Literacy woes

[Rosemary]

I am not sure if this happens in other countries but I have had serious concerns about literacy education in our school.

It is a damning comment on schooling standards....an independent national enquiry into how reading is taught at schools...to make the point that all aspiring teachers should have to prove they could read and write proficiently before being allowed into classrooms.....evidence that many student teachers lacked the literacy skills required to be effective teachers of reading. This newspaper reveals today that almost a third of student teachers at **********University...failed a compulsory literacy test this year. It may well be that these student teachers......are victims of educational fads which tend to sweep......through the school systems - such as not correcting grammar and spelling for fear of damaging 'self-esteem'

Not correcting grammar and spelling has been going on for many years. About 1978 my son was top of his class in spelling. However the following year when he started Senior High School, all spelling and grammer errors were not noted by the teacher. All too soon he and his friends were spelling words by their sound, ie., shood, wen, teech etc. I made a point of meeting the English teacher, who pointed out that there were more important aspects of the English Language to learn.
I ended up doing the spelling and grammar checking myself but I was very angry at the education system.

I do hope that this drop in literary skills will not affect our up and coming writers.

 

[Rosemary]

Yes, I know we have dictionaries, the thesaurus and spell checkers...

Why? If the student can get away with incorrect spelling and grammer then I am sure non of the available help will be used...

 

[polymorphikos]

I attended several high schools, all of which made a point of correcting spelling and grammar, some holding spelling tests in the lower year-levels, and my professors continue to catch me up on my assignments (unfortunately even in creative writing, hwere the laws of grammar are to me highly-flexible).

I think this is one of those scare-thingies, mostly. Plus laziness on some of the kids' parts.

 

[Culhwch]

I don't know. Laziness is definitely a part of it. But I'm concerned, too. I've commented before that I believe things such as SMS text messaging on mobile phones, instant messaging on computers, emails and so forth are programming kids to cut corners in spelling and grammar. Add to this the seeming inneffectiveness of our education system to impart these basic elements of language use from an early age... Both of my sisters are teachers, one primary and one secondary, and I've seen countless examples from them of students who just have no idea how these things work. Even when I was in my second and third year of university studying creative writing, many of my classmate's pieces that I read were riddled with the most basic mistakes in spelling and grammar. It's endemic, I think, and spreading.

 

[ras'matroi]

Here every test no matter which class is corrected if there are spelling or grammar mistakes. You could even loose points in eg. biology for too many spelling or grammar mistakes.
I think that is a good idea since everyone has to learn it.

BUT.......

Here the goverment made a reform to make the spelling and writing easier for everyone. Even if it was thought different before and almost everyone got along with it.
For some time it was OK to use both versions and a lot of people liked the idea. Then the new one was the only one and at once a lot of people diliked it.
By now even a few publishers (newspapers) started to use the old one again.
......

Even the teachers who liked the reform at the biginning dislike it now and were confused for some time. (I do not want to talk of the students.)
By now it is working ok.....

 

[Rosemary]

I attended several high schools, all of which made a point of correcting spelling and grammar, some holding spelling tests in the lower year-levels, and my professors continue to catch me up on my assignments (unfortunately even in creative writing, hwere the laws of grammar are to me highly-flexible).

I think this is one of those scare-thingies, mostly. Plus laziness on some of the kids' parts.

Were you attending an Australia school?

I don't see how this can be scare mongering for it has been happening for such a long time...

 

[GOLLUM]

I agree with Cullwch.

It's certainly something I continously notice with young people these days as well as a good deal of so-called public speakers and media presenters one would hope would know better. Just like the introduction of calculators into mathematics, spelling and grammar checkers are making it all too easy these days for people to rely on technology first at the expense of using their own brains.

2C....

 

[polymorphikos]

Were you attending an Australia school?

I don't see how this can be scare mongering for it has been happening for such a long time...

Yes I was. Just because people frequently err in their spelling, does not mean that more and more people are erring every year. It is probably stable.

Also, Culhwch, SMS spelling is the difference between talking all colloquial with your friends, and formally during a job interview.

 

[Culhwch]

Also, Culhwch, SMS spelling is the difference between talking all colloquial with your friends, and formally during a job interview.

To a point, yes. Though I don't think I speak that differently when I'm with my friends to when I'm in a professional situation. But granted I am always correcting their speech...

It's when those habits of cutting corners in SMS and instant messaging start creeping into school work or other more 'serious' mediums that it becomes a problem, I feel. Plus, I don't see the need to cut those corners in the first place, but I am a very patient and thorough person, so it is on my nature to spell things out fully and check my grammar before messaging or posting. I do understand that other people are of a more 'hasty' disposition....

 

[Brian G Turner]

I agree with the concerns - once I hit secondary school (10 years and up) the whole English Comprehension syllabus went out of the window. We were encouraged to do creative things instead, which seemed great at the time.

But nowadays as an aspiring writer, I find myself very frustrated because I don't have a clue about the basic technicalities of English grammar - sure, I can still try and write stories, but because I don't know how to write technically correct when required, I find it very very difficult.

I've bought a book on grammar, and went back to college to do an A-level in "English Literature and Language" (again, technical grammar was downplayed) but still feel like I haven't learned what I need to.

I always scored well at school and have a string of good exam results, but I feel they definitely let me down with Enlgish.

(Note: having spent a long time as a student, I can also see general education standards have fallen dramatically - education is being dumbed down in general to increase pass rates, and it's the students who are losing out to these pathetic political games by getting a second-rate education. Every year when there's an outcry about pass-rates increasing, the complaints are very justified).

