Why do students often type TWO spaces after a period - POLL added

[beattyfamily]

I'm currently a high school sophomore and we have ALWAYS been taught 2 spaces after a period. Even when we were being taught to write we did two finger spaces to represent the amount of space to use after a period and one for after commas. As a freshman I took a keyboarding class and nothing had changed.

Well, now I don't feel so old if a sophomore in high school is saying there should be two spaces after a period!

You just reminded me. I have a 7 and 10 year old and both of them (my 7 year old is doing it right now) learned the two finger space in between sentences!!

 

[CdnDisneyNut]

two spaces here.

 

[JerseyJanice]

Well, the 2-space rule is winning the poll here by a landslide, but I'd like to point something out in any event.

When you type two spaces after sentences in word processing documents, the automatic spacing turns out better after the proportional font does its magic. IOW, using two spaces tells the WP program to put more space in between the sentences than in between words.

Try it sometime, and you'll see what I mean (i.e., of course, unless you have your WP program set to autocorrect two spaces into one--in which case it's set wrong anyway ).

 

[pinkgalYall]

Usually its because we "think" thats what double spacing is hehe

 

[Mom2Em]

Another two spacer here...

 

[Kahana-ri]

Two spaces for me. I may of passed typing with a D, but I do remember that rule.

 

[minniecarousel]

Two spaces is the old rule. One is acceptable these days.

 

[Mary Anne]

a 1965 typing class student here; two spaces after a period.

 

[Micca]

You may have missed something. Two spaces after a .

 

[NJOYURLIFE]

Learned in HS to put two and have always done so.

 

[All American]

Learned to put two spaces in high school and told to do the same in college.

 

[Nancy]

The correct way to space is one after a comma, two after a period. Newspapers do all kinds of goofy things to make things fit.

If you like to read, you'll have some novels in your house. Open one up and you'll find one space after commas and two spaces after periods.

I love the DIS, but it drives me nuts by deleting spaces after sentences.

This is a test.

This is one space. One
This is two space. Two.

Now we all learned the two space rule for typing but with APA guidelines for writing papers in college it is only one space after a period. it took me along time to get used to it, but now it is second nature.

Edited: The DIS took the extra space away in my line with the TWO spacing. It is there in my typing, but not in the actual posting.

 

[buckylarue]

Another person here who, at my last job, did a lot of proofreading of government documents, grant proposals, etc., and always, ALWAYS removed the double spaces that about half of the other staff had put into the documents when typing them! With proportional fonts, the second space is extraneous and unnessessary. Also, I never had Word set up to auto-correct, because it would change far too many technical word spellings into totally incorrect words, so I never had to deal with Word placing 2 spaces where one belonged. If you do use auto-correct, you can change any of those settings individually, by the way. You could make your sentences put one space after a comma, 2 after a period, 3 after a question mark, 4 after an exclamation point, 5 after an asterisk....

 

[PrincessTiff]

Bbgrizzle- I've always thought she was the tag fairy as well . There is only one right?

 

[catherine]

DH who used to be a technical writer said that the "two spaces" rule was a long-standing typographic convention that grew out of typewriter (mono-spaced) fonts. The reason was to provide a clear visual break between sentences. (The two spaces would be required after any punctuation that ends a sentenc, e.g. a question mark or excalamation mark.) However, modern word processing software -MS Word etc.- uses "proportional spaced" fonts (unless you're using Courier), and knows to insert a slightly larger space after a period.

Some people who learned to type using a typewriter don't realise that the software will put in the extra space, so they probably use two spaces. So unless the people that you are doing these papers with are using a typewriter, they should only be using one space after puncuation!

 

[wideeyes]

What is a period?

 

[catherine]

What is a period?

It's a full stop!

 

[Corwin12]

This is like that Dr. Seuss Story, The Sneeches ... we can be divided into one space period people and two space period people. I am a two space period person and my mom warned me about those one space period people.

 

[MrsPete]

When I was in high school in the early 80s, we were taught to use two spaces after a period -- it's more of a complete break between two sentences. Now a single space has come into vogue.

Other "preferences" have come and gone in the presentation of the English language. One that comes to mind right away is the abbreviations for states:

When I was in high school, it was considered appropriate to type "N.C." Now "NC" has come into acceptance.

 

[sweetinmaine]

I was taught two spaces after a period, one space after a comma.

That's the way I was taught too!