Welcome Message

Thanks for dropping in on the editing foxhole. Let's review the protocol for the foxhunt:



Catching them nine li'l foxes with the editing checklist rather than the old way* (see endnote below) is as easy as 1 - 2 - 3:

1. FLAGGING--Getting the hounds to sniff out the scent of the game, 30 minutes on up. That's the skinny strip of paper that sensitizes learners to the whole slew of writing errors. Didn't know Subject-Verb Agreement mattered? They'd know when the exercise was over. Can't put a space before a period or comma? They'd so know as they count up the number of mistakes. Learners don't all need to start together--perfect for an early morning exercise. Those who finish first get to check with a partner and count up the number of mistakes caught. Mention out loud the tally of mistakes--what, Silvia there's got 15 already? You need to find another 5!--that'll get participants all heated up and competitive. Taking up the answers can be done on a whiteboard, handout, PowerPoint screen, etc. Each mistake will be tagged with a number using the checklist (next).
2. THE CHASE IS ON--Hitting and opening a line, 90 minutes or more. So the exposure stage is done, and the hounds are ready to tackle each "line" or whiff of fox they discover. Everybody now gets an letter-sized editing checklist with errors numbered 1 - 9 to correct (see sample pages across the top of this blog). To get the hunt going, leave the answers for the skinny strip on the board and number them off according to the checklist--e.g. a spelling mistake will be flagged "9. Spelling." Some learners may start doing the handout from the beginning; others from the end (spelling's a favourite, Number Nine!). They can refer to the board or answer sheet if they don't remember what a Comma Splice looks like. Do emphasize that they're to look for only the mistake that's covered by the number, i.e. they're not to check for SVA or Comma Splices under Spelling. Like hounds, the class moves in a pack. Early finishers check their work with a partner who's finished. The final answer check-in could be one-way or collaborative, depending on class dynamics and other factors, like amount of time. Spelling seems to be a favourite, and leaving the class in the hands of a volunteer learner to write the answer out on the board with classmates' help for 15 minutes can be an interesting experience. The other eight points could be tackled backwards after that, from no. 8 all the way back to no. 1.
3. TALLY HO!--Spotting and waving your hat in the direction of the quarry, 120 minutes on up, who knows? It's a mark of success when not just the hounds but the humans, too, get in on the act. In the ESL classroom, this happens when learners are able to spot their own errors or someone else's without a prompt. They're no longer mere spectators but directors of the hunt. There are several ways in which to do this. One way is to print out learners' writing samples (if they have their own blogs, that's super handy) ahead of time, double-spaced and preferably enlarged on 11 x 17 paper, and create an editing gallery inside (or outside) the classroom. If space and paper are constraints, letter-sized printouts--double-spaced!--would do, and these can be taped to desks for a editing walkabout. Everybody becomes an editor, editing checklists in hand, to inflict their new-found knowledge on their classmates' writing. Anonymity is your call. Notwithstanding the risk of permanent and irreparable damage to self-esteem, the pluses of writing down names, by both authors and editors, is a sense of ownership and responsibility. In cases of ambiguity, the author could look up those two or three classmates who signed their names on the sheet as editors. The teacher, coloured pen in hand, is the final arbiter, going through any under- or over-corrections and adding any comments necessary. Learners then collect back their work and proceed to do their corrections. The fun part is watching the class move from teacher-guided corrections to peer correction to self-correction, editing checklists in hand.

It is unknown if King Solomon actually yelled Tally Ho! or even staged a mounted red-coated foxhunt. But going by his nuptial conquests, he seems to have been fairly successful at eliminating them little foxes that spoil the romantic vine.
Thanks for coming by! Please leave a comment on how the method or the handouts could be improved!



*The "old way" for some of us involved doing things piecemeal, a week here on comma splices, a week there on verb forms and tenses, where it's easy for learners to forget what they've learnt as the weeks drag on. Catching all nine foxes at a go is far more demanding on learners' concentration but aims to give a sense of what instructors and native speakers see, with the added advantage of being adaptable to and repeatable with a continuing intake of students.

Thanks to All Who Visited!

Please do leave your comments, suggestions, or whatever through the Comment link below.

Two foxes bagged! Congratulations, LINC 4 - 5 alumni Ghafour and Katie!

Another two foxes! Congrats alumni Jenny and Xing!

Post-Conference editing in a  LINC 4 - 5 class

How Many Little Foxes Do You See?

Here are a couple of real-life samples from my CLB 4 - 5 Writing students, end-of-course thank-you notes to a guest instructor at a life skills workshop:

No, not in this picture, silly.

Sample 1: Learn body language and table manners from Kathleen

Last week Kathleen taught us more useful tings to live in canada. Like body language, table manners and so on.That let me know more different ting than in China.In China people didn't use more body language in the life. If you find a people have more action in his talk, that he maybe a actor or he make a speech now.But Kathleen taught us in canada people use the body language everywhere. The canadian use more body language to show their feeling in the live. Table manners is more useful for us. Because in China People use chopsticks to eat food. Kathleen taught us how to use the tableware when you see more different kinds of the knife,spoon and glass in table.Next time if canadian friends invite me to have dinner, then I can use it.

Sample 2: Thank you Kathleen.

Thank you. Ms. Kathleen.It was so kind of you give such a good information last week. There was good to know about self-esteem.
Thanks to you. I learned a lot of good to know lived in Canada.
Thanks for helping our class and good luck.
Sincerely

Feel free to record your responses under Comments below.

