Month: February 2014

• Users will see three choices on their screen(s).
• Clients must update their account(s) before the end of the month.
• Patients may leave their bed(s) during visiting hours.
• Employees must wash their hand(s) before leaving.

Do we talk about the end users, or clients, or patients, or employees in the singular or in the plural? And then when those individuals have screens, or devices, or symptoms, or workspaces, are those singular or plural as well?

We have already mostly solved this problem when directly referring to those we are training. We just call them "you," and think of them as receiving the training one-on-one, so that we say "click your mouse" and "save your file," using the singular without a second thought.

But when we are training our learners to deal with other people–software users, clients, patients, employees–how do we talk about them?

The good news is that the rules of grammar are relaxed here, and we can use singular or plural as it makes sense.

We are probably going to talk about those third parties in the plural–users, clients, etc.-so as to avoid the "his or her" problem. We want to avoid this:

The client must update his or her account by the end of the month. His or her name and address must match his or her ID card.

So we use the plural: Clients must update their account(s)…

This is where the grammar loophole comes in. You are allowed (see, Grammar is not so draconian, after all) to use the singular if each client has only one account. Or, if one client might have several accounts, then you can go ahead and use the plural.

Let's look at the other examples.

Users will see three choices on their screen.

Since each computer user will be seeing the choices on one screen (even if they have dual monitors, typically they will be looking at one at a time) you can go with screen.

Patients may leave their bed during visiting hours.

Each definitely has only one bed. Singular sounds better.

Employees must wash their hands before leaving.

Each most likely has two hands, so plural makes sense.

The students all raised their hand.

In a classroom (unlike, say, on the dance floor), each most likely raised just one of their hands.

What makes this a true grammar loophole is that you can still use the plural if it sounds right, even if each person has only one of the items in question. Give it a try in the challenge, and we will see what the consensus is.

Plural or Singular Challenge

1. The audience waved their hand/s in the air.
2. The kids stood on their chair/s.
3. The diners raised their glass/es.
4. Despite the economic setback, the renters all paid their rent/s.
5. The kids all looked at their iPad/s.
6. The learners clicked their right mouse button/s.
7. The employees entered their client/'s or s' name/s into the database.

The flowerbed should be 12 feet wide and 5 ft deep. To determine how much sunlight the area receives, start at 5:30 AM and observe the area at 1-hour intervals until 8:00 p.m. I prefer to use the guidelines published by Ms Good Gardener in her blog, but you may want to consult others if your garden is outside of the US. Also be aware that some plants are sensitive to U.v. radiation. You can find additional information on the amount of sunlight your lawn receives by typing your Z.I.P. code into a search tool. If your garden is big enough, you may need an ATV to get from one side to the other with all your tools. FYI, yours truly once had an RV and an S.U.V., but now drives a Prius.

Making abbreviations consistent is one of the most difficult areas of editing. Here are some tips on things that slipped through in the revisions by various respondents:

The acronym for Zoning Improvement Plan, according to bothThe Gregg Reference Manual and the Associated Press stylebook, should always be written this way: ZIP code.

The social title Ms. should have a period in American English, to match Mr., even though it is technically not an actual abbreviation.

If you are abbreviating the measurements, such as ft for feet, you should abbreviate hours (h), minutes (min), and seconds (s) also. And notice that you don't add an s to the plurals of units of measure or time or their abbreviations.

In the phrase "outside of the US," almost every style guide agrees, US should be spelled out as United States. The short form US should be used only as an adjective in front of another word, as in US Navy, and not as a noun on its own.

No respondent escaped unscathed the wrath of my eagle editorial eyes, but Sonia Verma comes the closest, having missed only the "US as a noun" thing. Here is her paragraph:

The flowerbed should be 12 ft. wide and 5 ft. deep. To determine how much sunlight the area receives, start at 5:30 AM and observe the area at hourly intervals until 8:00 PM. I prefer to use the guidelines published by Ms. Good Gardener in her blog, but you may want to consult others if your garden is outside of the US [s/b United States]. Also, be aware that some plants are sensitive to UV radiation. You can find additional information on the amount of sunlight your lawn receives by typing your ZIP code into a search tool. If your garden is big enough, you may need an ATV to get from one side to the other with all your tools. FYI, yours truly once had an RV and an SUV, but now drives a Prius.