How Proof It works
Each round is a passage with errors planted in it, and you mark as many misspelt words and punctuation errors as you can in the time. There are 5 rounds in 5 minutes. Proof It is the game behind the Verbal Knowledge sub-score, which covers spelling, grammar, finding errors in text and working quickly without slips.
A counter on screen is reported to show how many errors are left in the passage. Errors are reported to include typos, missing words and wrong or missing punctuation. Marking text that has no error counts as an incorrect mark, and three incorrect marks are reported to move you on to the next passage.
It is the only Cognify game that depends on English. Criteria found only minor score differences between people with English as a first or second language.
How to proofread for Proof It
Read to check, not to understand:
- Go word by word. Reading for meaning lets your brain fill in what it expects to see.
- Use the error counter as your stopping rule. When it shows none left, stop looking.
- Check the usual pairs: their, there and they’re; its and it’s; your and you’re; then and than; affect and effect.
- Look at every apostrophe, every comma and the end of every sentence.
- Mark only what you are sure of. Wrong marks are reported to cut a passage short.
Worked example
“Its important that every invoice is checked before it is sent, so please pass them to the acounts team by monday.”
There are three errors. Its needs an apostrophe, because it is short for it is. Acounts should be accounts. Monday needs a capital M. Every other word is right, so you stop at three.
Tips for the real Proof It
- A minute a passage is tight, so make one careful pass rather than two quick ones.
- Practise on text you did not write. Your own mistakes are the hardest to see.
- If English is not your first language, review apostrophes, capital letters and commonly confused words beforehand.
- Use a screen big enough to read comfortably. On a laptop or desktop you need a mouse.
- Take the tutorial to see exactly how a mark is placed before the clock starts.
Practise Proof It on CogniPrep
Our Proof It gives you 8 passages on a 6-minute clock. Each is a couple of lines of workplace text with 2 to 4 planted errors: misspellings, wrong words such as too for to, missing apostrophes and wrong verb forms. Every word is a button you tap to flag, and the number of errors is shown under the passage. Next Passage submits your flags, with no going back. Wrong flags do not end a passage early, but they cost you: the score out of 100 is half errors found, about a third the share of your flags that were right, and the rest speed. Passages come from a fixed pool of 16, so repeat runs will repeat some.