Writing Samples to Help You Practice Proofreading

At Knowadays, we love to help you improve your proofreading skills. Practicing on a range of texts is one of the best ways to build your skills and gain proofreading experience. So today, we’re giving you three short passages of text to practice on. They are all written in American English.

Copy and paste each passage into a Microsoft Word document and correct any clear errors you spot. For this exercise, focus on spelling, grammar, punctuation, and usage rather than stylistic preferences or phrasing. Afterward, you can compare the changes you made with our suggestions further down the page.

Proofreading Tips and Tricks to Improve Accuracy

Before you dive into the proofreading exercises below, here are six techniques that professional proofreaders rely on to work more accurately:

1. Change the medium. Print a digital document, or read it in a different font or colour. Changing how the text looks can help you notice errors that have started to blend into the page.
2. Read backward for spelling. Start with the final sentence and work backward through the document, one sentence at a time. This reduces the distraction of meaning and context, making it easier to spot errors your brain might otherwise autocorrect.
3. Work in dedicated passes. Rather than trying to catch everything at once, focus each pass on a single category. For instance, start with spelling, then check punctuation, grammar, and formatting.
4. Leave a gap before proofreading. Letting time pass between writing and proofreading allows your familiarity with the text to fade, making errors easier to spot.
5. Read it aloud, slowly. Vocalizing every word can stop you from skimming and help you notice missing words and awkward phrasing that are easier to overlook when reading silently.
6. Work to a checklist. A written proofreading checklist helps you work systematically and reduces the chance of overlooking an entire category of error.

We’ve built a library of ready-to-use proofreading checklists tailored to different types of writing, including fiction manuscripts, nonfiction texts, formal and informal business copy, and academic writing. There’s also a blank template if you’d rather build your own from scratch. We’ve recommended the most relevant checklist under each sample below.

Sample 1: Excerpt from a Blog Post

A blog post’s informal, conversational tone can mask genuine grammatical errors, and a proofreader might unintentionally overlook them as an intentional style choice. Deliberate sentence fragments can add to the difficulty because they may be hard to distinguish from incomplete sentences that need correcting. This means you need to consider the author’s likely intent rather than flagging every fragment automatically.

Run through the basics first: spelling, grammar, and punctuation. Then make a few checks specific to blog posts:

• Heading capitalization – make sure headings follow one consistent style throughout (e.g., either Title Case or sentence case, not a mix).
• Hyperlinks – click through to check that links go where they’re supposed to and aren’t broken.
• Voice and tone – check that these stay consistent throughout, without unexplained shifts between casual and formal.
• Sentence fragments – these can be a deliberate style choice, so check that they read as intentional rather than accidental before flagging them.
• Passive vs. active voice – blog writing often reads more naturally in the active voice, so consider whether any passive constructions make the writing unnecessarily indirect.

These are all useful checks for blog posts generally. In the short passage below, focus particularly on any clear errors you can spot.

Proofread the excerpt below, then compare your version with our suggested edit further down the page. If you want a ready-made list, our Informal Business Proofreading Checklist covers this kind of marketing copy too.

Dream interpretation is a skill that any one can acquire. It is the art of divining knowledge that is buried in our sub-conscious. It can help us know our selves and solves problems. What more could you ask in a facility that’s freely to your disposal whenever you fell asleep. All you really need is a pen and a paper. Get as relaxed as you can before bed (some book recommend meditation, breathing exercises, or yoga), and then repeat to your self, “I will remember my dreams, and after each dream I will wake up and write them down.” Then, when you wake up, immediately write down your dream. When you come to interpret the dream, look at the events, objects, peoples, colors, and etc., and ask yourself what they do mean to you. This is your own sub-conscious, so your personal interpretation is vial. Once you have done this, you can consult a book or online database of dreams symbols.

Sample 2: Excerpt from a Short Story

Dialogue has its own punctuation rules that are easy to get wrong, and narrative tense or point of view can drift without the writer noticing, especially over a longer piece. Homophones and missing apostrophes can also hide in plain sight because the intended meaning is often still obvious.

The same basics apply here, along with a few checks specific to fiction:

• Dialogue punctuation – check that punctuation in and around dialogue is appropriate for the sentence and positioned correctly relative to the quotation marks.
• Narrative tense and point of view – check that the story stays consistently in one tense and viewpoint throughout.
• Homophones and easily missed typos – these are easy to read past when you’re following the story rather than focusing on the mechanics.
• Possessive apostrophes – check that possessives take an apostrophe where one is needed.
• Comma splices – watch for two complete sentences joined by only a comma.

