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I teach first year writing at a four-year college. It’s not called “First Year Writing” at my institution, but that’s the simplest description of what it is. I want to spend time teaching my students higher-level thinking skills and how to do critical analysis, rather than spending time on basic spelling and grammar issues. (Yes, I still spend some time teaching grammar.) Yet many of my students struggle with the basics of grammar and spelling—things that their word processor already knows.

At first, I started out by just telling students that they needed to use “spell check” before they turned in their papers. I kept getting papers with the most basic spelling and grammar errors, the ones that I knew Microsoft Word’s Spelling & Grammar Check should catch.

Then I realized: most of my students have no idea how to use the Spelling & Grammar function of MS Word. I find that it is worth my time to show them how to use it effectively. I am lucky enough to be in a smart classroom, with computers and an overhead projector, and it only takes 10-15 minutes to show students the basic functions.

The tutorial below starts at a basic level, but gets deep quickly.

There are four parts:

-using Spelling & Grammar Check more robustly,

-adjusting AutoCorrect,

-using the Citation/Bibliography function, and

-using Find & Replace for grammar & spelling.

If you are an instructor, the first thing you should do is familiarize yourself with the functions. I have screenshots below from MS Word 2008 for Mac.

Part One: Spelling & Grammar Check

To get to Spelling and Grammar on a Mac, first open a document in Word.

Go to the Menu Bar, select Tools, and pull down to select “Spelling and Grammar.” Or, just hit option-command-L.

Getting there from the Tools Menu

This should bring up the basic Spelling and Grammar window, the one you use to check your document.

The Spelling and Grammar window

This is as far as most students ever get. They change whatever the window tells them to change (or not), and they go on their merry way.

You, however, are going to teach them to click on “Options…”

Which gives you this:

Spelling and Grammar options

I have the settings checked here that I recommend, but the most important are:

√ Check spelling as you type

√ Always suggest corrections

√ Check grammar as you type

√ Check grammar with spelling

I have students use the “Writing Style: Standard” setting. This is a good baseline.

The magic really happens, though, when you click the button right next to “Writing Style: Standard,” the button marked “Settings…”:

Grammar Check options

Let’s start with the three settings in the middle of the box. The first one allows you to set a standard for the “Oxford” or serial comma. The second allows you to define where punctuation with quotes should go (inside for US, outside for UK, and I am ignorant about what Canada does!). The third box is for spaces between sentences, which the MLA 2009 guidelines have changed to one space.

Now, let’s talk about the box. This is the real power of MS Word’s Grammar check. You can turn items on and off, depending on what kind of writing you are doing and what you want to achieve. Students inevitably ask: “Should we just turn them all on?”

I advise against that, simply because then Word tends to mark almost every sentence in a undergraduate paper. That is defeating and overwhelming, to say the least. I tell students to mark a few boxes (you can see my checkmarks in the screen shots). If students are really struggling with multiple issues, I tell them to mark only one box (say, passive sentences) and work on only those sentences. Once those sentences are addressed, the student can turn the other options back on and recheck the document without being overwhelmed.

more Grammar Check options

even more grammar check options

Play around with these boxes and see which settings you like for student papers (or, for your own writing!).

Part 2 – AutoCorrect

You can reach even more options, like the AutoCorrect functions, by going through the MS Word Preferences pane.

Go to the Menu Bar and select Word->Preferences, or hit command-comma.

Getting there from Preferences

This brings up the Preferences pane. Clicking on Spelling and Grammar gives you the same panes you saw above.

But here’s something new… click on AutoCorrect.

Getting there from Preferences

The AutoCorrect window helps correct all those pesky typing problems easily. It can also auto-complete difficult words (like author’s names) that need to be typed over and over.

AutoCorrect

Here’s what you see when you click the center “AutoFormat” button:

Autoformat

These are some of the things that make students crazy when they are typing if they don’t know how to turn them on & off.

Play around with the AutoCorrect, AutoFormat and AutoText buttons in this window to see if you want to show these to students.

Part Three: Bibliography/Citations

Another feature of Word that is helpful for writing students is its ability to help format a bibliography in MLA, APA or Chicago style.

If your floating palette isn’t open, go to View: Citations.

Citations Palette

You will get this option. Where you see “MLA,” you can change to APA or Chicago with the pull-down menu.

