English 3764 @ Virginia Tech, Summer 2017
Please remember to complete the SPOT Survey, and mention that you have done so in your Final Exam.
Currently 2/3 of the class has completed the survey (shown below).
I’d be much obliged if those of you who haven’t completed it will do so. My department uses the information from the survey to make decisions about how the course is taught, so it is extremely useful information. Thank you.
We all rely on grammar and style checkers to help us find the small errors in our writing. Anyone who has had autocorrect go wrong, however, knows that grammar and spell checkers are not necessarily accurate. Sometimes (as in the case of the unicorn-riding police officer) these tools can change our messages to say things we never intended.
In the same way that you must double-check the changes that autocorrect suggests, you have to pay attention to the grammar and style tools that are available in your word processors. Read the Slate.com article Microsoft Word’s Grammar and Style Tools Will Make Your Writing Worse for lots of examples of how Word can suggest changes that will confuse your readers.
Finally, as long as you are still at Virginia Tech, remember that you have free access to the Lynda.com course Grammar Foundations (below). You can look up any grammar questions you have there.
