When you absolutely need a document to contain no superficial or grammatical errors, don’t panic! Once you understand why you miss errors even though they are right in front of your face, you can learn to edit efficiently and accurately.
When you read words your brain automatically adjusts them to what it thinks they should be. Typos disappear completely and spelling errors do too. Your brain will insert words where they are missing, and skip them if it thinks they shouldn’t be there. This is why we can easily read text that contains typos or intentionally mixed up letters. It’s also why we mispronounce unusually spelled names so frequently. The following tips help you circumvent your brain’s built-in “autocorrect.”
1. Take a break for a bit
This is the most common advice but it is too useful to leave out. If you have been working on a document for a while, take a break from it and do something else.
The reason it works is because your brain has stored the meaning of what you intended to write, or the meaning of what you thought you read before. After a break, you can view the material clearly without the haze of what you thought you wrote clouding your vision.
2. Read it out loud
When we read out loud, your brain does more than it does when reading text silently. The additional step of processing words for speaking makes typos, missing words, poorly constructed phrases, and grammar issues more obvious.
Some people may find that their brain still “autocorrects” when reading out loud. If that happens to you, try using an automated text to speech application. Both Windows and Apple computers have this built-in, and so does Android. To find the feature on your computer or device, look in the accessibility features or do a Google search.
Because you are likely going to find phrase and paragraph level isues with this method, I recommend that you do it before you break the content down with theother methods. Otherwise you will need to repeat those steps after you have fixed phrase issues.
3. Break it down
Paragraph level
Take a single paragraph and copy it into a blank document, write it out by itself, or cover the surrounding paragraphs so that you can only see the one.
Read through it, paying close attention to the continuity between each sentence. Channel your grade school lessons and ask yourself these questions:
- Look at the paragraph as whole, does it fit together?
- Do any sentences seem out-of-place?
- Does the paragraph have an opening or introductory sentence?
- Does the paragraph have a closing sentence?
- Are there any errors in the punctuation or capitalization separating each sentence?
Sentence level
Take a single sentence and separate it from the rest of the document content. Read the sentence by itself, go back to grade school again and look for grammar, spelling, typing, and punctuation errors. Then look for larger structural issues with the following questions:
- Does the sentence contain more than one list or multiple “sets ” of commas? Consider breaking the sentence up or rephrasing to be clearer.
- Is the sentence longer than 30 words? Consider breaking up the sentence or using more concise words.
- Does the sentence combine unrelated items? Sometimes this is fine in creative literature, but if it is a technical or professional document of any kind you should avoid it.
Word level
With the individual sentence isolated, further isolate each word. Use your hand, paper, or cardboard to cover all of the other words as you read each word individually. This is one of the most important steps, even though it may seem excessive. It is important because your brain changes its perception of each word based on the words around it.
4. Change the font
To further “reset” your brain on the text, change the font to a drastically different type. For example, if it was in Arial font, change it to a cursive or script font, and then read it again. Not only will this force your brain to truly re-read the text, but the spacing in different fonts may emphasize certain errors, such as a misplaced comma or an incorrect capitalization of a word.
Other visual changes can help as well, such as changing the background color and font color, increasing font size, etc.
Summary
Practice on different types of documents and on screens as well as on paper. The more aware you become of your brain’s “autocorrect,” the easier you can temporarily disable it.
What methods do you use to proofread documents? Did the above methods work for you? Did you find any typos in this document? (I left some intentionally)
Leave comments below and let me know!