To think it's embarrassing how English has one of the easiest grammar systems, and yet so many people don't know the basic rules...

[Skyeboat]

I'm a linguist, and the languages I studied have very complex grammar rules compared to English. So much so that native speakers have to memorise verb tables, moods, cases etc. at primary school level, and even those who didn't study to a high level know the basic rules.
English is one of the simplest languages, and yet the amount of native English speakers I see making really obvious mistakes is just embarrassing.
Is the problem that we just don't teach grammar and syntax in school?
For example, I saw a FB post today selling "Teddy's" (as opposed to teddies). That's actually the most common mistake I see - people, even businesses, not knowing how to use apostrophes and form plurals. I'd understand if it was a complicated rule that required memorisation with a lot of exceptions, but it's soo basic. It takes about 10 minutes to learn then you're all set.
I went to a pretty average state school, and I remember they did teach us these things, but we weren't rigorously tested on them or required to repeat them regularly. So I do believe the problem is with a lack of focus on basic English from a young age.
Am I being unreasonable or is this really embarrassing that we have such a poor grasp of our own mother tongue?

It could be correct in some contexts - e.g. "I don't play the piano but I do play the guitar" or for emphasis, e.g. "I do like that". No idea what the tense is.

Grammar is taught in primary school- it's pointless though as it's not then continued through secondary school. I know from seeing it with my own daughter, who passed grammar with flying colours for her SATs, that the knowledge is then lost once they stop studying it regularly.

The SATs requirement for grammar is also an issue because it encourages teachers to teach for the test, which is based on children recalling the correct grammatical terms and identifying them in sentences. This is often taught in isolation to other English lessons and children don't get a feel for correct grammar use. I was never taught what the terms were for different sentence structures etc. when I was at school- you don't need to know what a subordinating clause is etc. in order to use it- but I feel my grammar was better than many people's today.

One of the issues is with children who don't read enough. I have found that those that don't, struggle far more with differentiation between spoken language and written conventions. This is especially true when you are working with children who speak in broad local accents and use commonly spoken grammatically incorrect phrases. If they haven't been exposed to enough conventionally written English they can't make the connection between what they might say and what they should write. I see plenty of adults who never got past this stage.

Again, and OP has made this point several times, this is not about learning English as a foreign language, it’s about native speakers making basic mistakes.

I always told my first year students not to worry because English is easy, apart from its inconsistent spelling. I could have added "...and its large vocabulary", but no need to worry them unnecessarily with that at their stage of learning.

I think house/home/dwelling expresses distinct shades of meaning which are easily grasped and presumably have their equivalents in most languages. Maison / chez soi / demeure for example. (Happy to be corrected on my French, my students always enjoyed doing that!)

Your daughter having a problem with sounding them out is nothing to do with the grammar rule, though, is it? Children generally struggle, in particular, with "to" and "too" until they learn the rule, it's not confined to dyslexics.

Rosetta Stone is not an authority; it's a (pretty bad, in my experience) suite of language-learning software with an SEO-optimised blog.

Re. Grammatical simplicity:
A Czech friend told me that English is simple because it is essentially a pidgin language. I have been told since that this isn’t true. I am no authority on the history of language, but there seems to be a grain of truth in it.

We experienced a military takeover in 1066. Anglo-Saxon leaders and their retinue were either slaughtered or fled (to Constantinople, from where legend says they settled in Crimea). The new rulers spoke Norman French and lived behind castle walls for fear of attack. The general population were forced into their feudal system. Consequently, early medieval writings were in French. But, slowly, over centuries, the small Norman population integrated. English that is recognisable to us emerged in the Middle Ages from the blending of the various dialects of Anglo-Saxon and Norman French. That’s why we sometimes have two or more words for the same thing. You can also tell a lot about society from the fact that French-origin words dominate in some areas and Anglo-Saxon in others. Eg. Beef and pork ( the words for meat / food) are French in origin, but ‘cow’ is Anglo-Saxon and ‘pig’ is a bit of a mystery, but is definitely pre-Norman conquest and might be from before the Anglo-Saxon migrations. It shows that the animal husbandry jobs were done by local Anglo-Saxons and the meat eating was done by Norman lords.

Anyway, I digress. When you have a mix of people who speak different languages meeting and conversing at markets and in other locations then it is inevitable that grammatical intricacies will need to be simplified. But we have kept oddities like a specific order for adjectives: opinion, size, age, shape, colour, origin, material, purpose. We do this without thinking about it. It just sounds right.

