In our last blog we talked about some of the most common yearbook errors:
Principal / Principle
It / It’s / Its
They’re / There / Their
So now you’ve gone through the process of checking these concerns, have made your corrections, and now feel like you’ve created a grammatically correct book – your 6th grade English teacher would be proud of you!
Yearbooks, however, have unique concerns that go beyond well-constructed sentences. Nothing, absolutely nothing, will upset a child, or worse a parent, if the child’s name is mis-spelled. It’s frustrating for them, and embarrassing for you. You’ve just printed hundreds of yearbooks with this same mistake. How could you have avoided it?
We always recommend a review of the student pages. If your pages are sorted by teacher, this is easy: ask the teacher to check his or her own class page. To do so, create a pdf of the page. Then print that page and give it to the teacher for review and their signature of approval. Or, email the pdf and ask the teacher to reply with their approval.
If they have noted any changes (names mis-spelled or students in the wrong class) then go back into the Portraits Folder and search for that child’s name. Click on that portrait and the Portrait Information window opens in the lower left corner of your Pictavo screen. You can then edit the information for that student.
There is no way you will know if the thousands of names in the book are spelled correctly – but the teacher should know all of the names and faces of their students.
If you have sorted your students by grade, be sure that you have sat down with someone to review the school roster to the names. If you’re not getting much help at the school identifying the students as the Principal for help.
Ashley, Ashleigh, Steven and Stephen, and their parents, will thank you for your efforts!