National Punctuation Day? Who knew?
Last week I posted an email I received from Public Agenda, a non-profit, non-partisan research group. It prompted a meaty discussion on education reform that brought some new commenters to Kitsap Education.
So here’s another one, though it’s more fun than anything.
Please, please, please let me know if you particpate in this (whether you’re a teacher, parent, grandparent, administrator etc.) This would be an awesome project for people who school their children at home. I would LOVE to do a feature story on a local entry on this contest.
HOLD ON TO YOUR OVEN MITTS!
The first Punctuation Baking Contest will highlight the celebration of the
6th Annual National Punctuation Day (NPD) on September 24, 2009.
NPD is celebrated in schools and businesses throughout the world with
activities, games, programs, and contests. It has inspired people to pay
attention not only to their p¹s and q¹s, but also their commas, semicolons,
and ellipses. NPD reminds us of the importance of proper punctuation for
communicating clearly at home, school, or at work.
NPD has received worldwide media attention since former newspaperman Jeff
Rubin founded the holiday in 2004, with newspaper coverage from Manila to
London and from Seoul to Seattle, in addition to broad radio and TV coverage
in the United States ‹ including a short segment on Regis and Kelly in 2008.
NPD is recognized by Chase¹s Calendar of Events and listed in its sister
publication, The Teacher¹s Calendar, two directories published by
McGraw-Hill.
RULES FOR THE PUNCTUATION BAKING CONTEST:
- Entrants must send a recipe and a sample of their cookie, cake, pastry,
doughnut, or bread baked in the shape of a punctuation mark to National
Punctuation Day, 1517 Buckeye Court, Pinole, CA 94564.
- Entrants must send two print photos ‹ one putting the item in an oven
before baking and the other taking it out when it¹s done. Make sure we can
see the baked goods clearly.
- First-, second-, and third-place winners will receive a box of non-edible
NPD goodies, and all entrants¹ photos and recipes will be published on the
National Punctuation Day website (www.NationalPunctuationDay.com).
- All entries must be received by September 30, 2009.
The NPD website ‹ in addition to highlighting the latest in literacy news
and featuring incorrectly punctuated signs from all over the world ‹ serves
as a resource that helps educators teach good writing skills and helps
students understand the basics of punctuation. Business people worldwide use
it as a reference guide.
³Casual shortcuts bred by e-mailing and text messaging have no place in
school papers or professional business writing,² Rubin says. ³In the
business world, words have power and help decision-makers form impressions
immediately. Careless punctuation mistakes cost time, money, and
productivity.
³There¹s an epidemic of poor punctuation in the United States, much like the
Swine flu. It¹s too bad there¹s no vaccine to prevent it.²
HOW TO CELEBRATE NATIONAL PUNCTUATION DAY
What can you do to participate in National Punctuation Day on September 24!
1. Go to www.NationalPunctuationDay.com and become familiar with punctuation
rules and issues.
2. Organize punctuation activities at your school, library, or office.
3. Share punctuation peeves with founder Jeff Rubin at
Jeff@NationalPunctuationDay.com.
4. Send photos of incorrectly punctuated signage to Jeff Rubin at
Jeff@NationalPunctuationDay.com
5. Forward this news as a way to spread the importance of proper punctuation.
To learn how schools and companies can participate in National Punctuation
Day, or to schedule an interview with Jeff Rubin, the Punctuation Man, visit
www.NationalPunctuationDay.com, call Jeff at (877) 588-1212, or e-mail Jeff
at Jeff@NationalPunctuationDay.com.
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Scripps Interactive Newspapers Group
September 15th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
This excerpt from the article is punctuated incorrectly:
National Punctuation Day website (www.NationalPunctuationDay.com).
It is properly rendered:
National Punctuation Day website (www.NationalPunctuationDay.com.)
Such writing is, alas, ubiquitous.
September 15th, 2009 at 1:02 pm
This is too fun. I will be forwarding this to a couple of my co-workers. Due to the nature the business in which I am employed, a significant amount of quality control, proofreading and format consistency takes place within my department. There are days when the conversation amongst the writers, course developers and myself regarding semicolon usage, commas and hyphen placement goes on entirely too long and is way too involved.
Last year, when inner office punctuation frustration reached an all time high, I purchased them their own copy of a book that is used quite frequently in the local elementary schools. It is called “Punctuation Takes a Vacation”. Now we can all have a great laugh over it when the debate over punctuation rules get a little too heated around here.
September 15th, 2009 at 5:31 pm
I understand what you are saying, Gary. I was taught the same way. In the case of parentheses or quotes the punctuation goes inside, but is it “judgement” or is it “judgment?” Language changes. You must go with the flow. The problem with the old style is that it is confusing. In each case you want to highlight something exactly. I don’t want to highlight and compare “judgement” and “judgment.” It is “judgement” and “judgment” I want to compare. In order to do so exactly, I must fudge the system to avoid the issue. With URLs the issue is even more important, for if I highlight the “URL.” I will get a 504 error: Page not found. In these cases the language “rules” are unreasonable; they do not work well in a real-life “copy and paste” world. Did I make it through okay?
September 28th, 2009 at 9:03 pm
Wow! That punctuation-baking contest seems tasty, does it? Celebrating punctuation day is a good way to bring awareness to people of the correct grammars and use of punctuation.
Take time to celebrate National Punctuation Day. It seems that National Punctuation Day would be a holiday that will make the respective buildings containing the home offices of Facebook, Myspace, and Twitter on fire, because hardly anybody on those respective websites seems to know what punctuation, or grammar is. It’s a fake holiday, like so many other holidays are, but this one at least highlights something concrete, but also a growing problem in that a growing number of adults are functionally illiterate, and people are learning the majority of their written communication skills with text messaging. Maybe a personal loan to celebrate National Punctuation Day would be worth it.