Gerald Grow's Newsroom 101.com

Exercises in Grammar, Usage and Associated Press Style

Newsroom 101 offers more than 2,000 free, self-instructional exercises for journalists, writers, editors, students and others who want to review (or learn) journalistic language, as governed by the Associated Press Stylebook. Visitors to this site have completed more than 2 million exercises. If you find this site helpful, send a small donation (see below) or at least pay us with Short Instructions Make sure your browser is set to allow pop-ups from newsroom101.com. This tutorial on pop-up blockers may help. Sign in when asked. Stay with each question until you click the correct answer. When there is explanatory feedback, read it. At the end of each set of exercises, you should receive a Thanks page with your score. If you are using Internet Explorer 7 and having trouble seeing the questions in the quizzes, read this. Once you get Explorer set up properly, the exercises on this site work well. Firefox works well when set to accept pop-ups from newsroom101.com. Newsroom Exercises (about 770 items) The original Newsroom exercises were developed by Ron Hartung from the kinds of errors made by journalists and interns working at a daily newspaper. They reflect his "Grammar Man" persona and charming, humorous style. Set 1 Newsroom 1 - 10 Set 2 Newsroom 11 - 20 Set 3 Newsroom 21 - 30 Set 4 Newsroom 31 - 40 Set 5 Newsroom 41 - 50 Set 6 Newsroom 51 - 60 Set 7 Newsroom 61 - 70 Set 8 Newsroom 71 - Newsroom-All Random selection from all exercises The Newsroom 101 Review Exercises All of them The Editor's Eye Train yourself to spot errors and fix them. Experimental Exercises If these work on your browser, they should be interesting.     FAQ Recent corrections Some recent updates to the AP Stylebook. AP Stylebook exercises chapter by chapter (about 450 items) Grammar exercises (about 650 items) Parts of speech Phrases and Clauses Nouns Pronouns Verbs Subject-verb Agreement Adjectives Essential and Nonessential Misplaced Modifiers Dow Jones Grammar Tests The grammar portion of the DJNF internship tests since 1998, with explanatory feedback on most questions. Punctuation The Comma -- An Introduction with Exercises Commas between Elements in a Series Commas after Introductory Clauses and Phrases Commas before Conjunctions Abusing Commas Commas between Equal Adjectives Commas with Quotes Commas in other situations The Comma -- general practice (16 items) Punctuation in general (20 items) Hyphens (64 items) Word Usage Confusable Words Around 200 frequently confused words, arranged in groups by alphabetical order. Word Usage (fewer/less, homed/honed, pored/poured, etc.) Around 200 words that are frequently used incorrectly, presented randomly. Choose the Right Expression (49 items). Exercises in common expressions and cliches. Who and Whom Around 50 questions on who and whom. You can choose all the questions, or a random selection of 10 questions. Learning Lay and Lie. When you are serious about mastering lay and lie, here's where you can do it. Five explanatory sections, plus nearly 300 practice items targeted to each step of the explanation. Dropped Word Endings (44 items -- use(d) to, suppose(d) to, etc. Nearly all these examples come from student work.) Here is an experimental form of this same exercise. Get Rid of Get. Rewrite the examples to replace forms of "get" with words that express the precise meaning. Spelling exercises (about 300 words) Spelling additional practice -- spot the misspelled word Additional Resources Online Exercises from ACES, the American Copy Editor Society. Tips on writing, editing, AP style, etc., from ACES. "When Journalism Students Don't Know Grammar," by Gerald Grow, article in Insights, the journal of the Association of Schools of Journalism and Mass Communication, Spring 2006. A Grammarian's Idea of Fun A few cartoons The World's Easiest Quiz Some Grammar Demons in "Single Choice Quiz" format. (You'll get them all correct!) Single-Choice Quiz No. 1 Single-Choice Quiz No. 2 If Bureaucrats Wrote Ads--a humorous look at wordiness and inflated language. How to Write Badly -- So you'll know how to write badly well. Redundicide Spray -- A humorous visual aid for teachers, editors and writers on reducing redundancy. Self-Direction Spray -- A humorous visual aid for teaching self-direction. For Teachers: Recommendations on how to use this site with your students.

