The Language Issue: A Discussion- Page 3

[jasonf]

Posted: 7/6/07 at 11:55pm

For five years I've fought the kids on "there/they're/their" and "you're/your" and "its/it's" -- after going over it and over it and over it - the kids simply don't care because it's not reinforced ANYWHERE. The thing is, they're really not that even that difficult to use if you take half a second to think about them!

[MatthewAddison]

Posted: 7/7/07 at 12:42am

But..but...how can we be sure that "they're" means "they + are"?

HOW CAN WE BE SURE????

[chealion313]

Posted: 7/7/07 at 8:41am

I think there are a few factors involved in this: 1) Alot depends on the way children are brought up. I've found that children who started out reading books at an early age have a much more proper grasp on grammar than those who don't read. Whether it be fiction, non-fiction, or newspapers and magazines, a well read person is going to have much better language skills than those who don't.

2) A few years back there was an article in the New York Daily News highlighting a memo from one NYC teacher to another and the entire memo was formed with improper grammar. If teachers can't learn to speak/write properly, how will the students? While there are alot of phenomenal teachers out there, there are also quite a few who aren't as educated as they should be.

3) There seems to be alot of kids these days who just don't want to put an effort into learning. There are some younger girls I work with who sometimes ask the most inane questions that just shock me--one was typing a letter the other day and had asked me what "CT" stood for (Connecticut) and then asked what "AR" stood for (Arkansas), and once I told her, she asked me how to spell Arkansas. My only response was 'what ARE they teaching kids in schools these days?' Alot of younger people are more interested in pop culture and having fun than they are in applying themselves and wanting to make the best lives they possibly can.

I think most of the language issue comes from the general lack of class and poise in our society nowadays. From guys walking around with jeans slung down their hips and their boxers showing, girls going to school wearing pajama pants and celebrities flashing their privates for the world to see, class has gone out the window.

I cringe when I overhear people having a conversation and they can't complete a sentence without cursing or people who just don't speak clearly. Unfortunately I just don't see a solution to this problem--I think it's only going to get worse.

[jasonf]

Posted: 7/7/07 at 9:35am

chealion-- you have A LOT of good of points, but the fact that you wrote "alot" four times in your post instead of "a lot" helped prove the point - no matter how solid your argument was, I kept seeing that "alot" pop out at me!

[erikaamato]

Posted: 7/7/07 at 10:55am

jasonf: I had the same thought... The post contains several other grammatical errors, as well, but they're mostly of the "improper use of commas/run-on sentence" variety.

Speaking of which, in my high school, they were such sticklers for grammar that any paper you wrote (not just in English class, by the way) was immediately knocked down a grade for every grammatical error. E.g., if your paper contained a single comma splice somwhere, the absolute best grade you could receive would be an A-. If it had a comma splice and a dangling participle, the best grade possible became a B+, and so on. It was a huge incentive to care about proper grammar, let me tell you!

Of course, this was at a private school... I assume you couldn't get away with that sort of system in a public school setting. Such strict rules/consequences would be damaging to the students' self-esteem or somesuch. :-P

Updated On: 7/7/07 at 10:55 AM

[Chita1933]

Posted: 7/7/07 at 11:26pm

"hamasee"
___________________________________

What did the young girl say to her brother when he asked why she hadn't taken off her contacts before getting into the pool.

Updated On: 7/8/07 at 11:26 PM

[gymdudeva]

Posted: 7/8/07 at 12:55pm

It's one thing on the street, but we get younger people in our office who, although they don't use vulgar language, etc., are so used to using improper English that they can't even use it properly in an office setting. Call me a snob but youi are not going to get very far if your professional communications are grammatically crude and incorrect.

[jasonf]

Posted: 7/8/07 at 5:03pm

Erika - you're absolutely right. In fact, I was admonished by my supervisor because my free-writing rubric had too much weight put on grammar. In other words, it's perfectly OK for me to TEST them on grammar if it was taught as an independent lesson, but for me to truly hold them accountable in their writing got me into trouble. Go figure.