MLA format

Clicking the “+” sign at the bottom of the palette allows you to add a new citation. The student types in all of the information, and Word does the MLA formatting for them.

inserting bibliographical info

You may think that students should be learning MLA style, rather than allowing the computer to format the citations for them. Yes, they should. I do spend time teaching MLA formatting, and I tell students that no matter what they use (Word, RefWorks, ottobib.com), they are responsible for the outcome and for the final paper. My thoughts are: A. this is a powerful tool, and it helps them in a way that I do not consider cheating and B. 95% of my students are in disciplines that do not use MLA style for formatting papers, so they tend to not keep the info in their long-term memory banks. And if they are going to use the tool, I want them to use it correctly, so I show them how.

Part Four: Find & Replace

The last thing I show them is the Find and Replace tool. This can be helpful for repeated instances of a misspelled word, or for checking to see where a source from the bibliography is used in the paper. Clicking command-F gives you this window:

Find window

This is useful for Finding, but if you want to Replace, you need to click the blue expansion arrow.

Then you’ll see this:

Replace window

Now you can type in the word you want to find, and the word you want to replace. So, if you want to replace all instances of “Nowsen” with “Knaussen,” you just type “Nowsen” in the Find box, and “Knaussen” in the Replace box. You can hit “Replace All” if you are feeling bold, or do it one by one with the “Find Next” and “Replace” buttons.

There’s also a way to use the Find tool to locate passive sentences. If the Grammar Check for passive sentences isn’t helping, type in “is” or “am” into the Find box. Then check “Find all word forms” at the bottom. This will locate all instances of am, is, are, was, & were. You will need to do a separate search for “be,” but it’s a heck of a way to locate passive voice in a paper.

Find and replace

That’s what I try to show my students about MS Word’s Grammar Check functions. If I don’t have time to go over this before the day the first big project is due, I will have students open up their papers on the computers when they get to class, and I show them these options. Any changes they make to the papers during class are accepted. You can bet that when they are turning in a major project, they pay attention to learning and using these functions! It’s also a nice last-minute check for them. (In that instance, I would probably skip the MLA citation tool, since that might cause more consternation than help at the last minute.)

Those are my tips for teaching Microsoft Word’s Spelling and Grammar check functions. Do you teach these in your writing class? I would love to get your comments!

An old college friend of mine, Dr. J, has invited the internet to read some Great Books along with him. Here’s where he describes the project, which is a seven year plan to read the 60-volume  Great Books of the Western World series. (That link goes to my Amazon affiliate page, in case you want to purchase the $960 set. Ha.)

After announcing this project, Dr. J (a classicist) was hit with “friendly fire” from colleagues accusing his list of being Eurocentrist and chauvinistic, among other things. Now, normally I love a good canon war. If, for example, we were debating the book list that all students would have to read in order to pass core literature classes,  I would be in there scrappin’ with the best of ‘em, holding aloft my copies of Virginia Woolf and Toni Morrison. However, that’s not what this is. This project is one person’s quest to conquer a vast, daunting series of readings. He’s invited us to tag along. No-one is required to read these books (Can you imagine freshman at the bookstore picking up this giant pile? They would need a wheelbarrow.).We are invited to read these books, not forced.

I tend to refer to the project as “reading some of the Great Books” because, while the title of the series seems to claim to be all-encompassing, I don’t think any of us really believe that this series includes all the Great Books that ever were or will be in the Western World. But once again – I haven’t read these books before (most of them, anyway). I hesitate to slam the door on a series just because it may be written by dead white men – we should read the dead white men too, should we not? At least then we can make a fair comparison.

Dr. J is posting the links to each reading online, which is great – you do not have to purchase the entire $960 stack of books in order to read along. I happen to love the anachronicity of reading a classic text on my mobile device; there’s something deliciously irreverent and yet marvelous about reading them on my iPhone while I’m nursing the baby.

If you want to skip the rest of Dr. J’s blog and just do the Great Books thing, here’s the link. You may not be able to keep up (*I* may not be able to keep up), but anything is better than nothing. Put a link on the home page of your iPhone, and read along. Why not?

No matter what your stance on breastfeeding, someone hates you.

If you are pro-boob, then you are demonizing moms who don’t/can’t breastfeed.

If you don’t demonize moms who use formula, then you are anti-breastfeeding.

If you do demonize moms who use formula, you are a lactivist. Yes, this is a word now, and it’s a dirty one.

Can’t we all just…well, you know. Get along.

Here’s my treatise on breastfeeding and all that, which is bound to piss off somebody.

If you can breastfeed, I recommend it. It’s good for the baby and it’s way cheaper than formula.

