posted on July 18, 2001 06:46:55 PM
I realize that my spelling is very bad and I sometimes make errors of grammar. However my wife who is an excellent grammarian
and valedictorian of her class tells me that I speak as well as the collage professors with whom she works. I understand exactly
why I have a weakness in English. When I was in school my family moved around a great deal and I would go from one school
system to another and they covered different subjects at different times so that I missed a great deal of instruction about language.
Spanish grammar actually makes more sense to me than English grammar. I could not draw a diagram of a sentence if you held a
gun to my head, or name the various tenses of verbs. However I can copy the form of speech I have heard others use.
One of my biggest problems is that I always read well beyond the level of the people around me so that I am often familiar with a word in print but have never heard the correct pronunciation.
At least English speakers are not as quick as the French to humiliate you if you do make a minor mistake.
posted on July 18, 2001 07:10:53 PM
"At least English speakers are not as quick as the French to humiliate you if you do make a minor mistake."
Oh, I don't know... One of the most amusing grammatical anecdotes (assuming there's more than one), had to do with the attempted humiliation of Churchill by someone taking exception to his ending a sentence with a preposition, which led Churchill to exclaim - "Up with this I will not put."
posted on July 19, 2001 12:09:41 AM
Borillar, What are the ages of your children? In fairness mine are 12 and 4.
T
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dejapooh, As a classroom teacher, what is your reaction to Gatto's "7 Lesson Schoolteacher"?
I am wondering because you express some classroom problems in common with Gatto but you do not express a personal opinion about them. If you haven't read it, I am posting a link below. I am curious because I have never discussed it with a classroom teacher, only homeschool parents.
posted on July 19, 2001 08:40:38 AM
I used to teach history, but now teach computer skills. I quite enjoy teaching, and I am a good teacher (if I must say so myself. However, since none of you have seen me teach, you have to take my word for it).
Please understand that when I post, I usually do not go through my normal spellcheck, and edit ordeal. I know I should, but I don't.
posted on July 19, 2001 09:09:43 AM
My feeling's on his writings? Whatever. Same old problems. Would it be better if every parent could stay home and teach thier own child? Sure, if they are able. Is homeschooling better the public schooling? It depends on the parents. I can teach history, computers, economics, government, and probably some basic science. My wife teaches math at the same school I do, and between the two of us, we have a pretty good working knowledge of most subjects, and would probably do a good job of homeschooling. However, most children do not have 2 parents with collage degrees. Many homeschooled children have huge holes in their knowledge (as opposed to the numerous small holes a school based education provides).
Is Private schooling better? Again, it depends. I went to a private school for 2 years. The Oakswood School is known in California as one of the top private schools in the state. It was the worst possible place for me. They were very loose, and I needed a firm discipline system to insure I did the work. I was able to fake it for 2 years, and I did almost nothing. This set up some very bad habits that I did not break until I was in collage (some habits, such as not always proofreading, I still have .
It is very easy to poke holes in public education, but no one has offered any real solutions. I know someone is going to shout about vouchers. That is not a solution, it is dilution. Whatever quality you get in private school would be lost when they had to start to accept some of the troubled children they are now able to keep out. There are so many weaknesses in the voucher idea, it is laughable.
posted on July 19, 2001 09:27:11 AM
Thanks, Dejapooh.
Your points may be valid, There are certainly some I wouldn't disagree with. Whether what you've identified in your post as "the" problems are all the problems, I don't know.
This is going to be harsh, but perhaps you can understand that on reading your posts, what jumped out at me was numerous, glaring mistakes, and I would have to wonder if the areas you've identified - discipline problems, too large class size, etc., are really all that's wrong. I never had a teacher of anything (except perhaps the wrestling coach who taught "The Threat of Communism" class in my high school), who would have written something like that.
Granted, spelling errors are easy to make. My sister always said that spelling proficiency (and typing as well), wasn't a useful indicator of competence. Funny, considering she's an excellent typist and a pretty good speller.
However, I could take a handful of commas, throw them at the computer screen, and have as good a chance of having them land correctly as you placed them. You've put them where no punctuation belongs. You've put them where, more properly, semi-colons belong, and you've left some necessary ones out entirely.
You've got people unable to "know" a perspective that they should be unable to "have." You've got pronoun/antecedent disagreements all over the place, and you say that "I have never met a parent that did not care about education." (bolding mine). You've ended a sentence with a glaring preposition. To be fair, my very smart friend says that "they" have changed the rule about ending sentences with prepositions. Though I don't know who "they" are, I don't believe it, no matter what area they teach in. How much proofreading should something need?
posted on July 20, 2001 06:51:42 AM
I know.. I don't want to run Dejapooh off, and I feel bad. What I said was impolite, mean, harsh. But I'm sticking by it.
About ten years ago, I went into my daughter's middle school on some business and right in the middle of the hall, so the whole school would be sure to see it, right next to the principal's office even, was a huge posterboard display, pictures of dozens of kids, with a big title - "Our Star Student's"
Everyone was walking by it. Who knows how long it had been there? I went into the principal's office to point it out. Oh, an oversight, a mistake, no one caught it, thank you for bringing it to our attention.
Femme frowns. I do fee bad, I know what I said was harsh. I'm sticking by it.
I seldom see a disgust emoticon in your posts. Are you unhappy that a teacher admits the need for spell check and "edit ordeal" in order to write a few sentences on the internet?
posted on July 20, 2001 08:33:09 AM
From what I see everyday when I buy a newspaper a teacher could make the shift to being a newspaper writer fairly easy. The standards seem to be the same for grammar and spelling and getting details of fact straight is pretty loose also. In my local paper they can not tell the difference between a revolver and an autoloader. Cities and leaders are attributed to the wrong country or continent. They can not tell the difference between types of explosives. Dynamite is interchangable with TNT if the space is needed in the story header.
Actually, I was more concerned with the content of the message. But, like Donny, I was also concerned about the fact that this teacher admitted that he needed spell check and "edit ordeal" in order to write a few sentences correctly. It also surprised me that while acknowledging this limitation that he would post these sentences in a thread about education on the internet without first using these crutches.
Did you read the content of the message?
He stated that it took him 3 years to get the children (12 to 13 years old) to sit down.
It took 4 years for him to motivate the children to "try".
It took 5 years for his students to achieve some degree of success.
And he concludes these admissions by stating, "Many teachers never succeed in getting the children to succeed.
Never in my lifetime or in my children's lifetime have I experienced a teacher with these concerns.
posted on July 21, 2001 07:22:47 AM
So, I believe that your disgust is misdirected. It disgusts me to know that teachers are deplorably insensitive to the emotional problems of children. Teachers who perceive children as another source of frustration and a "culture of failure" is what disgusts me. Children should be perceived as human beings trying to adapt to inner needs and external pressures.
Teachers will never be of sufficently high caliber until salaries are raised.
.