 

[Green]

Slightly off topic here, but I, Brian has reminded me of a program I watched about a year or two years ago. They took a class of 5th year students (15-16 year olds) and put them into a 1950's school environment to see how they coped/how it differed blah blah. So they had the discipline, the old lesson plans, etc.

At the end of the program they made them do an old maths test to see how they were getting on. What they didn't tell these GCSE students was that the test was actually an old 11+ maths test from the 50's (for those who don't know, children take/used to take the 11+ at about age 10).

One guy got 100% on the test, whereas about 90% or more of the others failed it completely.

Personally I worry for the state of education these days and I hope that when I have children I'll have the money or opportunity to see they go to a good school. The ones near me just scare me.

 

[littlemissattitude]

This is a problem here in the States as well, and it isn't new. Even back when I was in elementary school, I don't think I ever had a teacher who taught grammar, past the very basic things such as "a noun is a naming word" and "a verb is an action word". To this day, I probably couldn't go much further than that in explaining basic grammar. What I do know about grammar beyond that very basic level was only learned when I took Latin at university. The fact that I can write a gramatically correct sentence (most of the time, at least ), is entirely due to the fact that I read so much. Well, that and the fact that I was slavishly devoted to "Schoolhouse Rock" when they used to run that between cartoons on Saturday mornings. If it weren't for those short lessons in grammar, I would not know what a conjunction is. It's really sad, and not something I'm proud of.

Now, I do have to say that I believe it is more important to be able to write a gramatically correct sentence than it is to be able to explain why it is correct. On the other hand, I can't say that learning by just reading, as I did, is the best way to get there. The schools should be teaching this.

Spelling was a different story in school, however. We always had spelling tests, all the way through the end of elementary school (6th grade, age 11). Also, as far as I can recall, spelling errors were corrected in all written work all the way through the end of high school. Well, it was when we did written work, which wasn't that often in the higher grades. This is also still a huge problem. When I was tutoring on the community college and university level, it horrified me that there were students who had graduated from high school with good grades, and sometimes as honors students, without ever having to write a formal research paper.

 

[dwndrgn]

I was taught grammar in school (hated it, but it was there) as well as spelling and all the rest. I detest seeing such a huge amount of misspelling and obvious grammar errors, as well as the shortcuts that so many use these days. Of course, I'm sure I commit all types of grammar errors all the time, but I try at least to not be a complete idiot.

However, unless it becomes a problem to the extent that we cannot communicate effectively, it isn't going to be corrected. From what I see, it is hard enough to get kids in school, to pay attention while there, and to actually care about their education, that there are so many other things they need to focus on. I don't think it is essentially a school problem, yes, they should be trying harder - but on the other hand, they can only do so much and when parents don't take on the responsibility to ensure that their kids are well adjusted enough to take to learning, then the schools have to work with what they have.

It is sad when kids know how to work their cell phones and xboxes, yet cannot read a book.

When education is given the importance that it deserves (and I'm speaking mostly of the US where education is somewhere way down on the list after vanity, acquisition and sports) then maybe we'll see an improvement. Yet when national athletes who can barely speak or read are given ungodly amounts of cash for beating each other up and playing games, I don't see it happening any time soon.

 

[Rosemary]

I have also noticed a change in literacy skills by the media.

Many TV programs, including the News reports, now call our children "kids". I was taught that a kid is a baby goat. Congratulations is now pronounced "congradulations".

Yes, I know some Australians have their own way of pronouncing various words but surely the media should not be allowed to do so.

A written word that really had me puzzled was "miniseries"
It took me a while before I realised it was supposed to be "mini-series".

Is this poor literacy skills or just pure laziness?

 

[littlemissattitude]

Okay, here's a scary statistic, kids (yeah, I know, Rosemary ):

I heard a report on the news a day or two ago that said 80 percent of the third graders (eight-year-olds, generally) in the local school system read below their grade level. 80 percent.

I find that horrible.

 

[Rosemary]

Okay, here's a scary statistic, kids (yeah, I know, Rosemary ):

I heard a report on the news a day or two ago that said 80 percent of the third graders (eight-year-olds, generally) in the local school system read below their grade level. 80 percent.

I find that horrible.

It's about the same here littlemiss...which is one of the reasons I encourage and read with my Granddaughters...
(It's OK...I shall ignore the kids )

 

[Rosemary]

Fantastic Literacy Results in Western Australia?

“The Education Department has cut the minimum pass mark for the Year 7 literacy test to just 44% enabling the Education Minister to claim there had been a big increase in the number of students achieving an acceptable result.”
“She has admitted that the increase in students passing the target mark would have been 2 – 3 % had the bench mark not been lowered 5%, down from 49% last year”.
“In the Year 3 reading test, students were considered to be performing at an acceptable level if they just got 9 out of 35 questions right.”
“Results from this years literacy and numeracy tests show that there is still more than on in 10 students leaving primary school without being able to read, write, spell or add up.”

I just cannot consider that cutting the pass mark is helping our young students. Of course there will be an “acceptable result” if the pass mark has been lowered. How can students who only achieve 9 out of 35 questions be achieving an acceptable level?
I think it is deplorable that the Education Department has even considered this an “acceptable” curriculum standard.

 

[Marky Lazer]

Yes, I know we have dictionaries, the thesaurus and spell checkers...

Why? If the student can get away with incorrect spelling and grammer then I am sure non of the available help will be used...

You misspelled grammar, Rose.

 

[Rosemary]

You misspelled grammar, Rose.

Well spotted Marky You missed the word 'none' though

 

[Marky Lazer]

Well spotted Marky You missed the word 'none' though

No, I didn't. I thought you were trying to sneak some French in.