General Chat

Maggie if you want an English lesson, please don't listen to a politician.

And no they are not taught Grammar or construction at school anymore.
There a lot of things we SUFFERED to learn at school which teachers don't think is necessary to teach these days.

When I sit in front of the TV criticizing the newsreaders, my husband always says.... " language is changing all the time".
OK.... but why then were we given the belt just for getting something wrong if years later it would be forgotten by everyone?

AND.... another thing my husband says a lot... a quote from Mark Twain.... it is a poor scholar who can't spell a word in two ways.

And Bernard Shaw advocated writing a book with no punctuation.

I don't have much fun in our house when I get pedantic.... ha ha ha

Deanna X

I was lucky and found the English lessons and grammar came very easy to me.......always in the top 3 and passed all exams with distinction....

...not like my maths......lol.......always in the bottom mind you I handled accounts and did wages and was a treasurer, so I must have learned something.....

I remember sitting in an algebra exam and putting my number and the date at the top of the page........and nothing else........the only reason I had joined the algebra class was because I fancied a boy in that group......

sally

As a scientist I actually loved English Language - it had rules you could understand, just like Maths.

In my school we took our 'O' levels a year early, which gave us up to three years to study for A level to ensure we got good grades, like A's and B's

I passed my O level English when I was 14. I was predicted a 'B' but suffered a migraine attack during the exam, and had to settle for a 'C'

English Lit was totally different. I hated it from start to finish. How on earth can you know what the poet was supposed to think when high on LSD, pot or coke, as many often were. I managed to read the Hornblower stories, but little else appealed.

I did manage a pass in Lit (probably equal to an 'A' today) but since then have had no interest in the subject whatsoever.

Oooh Sally... you floozie, you, lolol!! I have to say that I asked for extra Art lessons at my new school. I was 15 and had fallen hook line and sinker for a lad in the lower 5th........ *sigh*

I married him, lololol!!

I came top once, and in the top 3 out of 156/7 in my year in English Lang and Lit (with Oral)........ every year for 4 years... and still haven't a clue how I managed the mechanical bits... but my descriptive and creative writing, it would appear, showed that I understood and was able to use all those mechanics appropriately. I was brilliant at comprehension, (modest, usually, but what the heck, I was!!) and I loved poetry. Plus, I can talk the hind legs off a donkey.... stood me in good stead ;¬))

Ann, did you tell T why you were laughing, lol? Oh, and the hellebores will be wonderful..... shall I bring a trailer up next time we meet, lolol?

Love

Daff xxxxx

Yes Julia, One Export Manager I worked for, made me do a letter all over again because I had a comma in the wrong place.
This was the days before Word Processors, and Tippex. The carbon copies with the piece of paper inserted to stop the rubber making a mess of the copies, and Manual Typewriters.
I did graduate to an Electric Golf Ball Typewriter, just before I left work to care for my father, and was away for a couple of years. When I wanted to return to work, had to go back to College to learn Word Processors, and was then in my fifties.
Still it put me in good stead for using Computers.

Mo

Yes, along with many of you I was taught English at Grammar School and had full coverage of the rules etc. and the best way to remember them... a conjunction = a joining word, a verb = a 'doing' word etc. etc. and I must admit it has stood me in reasonably good stead.

Ann in Glos - example of split infinitive......... she quickly walked ...... it should be she walked quickly. The way we remembered it was to to mentally say, she quickly? she quickly what? You now need an explanation for what..? quickly is an adverb and should follow a verb hence the correct order she walked(verb) quickly(adverb). It has been a long long time since I left school (dare I say over 50 years!!) but I think I have remembered correctly. If not, apologies.

I still say "different from" and "similar to" - I remember the red lines through our work if the spelling or grammar was not correct. When I was a student nurse, the teacher who had taught us English was admitted as a patient - and she remembered me!

I wonder what she would think of this "text speak/talk"??????

Liz