As an English major, one of our main requirements in schoolwork is proofreading. After spending hours pouring out your creative ideas and formulating what you see as your next masterpiece, you must then begin the uneventful process of proofreading.
It is a process that I dread more than completing the actual assignment, no matter how short the paper. When I think about having to critique my own writing, I am forced to become a biased reader. I constantly hear, “Read your work out loud and you’ll see where you need to make changes," as though reading the words that were just released from my mind will help make the process any easier. Aside from prejudices about my work, the real reason I despise proofreading is pure laziness. I love the part where I get to take the ideas in my mind and put them to paper; it’s like watching a flower grow from a seed into a beautiful rose, only for me to remember I have to water, trim, and mold the flower before it's ready to be sold. In other words, proofread until it can be published.
What if I don’t proofread properly? Am I following the correct guidelines? Will someone judge me because they still see mistakes after I’ve proofread? These are the thoughts that cross my mind when I am faced with the moment I have to proofread. A classmate provided a scenario for me that I couldn’t disregard. He said, “If you become a lawyer and open your own law firm, when you hand your documents, briefs, or any written articles to your assistant and he sees multiple spelling and grammar mistakes, not only will he wonder how you graduated from law school, but he will talk about you to the next lawyer he/she works for.” As much as I detest proofreading, I understand that proofreading is a representation of my writing, and my laziness shows a lack of investment and care for myself and future.
So I have decided to list some benefits and tips for proofreading for the many other students that share my issue. Some benefits of proofreading are that it allows you to catch and change misspellings and grammatical errors that spell-check might miss. You can make sure your paper is flowing and expressing the message you intended. Also, it enables you to change or remove words that have been repeated, just to name a few benefits.
As for techniques, some that might work are giving reading your paper a rest so that fresh eyes can catch mistakes you might have missed earlier. Look for one type of problem at a time (i.e., spelling, grammar), and read from left to right so you will focus on words rather than sentences, and most importantly, ask for help. These are a few of the techniques I found that will help the proofreading task.
Although proofreading will probably never be a procedure I enjoy, I now understand the importance of the process and how it helps to not only make my writing look better, but make me look better as well. So my first undertaking will be this article, among the many more to come.
