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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to be fed up with correcting teacher's spelling mistakes

321 replies

dealer · 26/11/2011 23:13

No doubt I will now write a post riddled with spelling mistakes, but I'm not teaching small children in my defence.

I accept, no-one can spell everything, and I would not be surprised if a teacher had to look up stationary/stationery for instance. But I'm really fed up with ones that I would expect children to be able to spell turning up in homework/letters/displays. And I feel compelled to correct them.

Recently we've had Antartica, in huge coloured letters on a display. Got me a very grumpy response since he then felt he had to change it. We've had a work sheet home with Autum on. My son asked for barbecue/barbeque in his spelling book (not sure how to spell it myself) but I think the teacher writing bar-b-q is a bit out of order. And the latest one is the teacher correcting squirl to skwirel on homework. I wrote on it in red 'teacher please correct correctly', possibly a bit snotty of me but I'm getting fed up of it.

Do other people get this? And do they get annoyed? Or AIBU?

OP posts:
Fo0ffysFestiveShmooffery · 27/11/2011 08:58

Yanbu - it's embarrassing but it needs saying. I had to approach my DSs teacher in yr 3 when she twice changed his correct spelling of Trampoline to Tramperline in red pen. It was toe curling but I couldn't let it go.

Dawndonna · 27/11/2011 08:58

My son has AS. At the age of five, he too was correcting his teacher. Sorry, but Hunty's child is not that unusual.

DownbytheRiverside · 27/11/2011 08:59

Exactly, lottiegb.

troisgarcons · 27/11/2011 08:59

andrew

See! no spell checker! Grin

WowOoo · 27/11/2011 08:59

When you tell someone they've made a mistake they feel crap, don't they?
I'd love to know how to point out the errors in a nice way.

Think you should do a whiparound for a great big dictionary. Christmas present sorted.

Andrewofgg · 27/11/2011 09:01

Trois Another poster had address you as triosgarcons while I was posting. It's infectious.

Andrewofgg · 27/11/2011 09:02

Addressed, damn it!

DownbytheRiverside · 27/11/2011 09:02

The reason you should be correcting the error is to help the person making it, not to feel superior or to score points. So it's easy to point out errors in a nice way.
I don't want to get them cross, how will that effect the change I want?

DownbytheRiverside · 27/11/2011 09:04

'Trois Another poster had address you as triosgarcons while I was posting. It's infectious.'

That was me, wouldn't have happened if I'd been writing by hand. I hit the keys in the wrong sequence. IT is not one of my talents.

Andrewofgg · 27/11/2011 09:07

I know, Down, I know. I just wrote Dwon but I corrected it in time.

But teachers should be expected to produce immaculate work, with or without spell-check.

troisgarcons · 27/11/2011 09:07

O/T we have a new A Level English teacher - she scrawls all over the class work because she doesnt like their written style. If I were the kids I'd be dropping the subject - she is just so demoralising.

smartyparts · 27/11/2011 09:08

I am a little Hmm about this.

I simply don't believe the 'skwirel' bit.

Our school newsletter regularly feautures such gems as, ..this will be Wednesday's only Confused

Andrewofgg · 27/11/2011 09:08

Of course when the definition of "educated" included some knowledge of Latin spelling was easier . . . now I am going to get the flameproof jacket out of the cupboard!

DownbytheRiverside · 27/11/2011 09:10

You need a grounding in Anglo-Saxon as well Andrew.

Andrewofgg · 27/11/2011 09:11

Goes without saying. And Greek. And Sanskrit.

WowOoo · 27/11/2011 09:19

Think the problem for me is the fact that some teachers don't like to gracefully admit they have made a mistake.
Ds questioned a 'square' in some homework in the 3rd week of this term. It was a rectangle (4x3cm) and did not look remotely like a square.

Since then, I feel he's been in her bad books and I don't want to make matters worse.

EndoplasmicReticulum · 27/11/2011 09:19

lottie - you are right, and I do check with colleagues if I'm not sure. Practise/practice is my particular problem, but I do know that I am prone to getting it wrong and so check before sending out reports.

I did my training with a physics teacher who was dyslexic - again, he checked everything carefully before sending it home. I do occasionally make mistakes when teaching, I am happy for students to correct me.

I haven't had to get my red pen out much since my children started primary, the letters from the PTA are not great, but the teachers seem competent.

Helenagrace · 27/11/2011 09:20

Sometimes the spellchecker IS the problem. My DS is learning about the great fire of London and the famous diarist Samuel Peeps, according to his KS1 newsletter from school.

AnnaKissed · 27/11/2011 09:20

I am shocked by some of these examples, and I have worked as a teacher and sat through many PP presentations prepared by the head, full of misplaced apostrophes, etc.

The point about repeatedly seeing misspelt words worsening your own spellling is a valid one, I was a language teacher so I was doubly aware of this, however a teacher should know how to check in a dictionary.

In defence of teachers though, they may be deliberately not correcting spelling mistakes, in creative writing for example, in order to not discourage the student and to focus on more relevant feedback. We were sometimes told to do this, but I was incapable of it!

DownbytheRiverside · 27/11/2011 09:24

'Ds questioned a 'square' in some homework in the 3rd week of this term. It was a rectangle (4x3cm) and did not look remotely like a square.'

A square is a rectangle, just a very specific type of rectangle. Smile

Dawndonna · 27/11/2011 09:30

Aaarghhh! Anna, I detest this airy fairy idea of not correcting mistakes. How can a child be expected to deliver a well written piece of work if said child is not given the correct tools.

So glad you were not able to do it.

exoticfruits · 27/11/2011 09:33

As a supply teacher part of my essential kit was a dictionary. Once I have seen a wrong spelling I can get a mental block.

Bonsoir · 27/11/2011 09:39

All the shocking examples of teachers' poor spelling on this thread convince me ever further that the very best way to ensure your children learn to spell correctly is to insist on them reading books very regularly indeed.

exoticfruits · 27/11/2011 09:48

That isn't the answer Bonsoir. My spelling was poor as a DC and my mother was always saying 'how can it be when your head is never out of a book!' I am a fast reader, always have been, and never see the words-it is like going to the cinema in my head.

Bonsoir · 27/11/2011 09:52

It works quite well for a lot of children - at DD's school, where all the children are at least bilingual, the key driver of decent spelling in any language is a lot of reading. For example, a child can be a perfect speller in one language and quite a bad speller in another and when they start reading as much in their second language as in their first their spelling improves in their second language.