These are all useful checks for fiction generally. In the short passage below, focus particularly on any clear errors you can spot.

Proofread the excerpt below, then compare your version with our suggested edit further down the page. Our Fiction Manuscript Proofreading Checklist is designed for exactly this kind of writing.

Sarah stepped out onto the porch, her breath fogging in the cold air. The house behind her was still, to quiet for a Tuesday night. She use to love this time of evening, when the street lamps flickered on one by one and the neighbors dog barked at nothing in particular.

“Are you coming inside.” her mother called, “its getting late.”

Sarah didn’t answer right away, she was thinking about the letter shed found in the attic that morning, the one with her fathers handwriting on it, and wondering weather she should of told anyone about it yet. Tomorrow, she decides, she would finally ask him the truth.

Sample 3: Excerpt from an Essay

Because essay sentences tend to be longer and more complex, small slips can be easy to miss on a first read, even though they may make an argument harder to follow.

Start with spelling, grammar, and punctuation, then check for issues specific to academic writing:

• Clarity – look out for unclear pronouns such as this or it. If it isn’t obvious what they refer to, the sentence may need rephrasing.
• Sentence structure – watch for comma splices (two complete sentences joined by just a comma) and run-on sentences.
• Small words – check that articles (“a,” “an,” and “the”) haven’t been dropped and that hyphens are used consistently.
• Tone – academic writing should generally remain formal and objective, so flag contractions or casual phrasing that don’t fit the register.
• Verb agreement and parallelism – check that subjects and verbs agree and that items in lists or comparisons follow a consistent grammatical structure.

These are all useful checks for academic writing generally. In the short passage below, focus particularly on any clear errors you can spot.

Proofread the excerpt below, then compare your version with our suggested edit further down the page. Our Academic Proofreading Checklist is designed for student essays, but it works just as well for other academic documents such as theses and research papers.

In the minds of many scholars and parents, the picture-book has long been soley for children It is well-known that children find images more immediately and naturally accessible than text. As is so often the case, though, it benefits the scholar (and, indeed, the parent) to have a healthy suspicion of so-called well-known facts. The statement has an element of truth inasmuch as picture of a tree should in some respects resemble a tree, where as the word “tree” is a purely arbitrary symbol; however, this should not lead us to assume a natural association between the iconic representation and the tree it self. The addressee - the child – must have some concept of the appearance of a tree. He must also understand, to some degree, how pictures work: that he is looking, not at lines and blocks of color, nor at a piece of paper, but at image intended to represent something seperate from the page. There are, therefore, less differences between words and images than one might except.

Edit 1: Excerpt from a Blog Post

Here’s our suggested edit for the blog post excerpt, with each change tracked:

Dream interpretation is a skill that any oneanyone can acquire. It is the art of divining knowledge that is buried in our sub-conscioussubconscious. It can help us know our selvesourselves and solvessolve problems. What more could you ask infrom a facility that’s freely toat your disposal whenever you fellfall asleep.? All you really need is a pen and a paper. Get as relaxed as you can before bed (some bookbooks recommend meditation, breathing exercises, or yoga), and then repeat to your selfyourself, “I will remember my dreams, and after each dream, I will wake up and write them down.” Then, when you wake up, immediately write down your dream. When you come to interpret the dream, look at the events, objects, peoplespeople, colors, and etc., and ask yourself what they do mean to you. This is your own sub-conscioussubconscious, so your personal interpretation is vialvital. Once you have done this, you can consult a book or an online database of dreamsdream symbols.

Here’s how the corrections above break down:

• Words incorrectly split in two: any one → anyone; your self → yourself.
• Subject–verb agreement: our selves and solves → ourselves and solve; some book recommend → some books recommend.
• Incorrect prepositions: in a facility → from a facility; to your disposal → at your disposal.
• Missing or unnecessary articles: a pen and a paper → a pen and paper; a book or online database → a book or an online database.
• Unnecessary words: colors, and etc. → colors, etc. because etc. already means “and other things”; what they do mean → what they mean.
• Incorrect word choice: peoples → people. Peoples is normally used to refer to distinct ethnic or national groups rather than as the everyday plural of person.
• Spelling errors: sub-conscious → subconscious; vial → vital.
• Incorrect punctuation: the period after asleep becomes a question mark because the sentence is a direct question.

