English book full of spelling mistakes [Title edited by MNHQ <ironic grin>]

[BerylStreep]

DD is Year 5. Her school has purchased new English books (Collins English Skills 5), but the problem is they are absolutely full of spelling mistakes.

For example, on last night's homework alone, there was

Gibralter
Captian
interupted

Over the last 2 weeks we have also had

Burgler
Calender
The worlds oceans

I have raised it with the teacher, but she seems uninterested. If I were the head teacher, I would be sending the books back to the publisher demanding a refund or corrected texts. It just seems unacceptable to have an English textbook that contains so many basic spelling mistakes.

What do you think?

This is incredible. I don't think even one spelling error in an English skills book is acceptable.

One or two of the other books in the series also have errors, looking at their Amazon previews.

That's beyond shocking. I just had a quick scan of the 'look inside' option for Book 4 on Amazon and discovered a piece about the myth of Echo and Narcissus in which Juno is referred to as 'he' throughout (she is a goddess), and Echo is referred to as a goddess (actually a nymph). Also, in another passage, Tutankhamun is misspelt.

As a writer and editor who has worked on some educational titles, this thread is making me come over all funny!

Wordsmith, with amusement or worry?

No, no not amusement - more like stress/twitchiness! Years ago I nearly sent a book to print with the final line on a whole chapter repeated - printed twice at the end of each page - gave me early grey hairs. Luckily I caught it just before it went. What you describe really shouldn't happen at all but least of all when it comes to an English textbook. Bit strange really and definitely not good enough.

This is appalling, but I am not surprised. I work in publishing, too. Books have much lower budgets these days - and the biggest cost-saving seems to be the copy-edit. Some publishers have pretty much dispensed with this stage - or they will pay a derisory sum for what should be several days' work - and some don't even bother to proof-read.

Collins is a reputable company, and it shouldn't be taking a book with this many mistakes to print. Complain to the MD!

That would drive me mad. If the head teacher and governors aren't willing to complain to the publishers is complain to them directly myself. Not acceptable at all.

I'm an English teacher. These books would be going straight back if we'd ordered them for our department! Awful!! I'd expect whoever we bought them from to fund us buying copies of an equivalent title from a different publisher if necessary.

According to this Collins website they can be tweeted @FreedomToTeach. I don't have twitter but I think they'd definitely reply to a tweet.

The class teacher has advised she has submitted a complaint to the publisher, so hopefully we will receive corrected copies in due course.

I'm itching to go to town with a yellow highlighter.

must not get drunk and do corrections

According to the Amazon blurb, 'This book was previously published as Folens English Skills 5', so it's possible that Collins made the mistake of taking over a series from a smaller publisher without checking the editing closely enough. Although having just Googled Folens, I see it is the biggest publisher of primary school materials in Ireland, so no excuse there.

If it were me I wouldn't be asking for corrected copies. Even if Collins jumped on the problem immediately (which seems highly unlikely if the books have been around for eight years), it's likely to take several months to have them proofread, reset, printed (probably in the far east) and shipped back. I'd be asking for my money back, and finding an alternative programme.

I really think they should be given over to a class with a bunch of highlighters and the challenge of finding (and correcting with dictionaries) as many mistakes as they can. Much better than trying to use them in their intended way and teaches them spelling in a relevant context.

I think we have that Folens book at school -will have to have a peek...

I'd be tempted to photocopy them in quadruplicate, mark all the errors in red pen, and send a copy each to the teacher, the Head, the Chair of Governors and the publishers.

Thank you for bringing to our attention the printing errors in Collins English Skills 5. They are due to an error in the reprint process, which resulted in uncorrected proofs being used. We apologise for any inconvenience or confusion this has caused and are currently in the process of pulping all stock and will replace it with a corrected version. We have corrected copies available for customers and will contact the school directly about replacing the incorrect stock.

Emma, thanks so much for posting with an update. Really glad to hear you are all over this.

Happy to offer my services as a parent proof-reader!

That's still an unusual amount of basic spelling mistakes for a text book, though, emma4collins - you don't usually need a proof-reader to pick up that many mistakes. Any writer should know how to spell 'interrupted' and 'burglar'.

I agree, bringbackproofreading - someone who is writing an English Skills text book should have at least a passing knowledge of English!