s coat is in the car.
Apostrophes show contractions:
 If it weren’t for the apostrophe, no one would know the letter was omitted. It’s
important to indicate this.
3) Don’t use “a lot” incorrectly; it is two words. (He’s been getting a lot of sleep lately.) There is a
less common word that sounds similar, “allot,” which indicates a share of something (He
didn’t allot enough time to the math section.) However, there is no word spelled “alot.”
4) Don’t forget you have an audience in any formal writing. If no audience is specified, assume
that your audience is made up of intelligent, non-specialists, who either haven’t made up their
mind about your subject or lean toward a position different than your own.
Don’t write directly to your teacher or classmates:
 This assignment confused me at first, but then I remembered when we read about
Andy Rooney stopping at a traffic light in the middle of the night. That other essay
we read about dads last week also had some of the same trust issues in it too.
Don’t make a formal announcement of what you will do, just do it (as Nike says).
 In this paper, I am going to prove that Langston Hughes was attacking slumlords for
undermining communities. (Fixed version: In his poetry, Langston Hughes attacks
slumlords as a force that undermines communities.)
Avoid a speechmaking tone:
 I’d like to make a few observations on this point…
 Ladies and Gentlemen, let me simply say that...
Avoid overly academic or long words for the sake of long words. Long words are fine on
occasion and if they say exactly what you mean; but don’t use them just for the sake of
using them:
 An overindulged thesaurus can be an exceedingly treacherous entity. (Meaning: It is
dangerous to use a thesaurus too much.)
 “It is the moment of non-construction, disclosing the absentation of actuality from
the concept in part through its invitation to emphasize, in reading, the helplessness—
rather than the will to power—of its fall into conceptuality." (Meaning: I don’t know.
I took this one from a book about poetry by Paul Fry; yes, it is a real sentence
published in a real book.)
Don’t bluster (related to the “ad hominem” logical fallacy):
 Anyone but an idiot could see that…
 You’d have to be blind to miss the symbolism in...
5) Make sure your language is appropriate to your audience.
Don’t be too folksy or informal:
 Well, now I’m going to tell you about… (“Folksy” includes word choice and tone
usually used with family.)
Don’t be needlessly crude:
 It took a lot of balls for Einstein to condemn the atom bomb even though he
suggested we try to make one. (“Crude” word choice and tone is the kind of
language we use with good friends our own age, but generally not around our
Grandparents.)
6) Cut unnecessary words.
Don’t spin your wheels:
 Most people have trouble getting started when writing an essay or a particularly
difficult sentence. When this happens, we add words/phrases/sentences that either
say nothing or that readers already know. It’s okay to use this to get moving in a
rough draft, but you need to cut these from the final draft. (i.e. We all know that
driving can be dangerous. I really believe that being aware of that danger…)
Don’t undercut your authority:
 Adding words/phrases that indicate what you are saying is just your opinion makes
your writing sound weaker. Your audience already knows your writing is your
opinion. (i.e. cut words/phrases like “I think,” “I feel,” “I believe,” “In my opinion”)
 Almost always, these words/phrases can be cut without changing the core meaning
of the sentence.
Don’t pad or fudge:
 Adding sentences that don’t really give any information or repeating points with
different words in order to make your essay longer is padding. (i.e. In my opinion,
the Industrial Revolution was a major chapter in the history of civilization. Our
country would not be what it is today if we hadn’t gone through the Industrial
Revolution.)
7) Avoid melodramatic punctuation! Exclamation points and question marks when overused can
lose their effect or give the impression that you are not serious enough about your subject. If at
all possible, avoid exclamation points altogether and turn questions into statements.
8) Pay attention to your sentence structures. The three most common errors are:
Fragments: a fragment can be short or very long, but has no independent clause. In other
words, if someone said it to you on the street then walked away and you’d have to run
after them asking questions to find out what they meant, it’s a fragment.
 After the long night they had at the hospital where the nurses were all too busy to
talk to them and the doctors were nowhere to be found.
Comma Splices and run-ons: both of these have more than one independent clause without
proper punctuation between them.
 A comma splice is two independent clauses with a comma between them. (i.e. Going
to the movies is fun, we went to see Little Miss Sunshine the other day.) There are
two really easy ways to fix a comma splice: 1. change the comma (,) to a semicolon
(;) or 2. use a period and capitol letter to make the two independent clauses into two
sentences.
 A run-on has two or more independent clauses with or without a comma between
them. Essentially, you just have to go back and divide the independent clauses up
into separate sentences.
Confused: sometimes when writing a complex sentence, one loses track of the sentence
structure part way through. It is also possible to lose track of sentence structure in simple
sentences by losing track of parallelism and agreement.
 Complex—a myriad of different problems might occur in the sentence structure if
your sentence is complex; usually, reading carefully through a sentence will make
the error clear.
 Parallelism (in form): I am looking forward to meeting you and to hear about your
trip. (fixed: I am looking forward to meeting you and hearing about your trip.) I like
to read, to write, and watch movies. (either another “to” must be added before
“watch” or the “to” before “write” has to be removed in order to make the sentence
parallel.)
 Agreement (in number); this is an error with nouns and pronouns or between the
subject and verb:
 Nouns and pronouns: Everyone cares about their families. (“everyone” is
singular, but “their” and families” are plural. All three need to be either
singular or plural.)
 Subject/verb agreement: The carrot and cucumber is on the shelf. (The
“and” causes a plural subject, but “is” is singular). Either the teacher or her
assistant are going to be there. (Same situation, only this time the “or”
causes a singular subject, but “are” is plural.) With regular verbs and nouns,
an “s” makes a noun plural, but an “s” makes a verb singular (i.e. the girl
walks/girls walk.)
9) Don’t use “you”…No 2nd Person:
 You should change the oil in your car on a regular basis. (Fixed: Car owners should
change the oil in their cars on a regular basis.)
 Even though you are a drug addict, that doesn’t make you evil. (Essentially you’ve
just called your audience drug addicts! Fixed: Drug addicts are not necessary evil.)