Can you please R E A D the instructions?!
I was quite saddened this morning when I saw that Heidi had to close her thread called “Let's create a story using "if-sentences," Spanish only” because many people simply ignored the posted directions!
This is not the first time I have seen a group of our beloved members disregard her instructions, for example, this happens often on the Saturday Night Skype Chats. Specifically, we get members who say “How do I play this game?” when the instructions in Heidi’s thread are perfectly clear on how the game works. At times it’s required to read certain flashcards, and thereafter, we have even had people who arrive at the chat and say “What flashcards?” Sometimes I ask myself "Aren't these adults we are dealing with?"
I’m certain that most people realize that this is simply a matter of common courtesy.
We all know that Heidi, Jen, Jason, Cogumela, Vaanz, Marshall, etc., dedicate their personal time to creating games and other exercises to help our Spanish and English. They make Spanishdict the great place that it is. Included in their threads are the instructions that are required in order to keep the game threads moving smoothly or the grammar practice threads capable of being corrected properly.
So my bottom line is this: If a person doesn’t want to read the directions in a thread, he/she is certainly not obligated to play the game, do the translation, or participate in any way.
Note: For those who really do read directions, please feel free to disregard this post. 
19 Answers
Here is a special gift for all the teachers out there. I wrote it this morning from a test I took early in my internship in medical technology. Feel free to copy as needed.
This test will assess your ability to read and follow directions. Please read the directions carefully and respond accordingly. Read and follow the instructions and read everything before you do anything.
The exam should take about 5 minutes.
- write your name here _______________________
- write your address _________________________
- write your City here ________________________
- cluck like a chicken
- stand up and say “I must be very smart because I have gotten this far”
- turn around to the person behind you and say “I’m really cool”.
- ignore the first 6 instructions and quietly sit until the instructors picks up the papers
I have been sitting here for awhile wondering if I should press enter or not on this post. If I upset anyone, it is certainly not my intention. Actually, it is quite the opposite.
I only invest my time and energy on topics that are near and dear to me. The people of this forum fall into that category. That includes all of our great administrators and moderators who sacrifice their time and efforts for our benefit. This includes the precious newbies that are coming along and learning the ropes of this forum. Lastly, that group includes my faithful forum friends who are here as I am, to learn a new language, to contribute to the best of our abilities, to encourage, laugh, learn and grow together.
Pertaining to the thread that was opened and closed because members were not following instructions: I do understand completely how frustrating it can be to carefully craft a thread with instructions, only to have those instructions not followed. It has happened on several threads/games I have opened. In addition, I have also been the offender.
Although I'm sure I have blundered more times in answering threads than I can count right now, two stand out in my mind. The first transgression (which was completely unintentional on my part) was a thread that I felt bad about never participating in, so I decided to add something one day. Apparently, the mistake I made had been done before and had been addressed, but I wasn't aware of this. My answer was followed by a rant and major announcement to everyone in the forum about how rude I was for not following the directions, etc. etc.....I have to say, although this occurred a long time ago, it still stings. I had been a faithful member of this forum to that point and I thought the person whom I offended (not the thread creator) could have handled the matter in a kinder way. The second transgression was this past week in one of Fidalgo's great threads. That day my mind was in a million places due to some sad things that have been going on. Anyway, attempting to distract myself with the fun of this forum, I somehow made a huge, but unintentional mistake in following the simple instructions. Only this time Lazarus, sent me a very brief, kind PM showing me the error of my ways with a full explanation. He didn't berate me in front of the entire forum and make me feel like an idiot.
I know I am being a bit too wordy, but I want everyone to be absolutely assured that I am not trying to condemn anyone. I am only trying to caution us about using generalities such as calling people impolite, lacking courtesy, implying they are not behaving as adults, etc. It saddened me so much when I saw who some of the offenders and/or people who apologized for being offenders were. They are all deeply devoted and committed members of this forum (at least to my knowledge) who would never in a million years dream of treating the administrators, thread creators, Skype organizers or anyone with anything but the deepest level of respect and care. Now do we sometimes do things carelessly, make mistakes or need to be sent to the dunce corner?....Absolutely!!! But I think I can speak for myself and those who apologized for not following the instructions, we have never meant to be impolite or show anything but our deepest appreciation and gratitude for the sacrifices made by the few who create great threads and for those who moderate and correct.
Sometimes, for whatever reason, we all do stupid things. I'll be the first to say that I make mistakes like this all of the time. Some days we are filled with more cares or worries than usual. Some days we might just be tired, distracted....who knows. I just think it is always best (no matter how appropriately frustrated one is) to handle these things either privately or a bit more delicately. If we are all told we need to go to our famous Dunce Corner, I'm sure most of us will get a big laugh over it. But looking back to that day when I was called "rude", "impolite", "thoughtless" and a few other painful adjectives, nothing good was accomplished. Despite what people say, words have power to hurt and to hurt deeply. Words also have power to help and to heal.
