AIBU in being shocked that pupils aren't marked down in exams

[Hammy02]

for having poor spelling and grammar? Apparently the coalition are reintroducing marking down exam papers by 10% if spelling & grammar is not up to scratch. How on earth did the previous government get away with this? No wonder employers are having trouble when people can't write a decent application for a job?

My Y4 dc has a good working knowledge of Grammar, tbh probably better than mine, his homework has included things like homonyms, synonyms, verbs, adverbs, nouns etc. What primary schools aren't teaching this if his state primary is?

2I'm shocked at this. How can people be expected to apply for jobs, express themselves clearly at work etc if they can't articulate their thoughts coherently?! Fair enough not to mark down for it at 11 or 14, but at 16, lots of these students could be out applying for jobs the next day."

Nowadays all job applications are on pc, and thankfully there is such a thing as a spell checker .

I don't know how dcs were taught, but i do know that they had a far greater knowledge of technical terms in primary than I did after secondary.

The white paper is likely to be very regressive, Michael Gove seems to want to go back to a system which relies solely on children being able to recall knowledge - a very basic thinking skill. While I agree spelling and grammar are very important and grammar should certainly be taught explicitly acgain - do we really want to back to a system where students are really expected to do very little real thinking e.g. analyse, synthesise and apply their understanding?

Are Ofsted criteria for evaluating teaching and learning very different then in primary schools, I have to say I don't recognise the picture being painted here (that of Ofsted wanting hoopla filled lessons with lots of razzle-dazzle but no learning)

Grammar, spelling and punctuation should be taught and examined on.

I've sifted through job applications for an admin position and out oof 20 or so only 1 or 2 were well written.

of

"Most exam boards have positive marking systems for spelling and grammar e.g. marks awarded for good spelling and grammer rather than taken away for mistakes. Remember that exams are very stressful environments for students and surely in most cases (except from English Language exams) the majority of marks should be awarded for knowledge and understanding rather than spelling and grammar."

and this appalling policy is why we have a generation of illiterate people teaching a generation of illiterates.

Abysmal, wrong-footed, wrong-minded

oh how govt. policy has destroyed education

Mnistooaddictive I work with "stuck" kids who are a significant minority that require repetitive reteaching of skills in order to pick them up. For most classes fun fraction work (which I have taught plenty and enjoyed) will work very well and it's great that kids can have access to this sort of teaching. But the prevailing belief is that this sort of teaching is the only acceptable sort, despite the fact that it clearly doesn't suit the very significant minority who make no progress at all.

I don't subscribe to the "page 58 today" style of teaching either, but I think it's totally unfair to children to hit them with "fun" pizza-slicing and playground-dividing work and then expect them to answer SATs questions that call for far more technical skills involving equivalent fractions. For the kids I work with it is necessary to repeatedly show them step by step how to find an equivalent fraction so that on SATs day they will be able to answer this question. They will not and have not picked this skill up from more interactive and group-based lessons. A lesson where I do 5 different examples of equivalent fractions on the board and then ask the children to complete 5 more might seem dull but it will ensure that they can do this question, which is all the SATs tests at the end of the day. BTW I hate the SATs but my job is to raise levels in these ridiculous tests, and that's exactly what I'm doing. No doubt Ofsted will be delighted with that, in spite of my "dull and uninspiring" teaching methods, which hold the attention of every child in my class (an observation made by the headteacher).

FWIW children love being in my class and number of them have commented on how they finally understand maths, having been baffled by it for the last 6 years. I agree that purely "chalk and talk" teaching is wrong, but I believe Labour threw the baby out of the bathwater and expecting every single lesson to be fun and inspiring is totally denying the fact that some skills are difficult to acquire and take time and persistence. Children actually like putting this work in and it teaches them a valuable lesson - not everything is fun but putting the effort in will be worth it in the end.

I mark GCSE English and we have a section of the marks for spelling and punctuation there are 54 marks in all of which 9 are for ssps so one sixth-more than 10%!!

Spelling and grammar are important

I so disagree with anyone who says they're not.

And I will never interview anyone with poor spelling or grammar in an application form: shows a lack of care; a lack of attention to detail and a lack of education

"I also feel that learning the logic of grammar can help a person to think logically in general. We don't spend nearly enough time teaching children how to think."

Now my DS has now problem with thinking,apparently a deep and abstract thinker but he jut can't put it down on paper when he has to write, he does far better using a pc.

a child pulling a level 7 in English at start of this year did a little work for me.

