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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

to have less and less faith in DS teacher

83 replies

OrlandoWoolf · 30/11/2013 13:24

He has to find some plurals for his spelling test.
Either she's being really clever or she does not actually know.

Dice

As she "has form" on homework mistakes and spelling errors - I suspect she does not know the mistake she's made.

OP posts:
ErrorError · 30/11/2013 15:16

Actually yeah I have never said 'dices' myself, but my response was a little tongue in cheek, meaning to go above and beyond what's required to justify the teacher's expectations. Ah. But if the teacher was referring to the act of dicing food, then 'he/she dices potatoes' would make sense. However, it's the game cube/polyhedra whatever. I'm just confusing myself thinking about it!

thecatlikesmebest · 30/11/2013 15:19

No one uses die as the singular for dice in real life
They do in this house.
Parent of pedants.

noblegiraffe · 30/11/2013 15:23

Ah, those saying 'I do' are on MN and therefore not in real life Wink

Taz1212 · 30/11/2013 15:26

Oh dear, more proof that I am a pedant. I use die for the singular- thought everyone did. Blush

Metebelis3 · 30/11/2013 15:29

NOBLE Yes they do. So long as they aren't illiterate.

FredFredGeorge · 30/11/2013 15:34

You're not even pedants, but anachronistic pedants...

Do you insist on "Much was ate" to?

lljkk · 30/11/2013 15:39

And I only use data in the plural, lol. Dinosaurs we are!

SilverApples · 30/11/2013 15:40

Call summat by the wrong name in a lesson observation, get marked down.
Call summat by the right name, but the observer don't know it, get marked down.
Stuffed both ways really.

YouTheCat · 30/11/2013 15:41

I use die for singular and have done since my d & d days.

Shente · 30/11/2013 15:46

Fredfred, derailing a little but why would it ever be much was ate? Is eaten a new-fangled past participle?

defineme · 30/11/2013 15:47

lljkk do you say 'datum' as singular then?

YouTheCat · 30/11/2013 15:48

I also say datum as the singular.

FredFredGeorge · 30/11/2013 15:55

It was just an example I readily remembered from a good piece on language and how it's fashion not rules really with English Grammar, it was from Jane Austen.

This looks like the piece I was remembering.
opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/09/a-matter-of-fashion/

JohnnyBarthes · 30/11/2013 15:56

But when would you ever talk about a singular bit of data? Actually I think irl that's pretty much how I'd refer to it - as an item of data, not a datum.

Shente · 30/11/2013 15:57

Data isn't really often found in yyther singular - wouldn't one piece of data just be a fact? To be data there needs to be an accumulation of information

lljkk · 30/11/2013 15:59

i would probably say "data point" as the singular. Or "bit of information".
I say criterion a lot, though, using it properly.
tbh, I find handwringing over language change a bit silly, language always changes. I mostly like language changes. It's clarity of communication not set-in-stone convention that matters.

FredFredGeorge · 30/11/2013 16:00

Data is quite often used in the singular as part of "data point" isn't it.

I think the distinction between fact and data is that it comes from research.

MaeMobley · 30/11/2013 16:04

she's a teacher, not God, you don't need to have faith in her!

and I hope you do not share this lack of faith with your DC.

OrlandoWoolf · 30/11/2013 16:35

So - she wants us to find the plural.

So dice is fine. I might just mention that some people use die for a single dice.

Chateau - do we do chateaus or chateaux? Both correct according to OED.

Clergyman, chairman.

Curriculum - dictionary says curricula or curriculums.

This will be an interesting spelling test when they mark it.

OP posts:
complexnumber · 30/11/2013 16:51

As another maths teacher, I always mention the fact that the singular of dice is die.

I then clarify any misconceptions pupils may have with mice, or with the plural of house...

(I am forever referring to 'criterion' and 'criteria' in boring paper work)

mrspremise · 30/11/2013 17:02

I'm no-one. I do not exist. Neither do my ds9 or my ds7. We all know that one die, two dice is correct and use the correct forms. BECAUSE IT IS CORRECT. Just because some people get it wrong doesn't mean it stops being wrong, otherwise we'd all be voting for the BNP, ffs... Angry

BobPatSamandIgglePiggle · 30/11/2013 17:07

Stop looking for something to bash the teacher over.

I do hope you're not critical and negative in front of the children.

OrlandoWoolf · 30/11/2013 17:12

bobpat

This is the 5th thing recently about homework. Talking about homophones that aren't homophones, using split commas in homework, monosyllabic words that aren't and teaching how to multiply and divide by 10 incorrectly.

I am a primary teacher and I don't want to keep having to explain to DS the correct way to do it and why so and so is incorrect.

OP posts:
OrlandoWoolf · 30/11/2013 17:15

And I know enough primary teachers who can't spell, who can't use punctuation and grammar correctly and who can't do "hard" maths. I saw it on my course and I saw it at schools I have worked at.

OP posts:
LifeHuh · 30/11/2013 17:17

Thing is it can be hard to not be critical about a teacher in front of your children when what they are being taught is wrong.

We had a lovely discussion the time DS's science teacher told the class sharks were mammals,like dolphins.We also had a truly awful and misleading homework about prefixes involving matching prefixes to the word where one word was "circus" (related to words like circumference but as far as I know "cir" isn't a prefix.Someone is going to tell me I'm wrong now ,aren't they Grin )and some of the words only worked is you looked at Latin/anglo Saxon...rather off point for Year 3!

I don't diss the teacher personally,but I do sigh a bit.