Introduction These free, self-instructional exercises are based on issues of grammar, usage and AP style that arose at a daily newspaper and in a course in journalism. They are offered here for journalists, professional writers, college students, high-school students and others who are learning or reviewing journalistic language. Teachers are invited to assign students to practice these exercises, but there is no provision for a teacher to track student performance. Please note: Many of the exercises apply to English in general, but some of them apply only to journalistic language as governed by The Associated Press Stylebook and may differ from standard English usage. When an explanation refers to "the official dictionary," that is Webster's New World College Dictionary, the AP's first reference for anything not covered in the Stylebook itself. AP style changes from time to time. If you are already familiar with AP style, here are Some Recent Updates to the AP Stylebook that you may want to review. There is some repetition in the topics covered. This is partly due to the way these exercises were developed, in pieces, over several years, in response to the writing problems of journalism students, interns and journalists. It is also due in part to the fact that certain grammatical issues keep recurring, and we want to make sure they are well covered. A Few Things You Need to Know (1) Pop-ups. For the exercises to work, you must set your browser to allow pop-ups from the newsroom101.com site. This should be simple. See your browser's help file for instructions. If you are using Google Toolbar, you may need to click on the Toolbar's pop-up icon for instructions. (2) Correct Answers. To see the feedback and to receive your correct score, be sure to click the correct answer to each question, even if you have to try more than once. When an exercise contains useful feedback, it is usually delivered when you click the correct answer. (3) The Grammar Habit. Grammar, usage and AP style are not so much knowledge as they are skills. They are habits. You need to be able to use them confidently, correctly, without thinking -- the way you know how to walk or tie your shoes. The only way you can gain this level of skill is through practice. Practice! Practice! Practice! These exercises are designed to provide you with practice. Of course you will continue to look things up. Of course you will continue to pause and think about things like "lay" and "lie." But make your goal, as much as you can, to make grammar, usage, and AP style automatic. Make them a habit. A good habit. News: Two-thirds of SAT Writing Score based on Multiple-Choice According to a New York Times article by Tamar Lewin on Sept. 3, 2006, two-thirds of the writing score on the SAT comes from multiple-choice questions on grammar and usage.   Instructions Each practice exercise below consists of about 10 multiple-choice questions. Many give feedback that helps explain the correct answer. Take these quiz-like exercises to practice the materials, then review groups of these exercises by taking the Review Exercises linked below. How to practice: Practice each set until you can earn at least a 90% on it every time. Use the review quizzes every five sets to test your learning. Set out to notice, learn and remember each point of grammar or style. Don't perform these exercises on automatic, in a perfunctory manner or while you are surrounded by distractions. Focus. Imagine you are learning to juggle with knives. Grammar is sharp and slightly dangerous; it can hurt you if you don't handle it right. Recommended browser: Firefox was used in the development and testing of this site. Firefox can be downloaded free from Mozilla.org. Set browser preferences to allow pop-ups from Newsroom101.Com. See the Help file in your browser for instructions. Short Instructions At the start of each exercise, enter your e-mail address to identify you as the user. Every five quizzes, take the corresponding Review Quiz. If this site helps you, send a small contribution (see the bottom of the page) Enjoy! Longer Instructions Help page About this site

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Revision of 07/03/2010

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Courses at Newsroom101.com

A related service, Courses at Newsroom101.com, provides a streamlined and updated version of this material designed for use in courses and industry training.

Minimum criteria and branching. Delivered on the Moodle platform, the paid version of Newsroom101.com makes use of branching to require students to attain a certain score on each exercise before being allowed to continue.

Students must then attain a minimum score on periodic reviews of the material in order to receive a grade for each unit.

Grades and activity reports. The Moodle course provides students and teachers with grades and activity reports. It can be accessed online through our server, using any platform.

For information. Teachers and trainers can obtain further information on Courses at Newsroom101.com by using this link.

Newsroom 101.com usage. In the period between Oct. 9, 2006 (when the count started), and July 3, 2010, Newsroom101.com served up more than 3,757,220 exercises on grammar, usage, spelling and journalistic style, by actual record of completed quizzes. 

This is equivalent to the number of exercises that would be completed in more than 187 semester-long grammar classes of 15 students each.

The site operated for two years before the count started.