I care about everyone here and I am not trying to single anyone out. None of us is perfect, especially me. I have thought and prayed about whether to open up this can of worms. Just know that it is being posted in love equally for everyone. We have discussed at length the need to show kindness to newbies. This is just a continuation of that conversation in an attempt to make us all consider how we are treating some of our faithful, longstanding, awesome members.
So aside from following instructions, here is how I handle those situations where I can't answer fast enough to keep the flow. Open the post in two windows. Do whatever it is you planned to do whether it is writing, posting photos or whatever in one window. Refresh the other and be certain it hasn't been answered yet, if not, click A N S W E R on your workbox. It's not an absolute guarantee that you will make it before someone else but it increases your chances considerably.
I want to say something here. Yes, it's part of life that many people don't read instructions.
It's also a fact that a lot of us read them, but at the same time are mixed up in our own understanding of how the world works, so we skim over the parts that we think we understand (dogwood's example is a great one, and I totally skipped the part about reading it all before answering).
Then again, how do we deal with it all? This is where I want to suggest that you're not being totally constructive. Feel free to read that again, and get over it before you read further. That was an instruction, not a suggestion, so obviously you know what to do.
People will always have different ways of understanding what they read, some skip a bit, others believe that they know it all already, and skip more (too much, of course).
The problem, though, is when you tell people off en masse. This puts people off, and especially those who want to learn and are eager to participate, but need to feel that they're in a safe environment. That is A LOT of people. I'd count myself among them, but I've developed a thick skin over the years. I still understand how anyone new feels, though.
The main point, though, is looking to ourselves. How can we communicate better? If there are too many people missing the rules, how do we improve them? Maybe put in a password that only people who have internalized the rules will be able to make out (this is a random thought).
People who don't read the rules won't improve by receiving a telling-off, so what do you do to improve your communication? It will, however, turn a lot of people off from trying and participating, and this is not the result you want. So, as a grown-up, what do you do?
Jason said:
I'm not perfect nor will ever be perfect
Thanks, Jason.
Clearly nobody is perfect, and my statements are in no way asking us to be. My point is to have enough courtesy to read the directions and then do your best.
I refuse to disregard this post on the grounds that I want to thank you for posting it. I'm not perfect nor will ever be perfect but I agree with your assessment of the situation whole-heartedly. Thank you for taking the time to bring it to my and others attention, AGAIN!! 
You are certainly a very dedicated person on the site and I appreciate your efforts here. Have a great day!! (my students are taking the MCAS test right now, so I had some time to type).
a matter of common courtesy.
I find this really hard to understand, ladies and gentlemen.
Why we should have to deal with these issues in public is quite beyond me.
We had to call the attention to those who used a translator on the Word of the day etc even though it should have been clear from the start that is was "common courtesy" not to expect Cogumela or me to correct a machine translation.
We had to put up rules and guidelines for those threads even though I personally think it should have been understood right from the start what one can or cannot do, we are all adults here.
I also thought it was common courtesy to come to the chat, where we, that is the mods and some native speakers, cogumela is always there (!!) , spend our free time with learners trying to help. I cannot count the times people have come to the chat and said: What game? What tense? what flashcards? Where are all these instructions or guidelines you are talking about?
I have lately posted several threads. There has not been ONE where the instructions were followed as indicated by everybody, there is always somebody who thinks he needn't be polite enough to read the instructions.
Last night was bad, you can see on the thread that I posted like a dozen times, please read the thread, except for some members all others simply had not read the thread at all or insufficiently.
Why people are so incredibly impolite is beyond me. They take the fun out of everybody to participate. I got several messages saying, hey, I loved this thread, why did you close it?!!
I don't want this to be about me, this happens on the chats, on threads , everywhere really.
Why do people think they have all the rights in the world and no obligation at all?
At least Common Courtesy should be expected!
Here I go into the bubbling cauldron.
"Read the thread" is no different than reading the instructions for anything new that we may endeavor to do. If you don't understand it the first time,read it again, and maybe yet again. And if we still don't understand, post your question in the thread. For goodness sake don't ever be embarrassed to ask, just think for a moment on the vast resources of this community.
Each and every one of us here have something to learn, and something to teach. You, that are fluent are the teachers that answer the questions in the forum. and in many cases develop a lively debate and some good fun. and a positive learning environment. Arrogance and heavy handedness are out of place in a learning environment, keep it to yourself, it has no place here.
Who here has not been scolded in your life? did you go cry in a corner,or did you get up and get over it?
The administration here works for free for our benefit, if they get irritated with us over these very basic issues,we know who we are that deserve the scolding, the rest of us let it roll of our back.I want to add that honest mistakes are just that,and a correction is the right response. Seems to me that it is MY responsibility to comply with the request if I desire to participate. and if I am unsure then it is MY responsibility to ask until I am sure. I sincerely doubt I will be scolded for that.
