Grammar's Making a Comeback
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Grammar Girl's Quick and Dirty Tips for Better Writing
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High School Grammar Starting to Make a Comeback
The MSN article below describes an educational climate where grammar is coming back to high schools. Education sees paradigm shifts like this all the time, e.g., whole language vs. phonics; text-based vs. non-text-based learning; mathematical rote memorization vs.mathematical concepts. It never seems like we have the right balance in education. It's either all one philosophy or the other. Perhaps, bringing back the importance of grammar in writing and speech will bring a much needed balance to the writing process. In today's educational world the tests rule the roost; maybe the reemergence of grammar on the SAT tests will have a positive effect on education.
The article below also describes the problem of teachers not knowing how to properly teach their students grammar. Since the 70s there has not been an emphasis on grammar in school; thus, many teachers were never taught proper grammar. They call it their "dirty little secret". I guess we'll see how this plays out in the next decade; it takes at least this long for a systemic change to occur in public education.
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Were you taught grammar in school?
Yes, as does your father's. ;)
I think spelling checkers and "chatspeak" have made younger people's spelling so bad that their writing is unintelligible. Good grammar and spelling are important if you want to be understood and perceived as educated and intelligent.
I agree. Spellcheck and grammar check don't always get it right. For example, homonyms can easily be looked over with these programs.
my children are learning through synthetic phonics(a part-to-whole phonics approach to reading instruction in which the student learns the sounds represented by letters and letter combinations, blends these sounds to pronounce words) and when my son who is 5 learns a new letter there is a hand action that goes with it,it is very strange when doing his homework with him.
I bet it's a lot different from when you learned to read, although I presume you learned through phonics as well. Phonics is definitely the instruction of choice these days. Our daughter is starting to learn to read and we talk about blends and letter combinations. We do some motions with sounds like with the blend "sh" we put our finger up to our mouth, as in be quiet; or when we do the sound "ch" we move our arms like we're a train, choo choo. We also do a sing-song voice with some sounds like "oo". I think the key is to keep it as fun as possible. It's an exciting thing to learn to read and write. Thanks for the comment. It's interesting to hear how other countries are teaching reading. ;)
Personally, I don't think Grammar has ever been out of style. I have to say I've been guilty of speaking bad english just for fun though. I have a supervisor who is worse than me...loves taking a word and murdering it and it just makes me double over...I'm sorry Robin. We're not worthy (smile).
There is definitely a different standard with conversational spoken and written words. My punctuation is horrible when I IM, for example. I'm actually not that grammatically strict and many times I need to be corrected; I just enjoy the subject. Thanks ;)
What grammar does is explain how words work in sentences. It stops there. That being educated in grammar does not translate to improved essay writing should be no surprise. Still, I have always thought an educated person should have grammar knowledge. Thank you, Robin, for doing this!
I agree, George. Essay creativity is not influenced by correct grammar, but correct grammar in essay writing or in any printed works is important for content clarity. For example, a misplaced comma can greatly change the meaning of a sentence. Thanks!
We were taught it at my school (centuries ago) even though it was a lowly secondary modern.
I got my mouse trapped before I could finish, and the message shot off. I'm glad to hear grandma is making a comeback - she'll soon straighten out our speach.
Good work!
I rely on the spell checker, partly for spelling, as much for proof reading. I'm a mad typist. Two flying fingers, often uncoordinated. (need spill checker in the comment module?)
Also don't trust the grammar checkers. I check myself in Robin's hubs, or go with the flow - love the comma.
Misfit, I'm glad she is back too. I remember learning grammar in elementary school, but I think we were supposed to know it all by high school. In college I had an English professor that was a stickler, and she was very critical of all of our work. Unfortunately, she didn't really teach us much; she just ridiculed us. She'd put our papers on the overhead and red ink them all over. It was quite embarrassing. At least she did it to everyone.
Jack, I type quickly too and often make errors, even when I go back and check I miss them. I wish there was spell check with comments too. I'll ask Paul about it. My brother-in-law says you should read through your work three times before publishing, but many times I don't have the time to read through it more than once.
With this information, can we expect reading comprehension among students to improve anytime soon? I hope so. Thanks, Robin. Nice hub.
I'm not sure if it will help with reading comprehension. I think this might be a different battle all together. I think you're right that reading comprehension among students does need improvement. Thanks for the comment!
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eats, shoots and leaves
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working
Paul Edmondson says:
2 years ago
Your smile widens:)