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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: um, I don't think that means what you think it means: a thread for teachers
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
Emerging briefly from a stack of 100 papers I'm grading this weekend. The tedium is alleviated by the occasional typo. Today I encountered this one that's particularly, if unintentionally, fun: in a reflection piece, the student affirmed her support for "ethical diversity". (Sounds like a really PC way of saying "I'm sort of a j******" ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif) ).
What humorous/ appalling/ confusing/ intriguing typos have you encountered?
[ 16. April 2016, 13:38: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
Must they be student papers? I do recall one from years ago, when a student with no ear wrote:
quote:
She stood at the dock as the ship came in, waving like a flag in the wind.
There was also a confused person who wrote some dizzy disaster of a sentence that ended up (unintentionally) conveying the idea that his underwear had more than the usual number of holes in it, for unusual anatomical reasons (wish I could remember it word for word!); and the offensive use of general you, as in:
quote:
When you rape and murder,...
[ 16. April 2016, 16:48: Message edited by: Lamb Chopped ]
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
Must they be student papers?
no limits!
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
When you rape and murder,...
Well that is certainly... ethically diverse...
[ 16. April 2016, 17:11: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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jacobsen
seeker
# 14998
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Posted
Here's one for musicians.
In music, there is a variety of cadences - two chord combinations which act as "punctuation" in musical phrases. There is a variety of names for the four main ones, but an examination candidate invented another, when she described an interrupted cadence as "irritated."
[ 16. April 2016, 17:22: Message edited by: jacobsen ]
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But God, holding a candle, looks for all who wander, all who search. - Shifra Alon
Beauty fades, dumb is forever-Judge Judy
The man who made time, made plenty.
Posts: 8040 | From: Æbleskiver country | Registered: Aug 2009
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Amanda B. Reckondwythe
Dressed for Church
# 5521
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by jacobsen:
she described an interrupted cadence as "irritated."
Our choral director differentiates between what he calls a "loud forte" and an "angry forte."
But getting back to student papers . . . "When Beethoven died, a violin thunderstorm broke out over the city."
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"I take prayer too seriously to use it as an excuse for avoiding work and responsibility." -- The Revd Martin Luther King Jr.
Posts: 10542 | From: The Great Southwest | Registered: Feb 2004
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M.
Ship's Spare Part
# 3291
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Posted
I think I've mentioned this one before. Many moons ago, I worked for an organisation that among other things sent people out to less-developed countries. Reading the standard contract, I discovered that employees were promised accommodation with sewage.
M.
Posts: 2303 | From: Lurking in Surrey | Registered: Sep 2002
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
for Star Trek fans--
We had Moses leading the twelve tribbles across the wilderness.
And my personal favorite, a marketing postcard I was so tempted to leave uncorrected. In huge headline print:
We Believe in Nuturing Church Leaders!
Yeah, you just know I wanted to add an e. ![[Devil]](graemlins/devil.gif)
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Trudy Scrumptious
BBE Shieldmaiden
# 5647
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Posted
One of my personal proudest internet moments was getting a sentence from one of my students' papers shared on the Tumblr "Sh*t My Students Write."
"If Caesar hadn't been killed, there would of been a lot less drama. And there may not even have been a play."
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Books and things.
I lied. There are no things. Just books.
Posts: 7428 | From: Closer to Paris than I am to Vancouver | Registered: Mar 2004
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Jack the Lass
Ship's airhead
# 3415
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Posted
I have marked more than one paper about Khrushchev which waxed lyrical about his desalinisation programme. Who knew salt was such a huge problem in the Soviet Union?
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"My body is a temple - it's big and doesn't move." (Jo Brand)
wiblog blipfoto blog
Posts: 5767 | From: the land of the deep-fried Mars Bar | Registered: Oct 2002
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Sandemaniac
Shipmate
# 12829
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Posted
Luckily my ability to spell* saved me from submitting an essay on agriculture in Latvia in which an errant spellchecker had done its damnedest to replace every incidemce of "Latvia", of which there were an understandable number, with "labia".
