Corrections

How to spell corrections

11 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce corrections

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does corrections mean?

1. nounChanges made to put right errors or mistakes in something such as a text, exam, or calculation.
2. nounThe official system of prisons and supervision used to punish and rehabilitate offenders.

Corrections in a sentence

• The teacher marked the essay in red ink and listed several corrections in the margin.

• She spent twenty years working in corrections before retiring from the prison service.

• Please review my corrections before the report goes to print.

• The budget for corrections rose sharply as the number of inmates grew.

Where does corrections come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin verb corrigere, meaning 'to make straight' or 'to set right', which was built from the prefix com- (here acting as an intensifier) and regere, meaning 'to guide, rule, or keep straight'. From corrigere came the noun correctio, describing the act of straightening something out or putting it right, and that gives us the spelling with the double 'r' followed by 'rect'. English took the word in through Old French in the late 1300s, originally with strong overtones of punishment and discipline, as in correcting a person's behaviour. The same rect root for 'straight' still sits visibly inside relatives such as 'direct', 'rectangle', and 'erect', which is a useful reminder that the middle of the word is 'rect', not 'reck'. Over time the gentler sense of fixing mistakes in writing or calculation became the everyday meaning, while the older disciplinary sense survives in phrases about a system of corrections.

How the word is built

• cor- (com-: together, intensive)
• rect (from regere: to guide straight, rule)
• -ion (noun-forming suffix)
• -s (plural)