Some Li'l Foxes in College-Level Writing

Following are a few Research Paper samples excerpted from one of my College English classes this year. Happily, there were no Comma Splice little foxes, some improvement from their first In-Class Essay for sure, but other mistakes seem to be just plain stubborn:

A fox in hand is worth ...

NUMBER: SINGULAR/PLURAL

1. As this studies show, maternal stressor …
2. In other word, stress experienced by the mother …
3. fitness equipments
4. … advancing … the economy of their citizen
5. more employments for the people
6. some regionals economies
7. … are major problem faced by …
   
   

Random Actual Scenes of the Fox Hunt in a Classroom

Sometimes you get to see some genuine excitement about the hunt.

More pictures below

What a corrected warm-up slip looks like

Click for more random pix ...

Quo Vadis?

REPLACEMENTS

It's now nine foxes and beyond. As the needs evolve, some of the skinnier of the little foxes may need to be swapped out of that one-sheet checklist.

Candidates for replacement include checks on

• MLA or APA compliance, 
• agreement in number, and 
• malapropisms. 

A couple of examples:

8. MLA

George, Lane .”Dude,Wheres MY Job.” Writing: a Journy. Ed .Lester, Faigley and Melanie Reuben. Toronto: Person, 2011 .(240_245).  Print

Tom Meaghers & Susan Traver. “Low wages, Srong Bocks.” The New Jersey Herald, P91. Print.

8. NUMBER—SINGULAR/PLURAL

One of the bottle is broken, and most bottles don’t break by themselves. I hope your store has a

good exchange policies. Most store will give a refund.

JUICIER SENTENCES

Screen capture from the video

Taking off from our Spelling samples and with a hat tip to Lily Wong Fillmore's notion of juicy sentences, another direction to be considered is the upgrading the sophistication of each "fox" sample in order to facilitate more holistic learning.
If the correction of Spelling could facilitate that of Pronunciation, why couldn't the correction of Subject-Verb Agreement, for instance, be upgraded to precipitate a discussion in Proper Nouns or Compound-Complex Sentence Structure?

Why the Magic Number Nine?

Only one reason: That's exactly how many I could cram into a letter-sized sheet.

Little Fox Number Nine: Using SPELLING to nail PRONUNCIATION

9. SPELLING ç with some pronunciation thrown in

Itt does’nt mater any more were de producta coms form. Wen yew oder on line, they staff can’t bee drop-shipt two you adderess frum Mombai, Shenzen, ore Calgry. Every thing a rives ata yore nearesta possed ofice.

ANSWER KEY: It doesn’t matter anymore where the product comes from. When you order online, the stuff can be drop-shipped to your address from Mumbai, Shenzhen, or Calgary. Everything arrives at your nearest post office.

9. SPELLING ç with some pronunciation thrown in

Two estart aa bigguh pooder bidness lack Madonna inwollwoo geting eh restauranter lesson, hells insbection, sarvice treening, anda a finansher alone, vitch requeer de entrepreneur too fox ontoo Manny sings.

ANSWER KEY: To start a bigger food business like McDonalds involves getting a restaurant licence, health inspection, service training, and a financial loan, which requires the entrepreneur to focus on too many things.

Student Samples Successful and Otherwise

Foxes bagged: Success stories

• Sample 1
• Sample 2
• Sample 3

Foxes afoot: Success latent

• Sample 1
• Sample 2
• Sample 3

What's This Allusion to Little Foxes?

Traditionally, it was King Solomon's lover who wants nothing to eat away at their blossoming love when she insists (2:15), poetically, to

Catch the foxes for us, the little foxes that spoil the vineyards, for our vineyards are in blossom.

She apparently succeeds. As she concludes,

My beloved is mine, and I am his; he grazes among the lilies.17 Until the day breathes and the shadows flee, turn, my beloved, be like a gazelle or a young stag on cleft mountains.

So also the quest to catch all the little problems that add up to an unreadable, unlovable text, of which nine are specifically targeted in this poster presentation.

Presentation Abstract

Those wishing to see them nine foxes framed in a different way can order this painting from Sophy White.

Presentation Abstract (as submitted to TESL Ontario Conference): The traditional approach to editing is largely piecemeal, tackling comma splices one week, capitalizations the next week, subject-verb agreement the next few days, etc. It's hard to see the forest for the trees, or, the vineyard for the vine. The "Catching Nine Little Foxes That Spoil the Vine" Worksheet presents a more holistic picture to the learner and sensitizes one to textual features that--ideational and interpersonal considerations aside--are nonstandard and tend to annoy the native reader. The nine selected features range from Prepositions (improper/absent/extra) and Sentence Integrity (comma splices/run-on sentences/fragments) to Punctuation (proper nouns, hard returns, spaces around words, quote marks, periods, etc.) and Spelling--stuff that sometimes seems trivial to the ESL learner. The fun part in all of this is how adaptable the handout can be in terms of LINC-related themes and peculiar learner difficulties, especially for the Spelling section, where the incorrect sample can be made to reflect the learner's speech, e.g. fox for focus, Madonna for McDonalds. The methodology, too, is fairly rewarding to the instructor besides three fairly predictable mornings. Beginning with the warm-up sheet that encourages the student to "catch five more" errors, and going on to multiple peer checking and teacher-class checking, the process has received a fair bit of anecdotal acclaim from learners. The takeaway is a checklist that is applied to peer writing correction and, hopefully, lifelong sensitivity to scribal "little foxes that spoil the vine."