Homophones and other confused words: Hank Ballenger's Guide to Freshman Composition (aka "The Ballenger FAQ"): Merriam-Webster Online: Lauryn's Pet Peeves:
Course Syllabus and General Policies
This page was put together by my fellow instructor, Ms. Kathy Strong, and it's a great
page. Ms. Strong lists all the words that seem to confuse many freshman compositions students. Homophones are word with
different meanings that a pronounced the same but spelled differently. So, choosing the word with the wrong spelling will change
the meaning of your writing, and that will hurt your grade. This site also has some word sets that sound mostly alike, and that
can also prove confusing to some writers. Lastly, there is a short list of words that are often written as multiple words, but which
are actually only one word (for example, "nonethless" is sometimes written as "none the less"). If you use a word that appears
on any of these lists, make sure that you've used it correctly. Use the link to the Merriam-Webster page if you need to
double-check the meanings of these words--it will help your grade.
If you've had Mr. Ballenger for the first half of freshman
composition, you've probably already read all of this. If you don't know who Hank Ballenger is, I suggest you take a look at the FAQ on his site. This pertains to Freshman Composition in general, and I should warn you that I espouse pretty much the same philosophy
of teaching as Mr. Ballenger.
Whoops! You forgot your dictionary, and you really need to look up a word. What to do? Well, this site should be very helpful to you. Just type in the word and press "enter,"
and the definition comes to you. Or, if you want, you can use the thesaurus function to find a better word for your paper. However, if you use the thesaurus function, be very careful: if you've never heard of a word before, it's probably not a
very good idea to use it in your paper. The word may have a meaning that you do not intend, and thus, it won't help your paper to use it.
This page lets you know what really stands out when I'm grading your papers. You might want to print out a copy of this page to keep with you while you're writing your papers.
I don't expect to see ANY of the errors described on this page, so make sure your writing is free from all of these mistakes.
ENGL1323 Section 011-meets TTH 8-9:20am
ENGL1320 Section 040-meets TTH 9:30-10:50am
Grading Policy
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