If you can’t, or won’t, breastfeed, then I’m going to assume that you as a rational adult and rich American are using sterile water and giving your baby enough to eat and all that, and I’m not going to worry about it. Many mommy bloggers are boycotting Nestle for the way they market formula in 3rd world countries, where women can’t afford adequate amounts of formula and don’t even have access to clean water to mix it with. This is a problem. However, a bigger problem in 3rd world countries is that moms are dying and the relatives can’t afford formula for the the orphaned babies, let alone find someone to breastfeed them. Maybe some of these bloggers should focus on the mother mortality problem. I’m just sayin’. (Some of you may be doing just that — would you let me know, if you are? I’d love to promote that with you.)

While I’m at it, let’s go over some of the crap that people give out about breastfeeding. (By the way, I have giant babies who measure off-the-charts-big at every appointment. Thriving is not a problem.) The reason I’m irritated about these myths is that if I had thought these things were all true, I would have never tried breastfeeding in the first place. To be pro-breastfeeding, we need to be open to breastfeeding options and tell women that breastfeeding isn’t a chain around their necks.

Myth #1: you have to sleep with your kids in order to breastfeed them.

Nope. Not at all true. I’ve never slept in the same bed with my children. Not even the same room, except on vacation. I don’t want to, and I don’t have to. I’ve never nursed them while lying in my bed. I have a lovely padded rocker in the baby’s room for nursing, and that’s where it happens. Yes, you do have to get up in the night, but the upside is that the baby ISN’T SLEEPING IN YOUR BED. Also there’s this. If you choose to sleep with your kids, that’s your business, but don’t tell me I have to.

Myth #2 – Nipple confusion. By this I mean the myth that if you ever give your baby a bottle, EVEN ONCE, he/she will never want to take the breast again.

I’ve heard people say that you should never give your baby a bottle when he/she is breastfeeding, because then the baby will never take the breast again. Maybe this happens to some people. It has never happened to me. Bottles are a great thing, created by God to give mommies a night out now and then. If you need one, use it. If you don’t have time to pump, the baby can have formula. Yes! The f-word! It’s ok.

Myth #3 – You have to wear your baby in order to breastfeed.

Um, no. You don’t. A sling or Baby Bjorn is nice, especially when you have an older child and not enough hands, but it’s certainly not required. I’ve never nursed a baby in one and I’m not sure I could figure out how. My baby loves to be held, but I don’t have to wear him. If you want to wear your baby, go for it, but don’t force it on me.

So now that I’ve pissed everyone off about breastfeeding, maybe I should tackle birth? Maybe I could talk about the way I want to sucker-punch people who tell women they’ve “failed” if they take drugs/have a cesarean/give birth anywhere besides an inflatable bathtub. (I don’t mean taking illegal drugs, which is obviously uncool. I mean getting pain relief while giving birth. Which is totally fine.)

See, here’s the thing: we humans operate out of fear. Fear of failure, fear of death, fear that we are doing the wrong thing even as we do it. So we make our choice, and then because we’re still secretly afraid we’ve done the wrong thing, we shout really loudly about what other people are doing wrong and try to get everyone to make the same choice that we made. Our choice must be the best choice. It has to be the best choice, actually, because to admit otherwise would be to admit that we made the not-best choice, and THAT would be inexcusable. We like to hide behind the “it’s best for the baby” line, but the truth is, we’re all afraid to admit we might be wrong.Is that what I’m doing here? Maybe. But before you jump all over me, ask yourself why you are defending your choices or attacking mine. Is it really because you think my baby is in danger, or is it because you don’t like for me to insinuate that your way isn’t the only way?

Let’s be pro-moms. Let’s be an awesome sisterhood. For goodness sake, let’s be on the same side. Then maybe we can tackle some of the bigger issues, like getting longer paid maternity leave in the U.S. Whadda ya say? Let’s do it TOGETHER.

Saturday I sang as part of a flash mob at the Nordstrom at Northpark Mall in Dallas. I was invited by a friend who was “in the know” about these things. It was amazing – almost 500 singers showed up.

I was excited to be invited to sing “The kingdom of this world is become the kingdom of our Lord, and of His Christ. And He shall reign forever and ever!” right in the middle of the mall.

I was also excited about the string quartet playing a cover of Taylor Swift, but I’m dorky like that.

Here’s the official YouTube video of the flash mob.

And here’s the one where you can glimpse me at :30 and 1:40. I’m in the background wearing a green shirt & white vest.I’m standing next to Bill Lawrence, my dear friend’s father, who was interviewed by the Dallas Morning News in a story about the singing flash mob.

