In its fourth year, National Punctuation Day may be an obscure holiday for some. But for the English teachers at Holmes High School, it was a day of celebration.
Period.
Exclamation Point!
On Monday, each of the 17 English teachers at Holmes wore a white t-shirt emblazoned with their favorite punctuation mark. Each teacher also presented special punctuation lessons to their classes in recognition of this relatively obscure holiday. Then, at the end of the day, each "acted out" his or her punctuation mark on the steps of the D academic building.
All of the punctuation hoopla was worth it, according to department coordinator Mina Stecklein, a 31-year teaching veteran, who wore a t-shirt emblazed with a black exclamation point.
"Young people today do much of their communication with emails and text messages," Stecklein said. "Because of this, especially with text messaging, students have become experts at using abbreviations and, unfortunately, proper punctuation is slowly going by the wayside."
It's not only the students who need to have a refresher course in punctuation. It's professionals in the business world and everyday Americans as well.
National Punctuation Day, started four years ago by journalist Jeff Rubin in Pinole, Calif., was created to remind Americans that a "semicolon is not a surgical procedure," according to the
National Punctuation Day website.
But, according to the website, what started as a clever idea to remind corporations and professional people of the importance of proper punctuation has turned into an everyday mission to help school children learn the punctuation skills they need to be successful in life.
"One of our team members, Katie Hodgdon, came to me with the idea of celebrating National Punctuation Day here at Holmes and our English team was all for it," Stecklein explained.
"Our teachers really had fun with it and the students were asking about the different punctuation symbols and talking about what teacher was wearing which mark, so I really believe the day was a success. And I say that with an exclamation point!"
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