These are the kinds of small errors that can be easy to overlook when proofreading, particularly when the intended meaning is still clear

Edit 2: Excerpt from a Short Story

Here’s how we’d edit the short story excerpt:

Sarah stepped out onto the porch, her breath fogging in the cold air. The house behind her was still, totoo quiet for a Tuesday night. She useused to love this time of evening, when the street lamps flickered on one by one and the neighbor’s dog barked at nothing in particular.

“Are you coming inside.?” her mother called,. “itsIt’s getting late.”

Sarah didn’t answer right away,. Sshe was thinking about the letter shedshe’d found in the attic that morning, the one with her father’s handwriting on it, and wondering weatherwhether she should ofshould have told anyone about it yet. Tomorrow, she decidesdecided, she would finally ask him the truth.

This passage contains several common fiction proofreading errors:

• Homophones: to → too; weather → whether.
• Missing apostrophes: neighbors → neighbor’s; its → it’s; shed → she’d; fathers → father’s.
• Incorrect forms and expressions: use to → used to; should of → should have.
• A comma splice: Sarah didn’t answer right away, she was thinking… contains two complete sentences joined only by a comma. These should be separated into two sentences.
• Incorrect dialogue punctuation: Are you coming inside. needs a question mark because it is a direct question, and because It’s getting late is a new sentence, the speech tag ends with a period and It’s takes a capital.
• Inconsistent verb tense: decides changes to decided to keep the narration consistently in the past tense.

None of these errors changes the story itself, but together they can distract the reader and interrupt the flow of the writing.

Edit 3: Excerpt from an Essay

Finally, here’s our suggested edit for the essay excerpt:

In the minds of many scholars and parents, the picture-bookpicture book has long been soleysolely for children. It is well-knownwell known that children find images more immediately and naturally accessible than text. As is often the case, though, it benefits the scholar (and, indeed, the parent) to have a healthy suspicion of so-called well-known facts. The statement has an element of truth inasmuch as the picture of a tree should in some respects resemble a tree, where aswhereas the word “tree” is a purely arbitrary symbol; however, this should not lead us to assume a natural association between the iconic representation and the tree it selfitself. The addressee -– the child – must have some concept of the appearance of a tree. They must also understand, to some degree, how pictures work: that they are looking not at lines and blocks of color, nor at a piece of paper, but at an image intended to represent something seperateseparate from the page. There are, therefore, lessfewer differences between words and images than one might exceptexpect.

Here’s what we corrected and why:

• Compound word hyphenation: picture-book becomes picture book because it is functioning as a noun. Well-known keeps its hyphen before the noun it modifies, as in well-known facts, but becomes well known when it follows the noun.
• A missing period: a period is needed after children to separate two complete sentences.
• Incorrect word choice (fewer vs. less): less is sometimes accepted with countable nouns in established expressions, but fewer is the standard choice here.
• Spelling errors: soley → solely; seperate → separate; except → expect.
• Words incorrectly split: where as → whereas; it self → itself.
• Missing articles: inasmuch as picture → inasmuch as the picture; at image → at an image.
• Incorrect punctuation: the hyphen used parenthetically around the child is replaced with an en dash.

None of these errors changes the essay’s argument, but small slips such as these can distract the reader and make the writing appear less careful.

Becoming A Proofreader

How did you do? Did your edits match the ones we’ve provided above? In some cases, there may be more than one way to correct an issue. As long as you identified the problems and made appropriate changes, you’ve done the job required.

If you’d like more opportunities to practice, our Becoming A Proofreader course takes you through the tools and techniques professional proofreaders use. Across 13 modules and dozens of practical exercises, you’ll learn how to spot and correct errors, work with different types of writing, follow style guidelines, and use essential proofreading tools. You can also try the course for free before you enroll.

If your goal is to build a broader editorial skill set, you can take Becoming A Proofreader alongside Becoming An Editor with our Proofreader & Editor Course Bundle. The bundle combines both courses and covers the skills needed to offer proofreading and editing services.

Complete both courses with a score of 80% or above in each final assignment, and you’ll be eligible for our work guarantee with Proofed. This gives qualifying graduates the opportunity to put their new proofreading and editing skills into practice on real client documents.

Related posts:

What Is the Difference Between an Acronym and an Initialism? Proofreading Tips: When Should You Write Out Numbers in Full? A Proofreader’s Guide to Exclamation Point Use Proofreading and Editing Journalism