Re: OT: Spelling errors

You said it, Francelle.  I can't believe most children all over the 
world are taught English (though we don't learn their languages), but 
our own children are getting less and less instruction in English 
grammar and spelling.

In high school, my son was in an advanced program on international 
studies.  But he couldn't spell, and what grammar he had he'd learned 
at home.  So he went to the principal, said he wanted to get in the 
remedial English class.  The principal was appalled, said he was too 
smart to be in that class.  He still can't spell.

A few years earlier, when my stepdaughter was in junior high, she 
brought home a story she'd written and got an A+ on.  I said I surely 
agreed that it was a charming story, but why hadn't the teacher 
corrected the spelling and grammar errors (I don't think there was a 
complete sentence in the bunch, and not as an intentional style).  
She said oh, the teacher said that didn't matter; it was the 
creativity that counted.

Even back in my day, going to college with kids who'd come from THE 
BEST college prep schools in the east, whose Honors papers were all 
but unintelligible because they had no cohesive structure.  So it's 
no wonder none of us knows the basics anymore.  Sometimes I think I 
was the last person in the eighth grade who actually got grammar and 
spelling instruction.

Well, I got that off my chest.  Sorry, those who find OTs a drag.

Patricia Brooks


--- In iris-talk@y..., "FRANCELLE EDWARDS" <fjmjedwards@w...> wrote:
> Credit it to our wonderfully inconsistent English language.  If, 
after a lifetime, we still don't always get it right, pity the 
foreigners.
> Francelle Edwards
>   ----- Original Message ----- 
>   From: neilm@c... 
>   To: iris-talk@y... 
>   Sent: Thursday, November 01, 2001 2:35 AM
>   Subject: [iris-talk] Re: OT: Spelling errors
> 
> 
>   --- In iris-talk@y..., pbrooks@w... wrote:
>   > Speaking of spelling...the common error that irritates me most 
is 
>   > the confusion of its and it's.  Which is pretty easy to 
remember:
>   > It's is a shortened form of it is...."
> 
>   Patricia, you are not alone.  I just sigh.  Not only "it's" 
>   and "its," but similiar confusion over "one's" and "ones," a 
parallel 
>   of the above construction--"one is" is "one's," 
whereas "belonging to 
>   one" is "ones"--and confusion of "you're" and "your," another 
>   parallel.  I cannot count how many times I have seen otherwise 
astute 
>   users of written English make these errors.  They all have the 
same 
>   root.  We were taught to use the apostrophe when making a 
>   possessive.  The rule, unfortunately, applies to nouns, not 
pronouns.
> 
>   Then there's the homonyms of "their" and "they're" and "there."
> 
>   Oy Weh!  I just sigh and try to hear what the author is trying to 
say 
>   and not let my literary perfectionism get in the way of 
fellowship 
>   and pleasure.  It's ("it is!") difficult, though.
> 
>   Neil Mogensen  z 6b/7a near Asheville, NC
> 
> 
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