Proofreading is an important writing strategy that students need to develop to become better writers.  The ability to get your thoughts across on a page is a skill that every young person needs to hone.   Writing is a life skill and so therefore proofreading is essential.  In this day and age, technology is playing a greater part in the writing process and fortunately we have the use of spellcheckers in our word processing programs.  Unfortunately, these spellchecker programs do not always catch our mistakes and so this following strategy will help you to proofread your work before you send it to the recipient.  The first strategy that I am going to discuss is the use of the mnemonic called COPS which stands for: Capitalization, Organization, Punctuation and Spelling. Once a student has finished their piece of writing they can be instructed to check their writing by looking at those four areas.  They can even be told that if they fail to check their writing for these four areas then they may get a visit from the Writing Police.  The illustration below can be used as a reminder for each student to proofread their writing.