I heard on the radio that my favorite Christmas carol, “Hark the Herald Angels Sing” was originally written to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the printing press. You read that right.

Felix Mendelssohn wrote the music in 1840 for a strictly secular celebration, while Charles Wesley (John’s brother) had written the sacred words a century earlier with the intent that they would be set to slow, solemn music.The words and music were only set together after Mendelssohn’s death.

Strangely, this makes me like the song better. Gutenberg’s press was, obviously, a watershed for literature. And for me, literature is inextricably linked to John chapter 1:

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”

The chapter heading the editor has placed over John 1 is usually, “The Word Became Flesh.” The Word, of course, is Christ. The mystery is His incarnation, what John Donne called “Immensity cloistered in… [a] womb.”

So when I sing Wesley’s words, words about the great mystery of God “veiled in flesh,” I cannot help but think of John 1, the Word made flesh. And to know that Mendelssohn wrote these words about Gutenberg, whose press made the printed Word of God available “in the flesh,” as it were, printed words which had such impact on men like Wesley… well, it adds another layer of richness to my favorite Christmas hymn.

Here’s a stunning video of this beautiful carol ringing through St. Paul’s Cathedral.

The amazing, mysterious words:

Hark the herald angels sing
“Glory to the newborn King!
Peace on earth and mercy mild
God and sinners reconciled”
Joyful, all ye nations rise
Join the triumph of the skies
With the angelic host proclaim:
“Christ is born in Bethlehem”
Hark! The herald angels sing
“Glory to the newborn King!”

Christ by highest heav’n adored
Christ the everlasting Lord!
Late in time behold Him come
Offspring of a Virgin’s womb
Veiled in flesh the Godhead see
Hail the incarnate Deity
Pleased as man with man to dwell
Jesus, our Emmanuel
Hark! The herald angels sing
“Glory to the newborn King!”

Hail the heav’n-born Prince of Peace!
Hail the Son of Righteousness!
Light and life to all He brings
Ris’n with healing in His wings
Mild He lays His glory by
Born that man no more may die
Born to raise the sons of earth
Born to give them second birth
Hark! The herald angels sing
“Glory to the newborn King!”

More on Wesley’s words at Christianity Today.

By popular request, I’ve done a roundup of some of the crafty blogs I love. Also, I’m trying to ease back into blogging after baby, and a roundup is an easy way to do it!

The blogosphere is always changing, so I anticipate posting more of these in the future. That’s the best part of the interwebz – running across something wonderful & new. Hope these are wonderful & new to you!

Sew, Mama Sew. this blog does great roundups of sewing projects.If you are reading it in an RSS reader, you will need to click through – the previews are limited.

OhDeeDoh. Not always a craft blog, but the crafts they do have are SO clever, and often book-related.

Make it and Love it. Cute stuff for home & kids.

Make Baby Stuff. Check the archives for even more good stuff.

Homemade by Jill. worth it just for the advent calendar patterns! so cute.

Ana White, previously Knock-Off Wood. Plans for building Pottery Barn and high-end furniture knockoffs by yourself. Love this blog and the blogger behind it.

Thrifty Decor Chick. Mainly home stuff. Lots of fun before & afters, on the cheap.

Martha Stewart Craft Dept. ’nuff said.

Sewing at CraftGossip. This is the king (queen?) of sewing blogs, with many small & easy projects. LOVE.

I am Momma – Hear Me Roar. Lots of great boy crafts! And she’s actually shown a couple of my projects. :)

Design*Sponge. Not technically a craft blog, but their before & afters will inspire you to no end, especially if you are like me and like to “upcycle” stuff.

Grosgrain. Tons of cute ideas, especially for sewists.

Ruffles and Stuff. No longer an active blog, but the archives are worth a look. Girly, but in a really good way.

Enjoy getting lost in these fun blogs. Happy Thanksgiving!

As you might have guessed from the silence here on the blog, I had my second child. He was born on October 21 and I haven’t been doing much else for the past ten days!

We named him Fitzwilliam “Liam” Torbjorn Keeth. Yes, Fitzwilliam is named after the most gentlemanly literary character of all time, Jane Austen’s Mr. Darcy. Torbjorn is Danish for “Thunder-Bear.” More on that later… the Thunderbear is crying and I’ve got to go.

Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series is wildly popular. After reading several Facebook recommedations along the lines of “the bestest book evar!” and seeing my students trying to sneak-read it while I was lecturing, I decided to give it a try. After all, I loved Audrey Niffeneger’s Time Traveler's Wife, and this was a time-traveling love story too, right?