The responsibilities that lie with the administration is to be clear in their instruction. The responsibility of we participants is to read and to question until we too understand. lets lighten the atmosphere, we are here to learn from each other.Punto!
I think I may have contributed to Heidi's closing of the thread and if so, I apologize to all who were unable to continue playing the game.
I remember seeing all the lines of the instructions in big blue print and the last line "As you can see, the idea is to follow up from the last post, so it is essential to click on newest!!" in regular size black print. Obviously, I skipped over one of the most important lines.
I am not attempting to excuse my inconsiderate behaviour but to simply give the reason as to why I unintentionally wandered from the instructions. Again, I apologize to all and will pay more attention in the future to even the "fine print," plus I will go directly to the dunce corner for acting like a moron.
Mariana, I agree with you. I tried to participate in that thread at the beginning, but I had a problem. I would see the sentence, then prepare a response. But, by the time I had prepared my response, another member had already responded.
I may not have taken the best action, but I modified my post that was then out of order by saying "too late". That happened twice, so I finally quit trying to respond to the thread (I had to go to work, anyway).
In the case of a game like this, if a member prepares a post and mistakenly posts it after another member has already responded, should they do what I did? I did not want to get the posts out of order. I noticed the post I had marked "too late" had been deleted, so that is good.
I could have avoided the problem if I had hit the "refresh" button prior to the final posting of the response.
Bruce said:
if a member prepares a post and mistakenly posts it after another member has already responded, should they do what I did?
Well, obviously this happens in a popular game; however, this is not the issue. We can always edit our posts to make it follow the prior post.
What happened in that thread was that people simply did not start with the word "if" (as instructed) and didn't put the next part in the form of a future event. In fact, some people just posted random sentences.
Marianne, I was very saddened to hear that Heidi had to close the thread entitled:
“Let's create a story using "if-sentences, I did read the thread carefully and used the present first then the immediate future voy a ir etc... but made a mistake while following on from Jason's thread in using the wrong person (she instead of I ) but corrected it as soon as Jason brought it to my attention.
I am sorry If I had contributed towards the closing of the thread in any way. 
It certainly was not intentional or through lack of reading it I read it through two or three times to make completely sure I would not mess it up..but I did a little although I corrected my mistake asap.
One final point. I found, as so often happens to many, that because I spend some time thinking about what I should write that someone else gets in there before me. I am not sure how to address this problem. except perhaps to start writing it down partially formed or with possible mistakes then correct it immediately so as to be able to get in there sufficiently quickly. I am reluctant to do this in case someone corrects me while I am in the process of self correction!
I often come up with a great idea only to find someone/several people had just posted leaving me with no option but to think of a different one.Sigh lol
I too was sorry to see that thread closed, but I do understand why it was. I just hope that type of thread keeps being posted. I get a double chance to learn on most of the threads here. When I post an answer, I get to learn what I have done right, and wrong. Then I get to learn by all the other posts, and comments on them.
I do appreciate all the hard work people put in on this site, and especially those that do it solely for the purpose of benefiting others. I know some of you work hard at a regular job, some raise families, and then spend hours on this site correcting mistakes, and encouraging us to learn.
Everyone wants to be appreciated for their work, and sacrifice, and I would imagine it is very stressful to feel as though all that work does not matter. Well, it matters to me, and I am sure it matters to many others on this site.
Thank you to all that participate here. If not for that, I would not reap the benefits from using SD.
Whenever I see someone post a random letter in the A to Z games it sort of takes the fun out of the game. I'm not talking about when two people post a "P" word at the same time, but those people who post a random "Z" just because they want to use their letter.
I'm talking to you...yes, you...you know who you are! :p
Vikingo said:
The problem, though, is when you tell people off en masse. This puts people off, and especially those who want to learn and are eager to participate
I agree that it can appear to be overkill when someone in the Administration opens a thread after sending several private messages to the "offenders." However, as Heidi says, these things really do continue until finally we post something publicly.
The main point, though, is looking to ourselves. How can we communicate better? If there are too many people missing the rules, how do we improve them?
You'd be really surprised at how much time we put into creating directions that are clear to follow, yet not overbearing.
People who don't read the rules won't improve by receiving a telling-off...
I really hope that the people who fail to read directions and continue to ask questions after the answers are clearly posted in those same directions begin to recognize themselves. It would be great if even a few people give this some thought before posting an answer or participating in the Skype chats.
It will, however, turn a lot of people off from trying and participating, and this is not the result you want. So, as a grown-up, what do you do?
I can only repeat myself and say "This is NOT about those people who make honest mistakes after reading the instructions." Hopefully, we are all grown up enough to understand the message that I am trying to convey.