She used 'are' instead of 'our'

bruffin - agree with the job application thing I applied for a job at McDonalds "crew member" recently........online (they didn't even invite me for an interview the f*ckers .

Plus most employers don't want a "hand written" letter - they want a printed one. And if they do want a hand written one then there is always the option of typing it on the computer, correcting mistakes and then copying out by hand.

I write EVERYTHING on the computer first have done since I was mid-teens (allowing essays to be done on a computer for coursework was my saviour at school ).

I must also add that I don't lack logic. I can think logically, and I can act logically - I just can't write very logically.

pranma does that mean spelling can mean the difference between an A and A* in English language.

Hmmm.

I teach spelling and grammar. It is not boring and repetetive...

I disagree that we have a generation of illiterate people activate. We have a literacy rate of 99% in this country. Inflammatory statements will not reform the system effectivley. I am not saying the system does not need to change but we have to combine a number or methods of teaching to ensure we have suitably skilled workforce for the future.

Now howling at my typo:)

Well - my kids are at primary school and they are CERTAINLY taught spelling and grammar.

As far as marking down papers for spelling and grammar, this used to happen, was called SPAG (Spelling, punctuation and grammar) and was worth 5% of the marks. However, although I think this is more than reasonable in subjects like English, I do wonder about other subjects. Dh is appalling at spelling, and I suspect he has undiagnosed dyslexia, because he simply CANNOT retain spellings. I have taught him some ways to remember some words he uses a lot, but these are 'non-spelling' ways - so perhaps using acronyms or patterns. I don't believe the school COULD have taught him spelling, it is something his brain just isn't wired up to do. And it seems harsh to penalise someone in EVERY subject because of one aspect. They don't penalise you on handwriting, and that might be considered just as important (unless it is an English exam). Spelling is a facet of ENGLISH - why then should you be unable to score full marks in GEOGRAPHY or in BIOLOGY because your spelling is problematic?

When dh was offered a scholarship to Cambridge, his headmaster said he didn't believe him and wouldn't believe him until he showed him the letter, because he was of the school that thought you must be 'thick' if you couldn't spell. Nevertheless, he did, and has a degree in engineering from Cambridge. Not so thick then. Still can't spell though.

Screwing up your application form is just laziness imo. Yes it takes a little time for some people to type out what they want to say on the computer (and lets face it - most jobs these days where you need to be able to use good spelling and grammar involve the use of a computer). Check for errors and then copy out.

I don't understand grammar, and probably use it wrong fairly often. However, I read a lot, so I know in general terms what does/doesn't sound right.

Aside from McDonald's (I didn't really want to work there anyhow ) the few jobs I've applied for have all at least given me an interview.

My daughter will be starting at an amazing primary school in September. from year 4 she will be learning subjects which I didn't touch on at all until secondary school.

I went to school in the 80s and my primary education especially was shocking, despite living in a v 'middle class' 'nice' area.

everything I see of education these days I could only have dreamed of at school in the 80s/early 90s.

I had to spell/grammar check a document as part of the recruitment process for the job I have now. It isn't a job that involves loads of reading or writing but is apparently a process that is on the increase to check prospective employee's basic communication skills.

pranma does that mean spelling can mean the difference between an A and A* in English language.

To be honest the rise of pcs,computer games etc is also to blame. I don't remember specifically learning spelling and grammar though I know we did it...but I do remember being a book worm from an early age,meaning I saw accurate,advanced and creative use of language every day. I think I kind of just absorbed it things just look right or wrong,as against just knowing the rules. The English language is so odd and convoluted it is hard to teach perfect spelling for example as there are so many anomalies. Extensive reading for pleasure and learning is very important,but not widespread now which is dad,and I think had a real impact. You can't learn it from a games console.

I think it is stupid to test spelling and grammar in every exam, when students don't have access to the tools they'd normally use to check these things with them in the exam! My spelling isn't good but I know how to use a dictionary and I would never send in a job application without checking the spellings in it: that's a realistic and useful skill to teaching children, not rote-learned perfect spelling.

cadders - we have a literacy rate of 99%? Are you sure? I'm absolutely certain levels of useful literacy are far lower than that.

I know I'm beginning to sound like I'm from the 1950s but I do think part of the reason children's grammar and spelling is so bad is that they don't read enough. When I see anyone writing "I should of told him" I immediately think "non-reader" because it is clear the person is writing what they hear and that if they read this phrase it would hit them that they hear "of" but actually it's "have." I think truly literate people who can write well gain the foundation of their skills at school but really build upon them through reading.