At first I thought I’d get it at my local Half-Price Books. After some searching, I realized it was in the Romance section. Strike one. I don’t read books from the Romance section, unless they are Jane Austen fanfiction and sometimes not even then. I’m embarrassed when I’m at Half-Price Books and I’m in the one aisle that is half Romance and half Sci-Fi. I want to tell people, “I’m here for the sci-fi! Really! I don’t read Romance novels… at least, not since junior high!” But I digress.

I got Outlander from the library and read it in a couple of days. I’ve heard people complain about the length of the book, but that never bothers me. As CS Lewis said, “You can’t get a cup of tea large enough or a book long enough to suit me.”  Besides, Gabaldon keeps the action moving and the pages turning.

The book was fine, and Gabaldon has done her homework in the history department. What bothers me is the romance-novel-ness of the whole thing. It’s not so much that sex scenes bother me (they don’t really) but that in romance novels they tend to take up an inordinate amount of page space and be soooo goofy. There’s much bodice ripping and bosom-heaving and “Wow, we almost died just then! Let’s do it behind this tree!” and so forth.

But more than that, the characters started to annoy me – especially the main male hero. He is so stinking perfect. I can see why it would mess with your head to read romance novels all the time (The Coquette, anyone?). No man—no one at all—is this perfect and brave and gallant all the time. It’s ridiculous. No, it’s preposterous. Give me a flawed, conflicted character any day. About halfway through I thought, “This book is a perfect example of why I don’t read romance novels.”

The real test is: would I read the sequel(s)? And my answer is that yes, if I’m ever in an airport and my flight is delayed, I would grab one of the sequels from the bookstore. Of course, I’d read a cereal box if I was stranded in an airport, but you get my point. Gabaldon’s Outlander series is not going to be first on my reading list, but it’s not quite to the point of “I can’t believe I wasted four hours of my life on that.” If you like romance novels, I imagine Gabaldon’s are probably better than most. If you aren’t a huge fan of romance novels, you may skip Outlander with no qualms at all. Better yet, read Time Traveler's Wife instead.


I have a challenge out there to everyone who has champions a cause. C’mon, we all do it. I am specifically talking to those of us (myself included; I talk to myself regularly and have not yet been admitted to any kind of psychiatric institution) who are championing “first world causes.”

For me, a “first world cause” would be something that only affects those of use who are ridiculously wealthy compared to the rest of the world. If you are American and not on food stamps, I’m talking to you. (Did you know that if you make a household income of over $50,000, you are in the top 1% of the world? It boggles the mind.) My challenge is to take your first world cause and make it bigger. I’m not saying you have to give up your first world cause, but maybe you could expand it in some way. You are probably talking to people about it with some regularity, or posting messages on your Facebook status about it, or maybe even doing more like fundraising. That’s great. But I’m asking you to widen your circle of interest here.

For example: If you are trying to get people to stop using plastic water bottles and start using reusable bottles (disclaimer: I love my SIGG), maybe you could expand your cause to help people in developing nations get drinkable water. I don’t know what charity you should support in order to do that, but I know there are a few. Get involved.

Another idea: if you are campaigning against childhood vaccines (in which case I still love you as a person but most wholeheartedly disagree with you), maybe instead of paying those doctor co-pays you could donate money for malaria nets for African children. You’d be saving lives, without compromising your beliefs.

Or: If you are into the home birth movement (I’m not, but I know a lot of people who are), maybe you could donate the money you saved on doctor bills toward fistula hospitals in developing nations. We in the developed world have access to incredible prenatal & obstetric care–so much, in fact, that most people don’t even know what a fistula is anymore. Unfortunately, that’s not the case in places like Ethiopia and Afghanistan.

Or maybe you, like me, are against the use of high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) in, well, anything. I can keep that up, but perhaps I should also spend time campaigning for children who don’t get enough to eat right here in my hometown. Programs like Share Our Strength or North Texas Food Bank help feed children whose parents can’t feed them dinner at night or food on the weekends. That’s not far away in Africa, folks… that’s right here, maybe in my neighborhood. Probably in my neighborhood.

If I’ve picked on your cause celebre, forgive me. I’m just having a hard time lately getting truly riled up about “first world problems.” Whatever you are fighting for, whatever you think worth arguing over—see if there’s a way to make it bigger, to make it life-changing, to make it real to more people. More than just those who have enough extra cash in their pocket to buy a latte. See if you can make it big enough to save a life.