A NINE-year-old deaf Bradford schoolgirl found 15 examples of the incorrect use of apostrophes during a 15-minute walk in the district.

As part of a school project, Ammarah Mahmood wandered around the market in Keighley and surrounding area looking for mistakes - specifically apostrophe S - on signage.

And the Swain House Primary School pupil was shocked at what she found.

The errors she spotted included: Banana's; Happy Holiday's; No Drink's Allowed in Shop; Pie's, Pasty's, Sandwich's and Cakes; DVD's; Customers For Taxi's Please Wait Here; Toilet's; and Open Sunday's.

Her teacher Sarah Rothera, who teaches deaf children at the school on Radcliffe Avenue, Bradford, said there was a mixture of professional 'screwed on' signs, neon signs and hand-written ones.

"We were shocked when Ammarah brought her pictures in," said Sarah. "We were shocked at the blatant misuse of apostrophes.

"The incorrect use does annoy me, and it is shocking how many she found in such a short space of time.

"She just walked round for 15 minutes. She was saying they need to go back to college!

"She was also saying 'these are adults. I am deaf and I am nine and I know the correct way to use them'."

Sarah added: "My favourite one is the 'Pie's, Pasty's, Sandwich's and Cakes' one. Why haven't they put an apostrophe in cakes, even though they have put ones in the others?"

Ammarah's class has been doing work on grammar and punctuation and was set a challenge to photograph pictures of any examples they could find.

Sarah explained: "I have been teaching the children about the use of apostrophe S for possession. As a follow up task I asked the children to use their school-issue PSP to take photographs of where they see the use of apostrophe S in the local environment.

"What was amazing about Ammarah is that she was genuinely shocked and wanted us to teach everyone in Bradford about how to use apostrophe S for possession. The photographs she took are both amusing and shocking."

Sarah added: "With the new curriculum there is a huge push for grammar and punctuation and it starts at a much younger age now.

"I took in a Slimming World banner with 'Thursday's' on it and asked the children to spot the error."