AG
*having said that, there has to be at least one typo in this post - especially as I am writing whilst knackered!
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"It becomes soon pleasantly apparent that change-ringing is by no means merely an excuse for beer" Charles Dickens gets it wrong, 1869
Posts: 3574 | From: The wardrobe of my soul | Registered: Jul 2007
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Firenze
Ordinary decent pagan
# 619
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Posted
I'm sure I have mentioned before the impassioned sermon on the Last Times in which we were exhorted to have our lamps girt and our loins lit.
Posts: 17302 | From: Edinburgh | Registered: Jun 2001
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
What humorous/ appalling/ confusing/ intriguing typos have you encountered?
I once encountered a student who was seeking gainful employment in the Department of Physics and Astrology. His star was not in the ascendant.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
From the same stack of papers as that in the OP: "walking into the Catholic church, with the origin marry plastered on the wall... and satin glass windows..."
That was followed by an even more incomprehensible reference to "singing of hymns and bleeding the staple..."
Is that some new liturgical practice I'm unfamiliar with? Pricking your finger from the stapled liturgy to create a stigmata or something???
[ 16. April 2016, 21:28: Message edited by: cliffdweller ]
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Pigwidgeon
Ship's Owl
# 10192
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Sandemaniac:
*having said that, there has to be at least one typo in this post - especially as I am writing whilst knackered!
Of course there is -- "incidemce".
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"...that is generally a matter for Pigwidgeon, several other consenting adults, a bottle of cheap Gin and the odd giraffe."
~Tortuf
Posts: 9835 | From: Hogwarts | Registered: Aug 2005
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Baptist Trainfan
Shipmate
# 15128
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
What humorous/ appalling/ confusing/ intriguing typos have you encountered?
I once encountered a student who was seeking gainful employment in the Department of Physics and Astrology. His star was not in the ascendant.
Presumably, however, he did not need to be told this?
Posts: 9750 | From: The other side of the Severn | Registered: Sep 2009
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
I can confess to one of my own. Well actually the group I was working with. I didn't make the typo myself. In our report on the Soviet Union, in conjunction with the five year plans I believe, we pointed out that "Actually, only a very small portion of the Soviet Union is flammable."
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
Posts: 63536 | From: Washington | Registered: Jul 2001
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Cottontail
Shipmate
# 12234
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Posted
Not a typo, but my absolute favourite came from a student who was writing about gender sterotypes in a play:
At this point in the scene, John gives us a brief display of his manhood.
![[Ultra confused]](graemlins/confused2.gif)
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"I don't think you ought to read so much theology," said Lord Peter. "It has a brutalizing influence."
Posts: 2377 | From: Scotland | Registered: Jan 2007
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Moo
Ship's tough old bird
# 107
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Cottontail:
Not a typo, but my absolute favourite came from a student who was writing about gender sterotypes in a play:
At this point in the scene, John gives us a brief display of his manhood.
That reminds me of this.
The three witches exposed themselves to Macbeth.
Moo
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Kerygmania host
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See you later, alligator.
Posts: 20365 | From: Alleghany Mountains of Virginia | Registered: May 2001
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Sarasa
Shipmate
# 12271
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Posted
My son always had an amanuensis when he did exams and chatting to his special needs teacher she told me of another student who insisted the word she wanted in her biology exam was fecal rather than fetal.
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'I guess things didn't go so well tonight, but I'm trying. Lord, I'm trying.' Charlie (Harvey Keitel) in Mean Streets.
Posts: 2035 | From: London | Registered: Jan 2007
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Penny S
Shipmate
# 14768
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jack the Lass:
I have marked more than one paper about Khrushchev which waxed lyrical about his desalinisation programme. Who knew salt was such a huge problem in the Soviet Union?
Anyone studying what's left of the Aral Sea. Though the first thing that came up to my brain - instantly - was Arthur Ransome's retelling of the Russian folk tale "Salt", a version of Lear with a happy ending.
