{"id":910,"date":"2018-01-17T10:53:03","date_gmt":"2018-01-17T17:53:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/?p=910"},"modified":"2018-01-17T10:53:03","modified_gmt":"2018-01-17T17:53:03","slug":"read-aloud-proofreading-method","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/2018\/01\/17\/read-aloud-proofreading-method\/","title":{"rendered":"Read-Aloud Proofreading Method"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"width: 580px;\" class=\"wp-video\"><video class=\"wp-video-shortcode\" id=\"video-910-1\" width=\"580\" height=\"697\" preload=\"metadata\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"video\/mp4\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/files\/2017\/10\/Read-Aloud-Proofreading-Method-1.mp4?_=1\" \/><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/files\/2017\/10\/Read-Aloud-Proofreading-Method-1.mp4\">http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/files\/2017\/10\/Read-Aloud-Proofreading-Method-1.mp4<\/a><\/video><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Proofreading is an ongoing challenge for most writers, especially when reviewing our own work. Because we know what we mean to say, our brains often autocorrect for typos. And a spellcheck won\u2019t catch some of the most common typos: a missing word, a wrong word that\u2019s spelled correctly or the right word that\u2019s in the wrong place.<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->Reading text out loud has long been considered an effective proofreading method, and I\u2019ve found an even more effective variation on that method. Let your computer read your text out loud while you follow along. The errors that your brain might autocorrect as <strong>you<\/strong> are reading the text will often leap out when you hear your computer read it.<\/p>\n<p>I recommend reading aloud text a paragraph or two at a time. Also, if you hear an error, stop the reading immediately and correct the error so you don\u2019t forget where it was. And the only way this method works is if you pay attention and read along as the computer is speaking the text. If you\u2019re distracted, you may not hear the error when it\u2019s read.<\/p>\n<p>There are a couple of ways to get your computer to read text out loud. On a Mac, this is built into your System Preferences. Choose Dictation and Speech and set up a keyboard shortcut. I use Command + Shift + S. Highlight the text, use your keyboard shortcut, and there you go. The same keyboard shortcut will stop the reading.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/files\/2017\/10\/Screen-Shot-2017-10-31-at-4.34.23-PM.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-913 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/files\/2017\/10\/Screen-Shot-2017-10-31-at-4.34.23-PM.png\" alt=\"Text-to-Speech Window\" width=\"665\" height=\"418\" srcset=\"https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/319\/files\/2017\/10\/Screen-Shot-2017-10-31-at-4.34.23-PM.png 665w, https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/319\/files\/2017\/10\/Screen-Shot-2017-10-31-at-4.34.23-PM-300x189.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 665px) 100vw, 665px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>On a PC, I recommend Natural Reader, available at <a href=\"http:\/\/naturalreaders.com\">naturalreaders.com<\/a>:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/files\/2017\/10\/Screen-Shot-2017-10-31-at-4.36.24-PM.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-914 size-large\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/files\/2017\/10\/Screen-Shot-2017-10-31-at-4.36.24-PM-1024x287.png\" alt=\"Natural Reader website\" width=\"770\" height=\"216\" srcset=\"https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/319\/files\/2017\/10\/Screen-Shot-2017-10-31-at-4.36.24-PM-1024x287.png 1024w, https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/319\/files\/2017\/10\/Screen-Shot-2017-10-31-at-4.36.24-PM-300x84.png 300w, https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/319\/files\/2017\/10\/Screen-Shot-2017-10-31-at-4.36.24-PM-768x215.png 768w, https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/319\/files\/2017\/10\/Screen-Shot-2017-10-31-at-4.36.24-PM.png 1900w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 770px) 100vw, 770px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>One workaround you may have to employ: Sometimes with .pdf files on a Mac, the file name will be spoken instead of the text you highlight. When that happens, save the file as a Reduced Size PDF, close it, and reopen the file. Then your highlighted text should read correctly.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/files\/2017\/11\/Screen-Shot-2017-11-01-at-9.54.18-AM.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-large wp-image-921\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/files\/2017\/11\/Screen-Shot-2017-11-01-at-9.54.18-AM-1024x576.png\" alt=\"Reduce size .pdf\" width=\"770\" height=\"433\" srcset=\"https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/319\/files\/2017\/11\/Screen-Shot-2017-11-01-at-9.54.18-AM-1024x576.png 1024w, https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/319\/files\/2017\/11\/Screen-Shot-2017-11-01-at-9.54.18-AM-300x169.png 300w, https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/319\/files\/2017\/11\/Screen-Shot-2017-11-01-at-9.54.18-AM-768x432.png 768w, https:\/\/osu-wams-blogs-uploads.s3.amazonaws.com\/blogs.dir\/319\/files\/2017\/11\/Screen-Shot-2017-11-01-at-9.54.18-AM.png 1920w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 770px) 100vw, 770px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Having your computer read text out loud while you follow along is a reliable method for catching typos when you proofread. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":462,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[160836,275,160871],"tags":[160886],"class_list":["post-910","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-microsoft-word","category-misc","category-tips-and-tutorials","tag-proofreading"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3JgyD-eG","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/910","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/462"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=910"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/910\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":922,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/910\/revisions\/922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=910"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=910"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/marketing\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=910"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}