to want my child's teacher to understand how apostrophes work!!!

[intothenever]

DD is writing things like 'She live's in a house' and has been taught that the plural of potato is potato's! I am getting really pissed off!

I was reduced to silent fury after sitting outside ds's classroom looking at an inspirational poster with a banner saying "Standing on the shoulder's of giant's". I felt I had to say something because I thought it appalling that pupils would be walking past that every day thinking it must be correct, so I mentioned it to the teacher when we went in. She pretended it was nothing to do with her, and I pretended to believe her. As it happened, it worked out quite well because she obviously then felt she couldn't make too much of an issue about ds's preference for being cold rather than wear his scratchy school jumper. And the poster apparently got corrected

Imagine 30 year 4 children all writing a story.
How much correcting would you expect?
What would you expect to be corrected?

I would expect anything to be corrected that was wrong.

Writing "see me" is not acceptable these days. In an SLT book scrutiny, or an OFSTED inspection, it is expected that an inspector can pick up any child's book, see formative, comment-based marking, the child's response to that marking, and then progress, based on the marking, in the next piece of work.

Sorry Orlando but I am quite mystified by your argument.

If my daughter wrote 'I sw mn' and the teacher did not correct it I would find that utterly bizarre.

intothenever

So you would expect every punctuation error, spelling and grammar error to be corrected in a 2 page story?

That's a lot of corrections for some people.

At what point is a piece of writing too long to reasonably expect a teacher to correct the errors?

intothenever - doesn't often happen. I teach secondary. Some of the literacy levels of the children I have in Yr 11 are dreadfully low. If they write an evaluation of their practical work (I teach Performing Arts) and I corrected anything that was wrong, it would take a very long time, would render their work unreadable and would be no guarantee that they would do it correctly next time. I correct subject-specific and recurring spelling mistakes, and mark against our literacy policy (for example, I would indicate that there was an error in grammar or syntax, that a new paragraph was needed or a word or letter was missing, using the codes that the students are familiar with, but wouldn't correct everything)

I recently went to view a school for DD1. On the wall in the room they'd set up to host the event was a display with a luminous orange sign carrying a spelling mistake. For the whole of the head teacher's briefing, which included wonderful comforting sentiment about high standards and attention to detail, the only thing I could see was a giant day-glow error. I had to conclude that the head either a) doesn't notice the information displayed on the walls of her school or b) can't spell.

The last time I was in DD1's current school there were two errors written up on the white board (both spelling mistakes).

Is it really so difficult? I despair at such low standards and the apparent indifference to such mistakes.

intothenever - in some cases, the teacher would end up writing the whole piece out again. It's not practical and is not an effective way for the student to learn.

Thing is - she might not even be able to read the correction. She has heard the initial sounds and will progress to getting the middle sounds. I'd probably write down underneath what it said - but I would probably not have the time to speak to 30 children and show them the correction and ask them to read it.

Marking work shouldn't mean editing it until it is correct: that isn't useful.

It would bother me if my child's writing was corrected incorrectly and I would expect mistakes to be corrected where possible.

I don't think it would worry me about incorrect use of apostrophes at that age as it is a descriptor for L4 writing 'correct use of apostrophes for possession and contraction' so plenty of time to get it right but teaching it incorrectly is awful IMO.

Teachers should have a high quality knowledge of SPAG if teaching English but mistakes in quickly done hand written notes (or on internet forums) is not a massive issue.

I'm an ex-teacher and now volunteer in school.
Some of the TAs are shocking for confusing your/you're.
I do agree that young children's work should not be over corrected though, as it's demoralising for them to see their efforts "ruined" by the teacher's writing - and overwhelming in expecting them to take on board many corrections/rules (especially if they cannot read the corrections correctly!)

If a child wrote

"I whent to a partee and ayt sum cack", then I would probably only correct the went and some, as these are common words. I might also write something like "I like cake too" which shows the correct spelling of cake, but in a friendly encouraging way - not an off putting one.

It's very very common for children to put apostrophes wherever the see an s at the end of a word. This doesn't mean they are not being taught the correct way to use them. For some reason kids get really confused about them.
I would not correct every mistake when marking for younger children. It can be very discouraging for them. By the time they hit year 5 and 6, yes I would pull them up on every basic misuse.

Sorry I meant mistakes corrected where appropriate not possible.

intothennever

For some pieces of writing, we use detailed editing. Pupils read their work - or a friend reads it. They check for punctuation - like capitals and full stops. Words they are are unsure about are highlighted and checked in a dictionary. They highlight errors they think they've made, check and then redraft.

No one corrects everything in anything they mark.

You don't even comment on all the issues on stuff you come across in work you mark at university. It's about seeing where the student is and giving them support and advice to improve. So you'll ignore a lot of stuff in something getting a 35 and concentrate on the really fundamental problems. If you pointed out all the issues, the student would be utterly overwhelmed. I'm not going to worry too much about apostrophes in an essay where the student clearly doesn't understand what paragraphs are for, for example.

'revise apostrophe use, here and throughout' is one of my most often used marking comments.

Well, I write similar things a lot too. But when faced with students who don't seem to be acquainted with the concept of an argument and write without any paragraphs or entirely in single sentence paragraphs and various other dreadful problems, commenting on the apostrophes would simply become white noise and detract for what I need to student to concentrate on.

They can pass with crap grammar and spelling; they will find it harder without any idea what the essay topic is. The threshold for passing is incredibly low. We're supposed to ask ourselves, 'is there any evidence that this students has learned anything whatsoever, however minimal, from the course?'. If we answer is 'yes', we must award a 40. It's a wonder any of them manage to fail. Yet, they do.

But this is a long way from 4 year olds and emergent writing. Even if it doesn't always feel as far as it should. The point is, that it's almost always best to prioritise feedback so it can be most useful, whether you're working with small children or adults.

Oh yes, sorry, I was actually agreeing with you really, in that it makes more sense to comment briefly on a repeated issue and focus more on more significant issues with structure, referencing, argument etc than it does to waste my time basically re-writing an essay until it looks the way it would if I'd written it!

I always remember a story I heard. A student had written a lovely description about his dead Dad. The objective was to use descriptive words to paint a picture of someone.

The only comments were - remember to use capitals and full stops. Plus some spellings corrected.

I teach secondary. Some of the literacy levels of the children I have in Yr 11 are dreadfully low. If they write an evaluation of their practical work (I teach Performing Arts) and I corrected anything that was wrong, it would take a very long time

Don't you think that is because they weren't taught properly in primary school?

Writing "see me" is not acceptable these days.

Seems to me we've found one of the reasons why literacy levels have plummeted right there. I would have thought that having a brief opportunity to engage with a pupil 1:1 and check that they've actually understood something that has been taught would be invaluable.

I understand the theory behind emergent writing (I'm a teacher) but I disagree with you nanny, I don't think we are getting it right or otherwise we wouldn't be so very far behind in literacy standards.

Before teaching I worked in HR and the standard of English in the CVs and application forms we received was truly shocking.

I'm not sure what the answer is but it's not what we're doing now.

Orlando I agree that is sad , however most of the time students are not writing about parents who have passed away and therefore it is acceptable to correct their spelling and grammar