Sorry for being littoral.
Posts: 5833 | Registered: May 2009
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L'organist
Shipmate
# 17338
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Posted
"Henry VIII was the most powerful man in England and women were constantly losing their heads to him."
Written by a student trying to pad-out an essay on music at the Tudor court.
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Rara temporum felicitate ubi sentire quae velis et quae sentias dicere licet
Posts: 4950 | From: somewhere in England... | Registered: Sep 2012
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Trudy Scrumptious
BBE Shieldmaiden
# 5647
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Moo:
quote:
Originally posted by Cottontail:
Not a typo, but my absolute favourite came from a student who was writing about gender sterotypes in a play:
At this point in the scene, John gives us a brief display of his manhood.
That reminds me of this.
The three witches exposed themselves to Macbeth.
Moo
They actually do that quite literally in the Polanski film version.
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Books and things.
I lied. There are no things. Just books.
Posts: 7428 | From: Closer to Paris than I am to Vancouver | Registered: Mar 2004
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Jonah the Whale
Ship's pet cetacean
# 1244
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Posted
I'm sure it's not the first time and won't be the last, but I had to insert an apostrophe to prevent weeping Baptists in an order of service a few months ago: On Jordan's banks the Baptists cry.
Posts: 2799 | From: Nether Regions | Registered: Aug 2001
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Piglet
Islander
# 11803
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jonah the Whale:
... On Jordan's banks the Baptists cry ...
... if I were a Baptist, so would I
They drink no beer, they have no fun
I'm glad that I'm an Anglican!
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I may not be on an island any more, but I'm still an islander.
alto n a soprano who can read music
Posts: 20272 | From: Fredericton, NB, on a rather larger piece of rock | Registered: Sep 2006
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basso
Ship’s Crypt Keeper
# 4228
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Posted
I've mentioned before a church bulletin that explained "Our Lenten array is of unbleached muslim."
Posts: 4358 | From: Bay Area, Calif | Registered: Mar 2003
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Athrawes
Ship's parrot
# 9594
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Posted
Not a typo, but a Freudien Slip of sorts. I was reading with a student today and he confidently read the following: Many students work on Saturday to earn pocket monkeys. Cue much 10 year old hilarity. I know he would love to be earning pocket monkeys, as he's rather monkey - like himself. ![[Eek!]](eek.gif)
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Explaining why is going to need a moment, since along the way we must take in the Ancient Greeks, the study of birds, witchcraft, 19thC Vaudeville and the history of baseball. Michael Quinion.
Posts: 2966 | From: somewhere with a book shop | Registered: Jun 2005
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georgiaboy
Shipmate
# 11294
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Piglet:
quote:
Originally posted by Jonah the Whale:
... On Jordan's banks the Baptists cry ...
... if I were a Baptist, so would I
They drink no beer, they have no fun
I'm glad that I'm an Anglican!
Thanks, Piglet. You beat me to it. (Except it rightly reads 'they drink no GIN'! (At least the way we sang it at the seminary.)
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You can't retire from a calling.
Posts: 1675 | From: saint meinrad, IN | Registered: Apr 2006
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Piglet
Islander
# 11803
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Posted
The Anglicans I learnt it from must be a bit lower down the candle than yours ...
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I may not be on an island any more, but I'm still an islander.
alto n a soprano who can read music
Posts: 20272 | From: Fredericton, NB, on a rather larger piece of rock | Registered: Sep 2006
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
A medical paper needed a reference to a treatment plan asking nurses to implement "careful daily bone distraction by tightening the distractors" but instead found their way to asking the nurses for "careful daily bone destruction by tightening the destructors".
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
A medical paper needed a reference to a treatment plan asking nurses to implement "careful daily bone distraction by tightening the distractors" but instead found their way to asking the nurses for "careful daily bone destruction by tightening the destructors".
Even the non-typo sounds funny to this layperson: nurses need to
distract bones? Have they tried waving shiny objects or making rude noises???
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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