I am in a college writing course. Not the fun kind of writing course where I get to write stories. It is the boring, technical kind of writing course where we learn about grammar and such. I know I don't have perfect grammar so I am ok with taking this class. I do believe I will learn a few things and leave the class having gotten something out of it.
I am amazed though as I read some of the posts in discussion. In a class where we are currently studying grammar, there sure are a lot of grammatical errors. By a lot I mean there are posts that are almost completely impossible to decipher due to the amount of errors.
I struggle a bit with proper punctuation. I also have the occasional fragmented sentence. At least I have a basic grasp of proper English though.
I know, I KNOW! Not everyone is at the same level when it comes to education. While the schools in this city are certainly not the greatest, they are also, by far, not the worst in the country. I was fortunate enough to receive a relatively good education growing up. Not everyone was as lucky. I also know that for some of these people in my class, English was not their first language. The language does have a variety of odd grammar rules. I know it it tough to learn them all. I know! I am still a bit frustrated though.
The frustration comes from the fact that I have to interact in group discussion with people whose writing I have to work hard to decipher. In my last classes there were certain people that after the first couple of weeks I didn't even bother to read their posts. I could tell by who posted whether or not I would be able to make an intelligent and substantive response to the post. Maybe that is unfair to some of the others, but it was how I managed to get by.
One thing I would love to do is just SCREAM on the message boards for these people to type their responses into Word before posting. At least then most of the errors would be caught by Word's grammar and spelling software. Really, isn't that a good method for them to learn to catch and repair their mistakes? It works for me.
I am done ranting now. Back to class I go.
1 comment:
I'm sitting here, absolutely frothing at the mouth-- for more of your SS/fly boy story; not that your post on the abysmal state of the English language (particularly as spoken and written by Americans) isn't endlessly fascinating. (please do forgive the fragment; it was intentional) ;)
Of course, I'll be a big grown up girl and will wait patiently until you are ready.
((hugs))
L
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