Editing/Proofreading Services Available

[Dennis Cayton]

Hi John!

Your post really caught my eye and reeled me in.

It sounds like you enjoy the same type of work I do!

Ever since I retired from my teaching job 3 years ago, I have been doing some occasional freelance work as a proofreader and accuracy checker for new and upcoming editions of mathematics textbooks which are in various stages of their proofs.

My first job is to check the teacher's edition to make sure that all of the answers are correct. They never are. You wouldn't believe all the errors I find.

Then I check both the teacher's edition and the student's edition to see if the content of each chapter is properly aligned with each other. I also check for the accuracy of the demonstration examples which are presented in each chapter before the chapter exercises are given. I find a lot of mistakes here as well.

I also find a lot of grammatical and spelling errors in the explanations given in both the teacher's edition and the student's edition of the textbook.

Here's an example of an error I caught a couple of months ago that cracked me up. One problem said:

"Find the volume of a 12-sided cube with each side equal to 4 inches."

Have you ever heard of a 12-sided cube?

Duh!

Another thing I like to do is to take a poorly written word problem or multiple-choice problem and rewrite it from scratch. It is unfortunate that a lot of these types of problems are written unclearly, rendering them uncertain as to their proper meanings and interpretations.

With so many states joining the high stakes testing movement, we can't afford to give our students test questions which are poorly written and unclear.

I love this work more than anything else I have ever done in my life.

There's only one problem.

I don't get enough of it.

My ultimate goal is to move beyond the freelance stage and do this kind of work full time.

I just wanted to share this with you.

In closing I want to thank you once again for helping me out with my library sales. I still have a ways to go before I sell my complete library, but you have been a big help so far.

Thanks again!

Take care and good luck.

Best Wishes,

Dennis Cayton

[liam stephens]

Hello Dennis,

That was a very interesting posting. I really liked that one about the 12 sided cube.
Reminded me of an old joke question:
What kind of toothpick does a non-believer use? - A gnawstick!

Good luck with your book sales.

Regards - Liam Stephens.

[Dennis Cayton]

Dennis, perhaps the 12-sided cube is for students who really like counting sides! John

I guess you could say that these students are "on the edge."

Dennis Cayton

[Dennis Cayton]

During high school, I had a work-study job in the local college's adult education department. My boss once asked me to grade a stack of math tests (with a key!) that he had given to his MBA students. About halfway through, I noticed that a lot of people were getting a certain algebra problem wrong, so on a whim I worked it out myself-- sure enough, the key was wrong! I tried to get my boss to let me grade the essay portions of his tests, too, but after the first round he told me I was being too hard on the MBAs, and only let me circle spelling/grammar errors after that. John

Hi John,

I enjoyed reading your account of the expereience you had in high school. Unfortunately, this type of thing happens all the time.

A lot of textbooks go through several pairs of eyes from different proofreaders before they go into their final print. If a major error slips by through several stages of the process, sometimes your supervisors will try to cover it up.

The reason for this is that your superevisors are supposed to be spot checking your work as well. If a proofreader misses an error, and if your supervisor misses it as well, it makes the supervisor look bad.

Case in point. One time I noticed something amiss in a chapter I was reviewing on quadrilaterals. This chapter covered the square, the rectangle, the parallelogram, and the rhombus.

They completely left out the trapezoid! It was not even mentioned in the chapter explanations, and no picture of one was provided.

Yet, the chapter exercises proceeded to ask questions about the trapezoid, even though it was not even covered. Believe it or not, I was the first proofreader to catch this.

I immediately brought this to the attention of my supervisor. She told me to "forget about it." She said that they had a deadline to reach, and that fixing this error would necessitate the textbook writers having to redo the entire chapter.

This was the same textbook series that asked the question about the 12-sided cube and which is now being used in the public schools in my residence in Norfolk, Virginia. I looked at a finished copy of this textbook recently. Sure enough, the poor little trapezoid remained left out of that chapter.

It is an unfortunate reality in this business that meeting deadlines is too often prioritized over taking the time to put out a quality product.

Take care and thanks again for all of your help.

Best Wishes,

Dennis Cayton

[Dennis Cayton]

Hello Dennis,

That was a very interesting posting. I really liked that one about the 12 sided cube.
Reminded me of an old joke question:
What kind of toothpick does a non-believer use? - A gnawstick!

Good luck with your book sales.

Regards - Liam Stephens.

Hello Liam,

LOL!

Nice one!

Nice to meet you as well.

Thank you very much for your good luck wishes for my book sales.

And good luck to you as well.

Best Wishes,

Dennis Cayton

[Alex_Moiseyev]

John, are you going to PA ty this year at the end of this week ? Would you agree to share my car ? Please, call me

Alex

[Patrick Parker]

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[mday]

What are you talking about, Patrick? No one understands your jibberish.

[Patrick Parker]

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[tommyc]

Jibberish is jibberish in any mans language.!!!

[Patrick Parker]

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[tommyc]

This is very bad news for democracy, that Patrick has to feel this way.Where did we go wrong??.Please dont go!!

[mday]

dennis or john mentioned high stakes testing
if you are not going to read the entire thread to understand
or perhaps reading comprehension is above your abilities
then i offer only this one piece of advice
stfu

You're talking about MY READING COMPREHENSION? Not one single person on this forum understand what you're trying to say


Must be the Louisiana affect.

"Damn, Patrick is retarded"