It's called the emphatic do. It's not a tense in and of itself.

I went to primary school in Australia in the 60s. We were taught spelling and grammar zealously.

I do think standards of written English have fallen off a cliff edge over the past decade. I feel like I'm constantly coming across unnecessary apostrophes, in particular. Is this in some way due to social media? Texting? Writing too quickly and not thinking? Autocorrect not being grammatically correct? I do think it won't be long before 'there' replaces 'their' and 'they're', for example.

Perhaps people just can't be bothered any longer? Although when they put an apostrophe in a plural, surely that's more effort? Perhaps it's natural evolution of the English language, but it feels chaotic, as if it's contagious.

What is language for? It’s primarily to communicate, so as long as people can understand, why get so pressed by the finer points of grammar? I hated learning it at school. It was tedious and beyond the basics there are more important skills to master. Especially now software can correct written pieces for you.

How many people on this thread don’t know the meaning of the word “linguist”? It has two definitions of which only one is someone who studies linguistics. And it’s ‘who’s studied’ not ‘that’s studied’.

You want language rules to be 'drummed into' people. Is this what language is, something to be imposed? Or is it something we use, something that we own, something that evolves with each generation? I think it's important to encourage children to find joy in books, and to enjoy the craft of getting their message across. Formal 'grammar' lessons crush the joy and confidence out of children and present a very hierarchical view of communication. I was a bit of a pedant like you when I was young; now I'm old as the hills and all that bollox just doesn't seem so important anymore.

People are taught it, but most people simply don't care, and our society doesn't place a high value on language being good, as long as the meaning you want to convey is clear. It does not help that the academic standards required to become a primary school teacher aren't especially high, so some reachers use poor grammar themselves and don't correct examples

My general view is most young people do not read widely enough.

I agree with you op. It was only when learning a second language as an adult that I realised how little I knew about the grammar and construct of my mother tongue, so much so that I didn't have the 'tools' to help me learn a new language.

I am a linguist (studied/working with both foreign languages and also linguistics as a discipline). I would broadly agree with the OP.

Also, do have a look at Y6 SATS. They have a strong SPAG focus and are far more rigorous than anything I did at primary school. They cause some children extraordinary stress.

Muphry's law, not Sod's law. Muphry is enjoying this thread muchly.

It really makes my toes curl. I see a number of professional people, including those in education, who get the basics wrong. Your/you’re too/to their/there🙈it’s embarrassing!

How dare she?? Women really do that?

I didn’t miss the point, neither did other posters. OP said English is not a difficult language, when in fact it’s very complex. Feel better though?

I'd take a minute and and look up Maslow's hierarchy of needs it might help you realise not everyone starts in the same place when it comes to their education. Something that is easy for you might not be for somebody else. I'm sure they're are many things you struggle with that might be easier to others. Never judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree...

There's a difference between speaking and writing. Everyone (apart from people with developmental/acquired issues) masters their first language, but not everyone can spell "correctly".

Also, "we was" is not incorrect. It's just not Standard English. In London/Essex, it's a perfectly acceptable way to speak. As a linguistic, you should know all about descriptive versus prescriptive grammar.

I think wee should speak english like wot we was taut.

The beauty of the English language, as I tell my friends from other countries, is that it doesn’t matter if they get their grammar wrong, because another English-speaker (doesn’t have to be a “Native-English speaker”, either) will mostly be able to understand them.
The same isn’t true of other languages, especially where nouns are gendered (French and German, for example), using the wrong gender can completely throw the (Native-speaking) listener.
Also, I’d like to point out that in written English, especially on SM forums like this one, autocorrect has a lot to answer for!
I do agree that over the years, some have suffered with lack of basic grammar teaching in schools. I certainly suffered with this, as despite having one of the highest scores on my 11+ comprehension and grammar paper, my answers were all intuitive - born of a childhood of being corrected in conversation coupled with a wide range of reading matter from Nathaniel Hawthorne to Enid Blyton to the Brontë sisters and everything in between.

Latin, at secondary school, therefore became a form of torture for me because I couldn’t understand, let alone explain why certain grammar rules should be applied, and I have always struggled to learn other languages as a result of this, so in my experience, my lack of the basics at an early age has held me back to some extent!

Agree with @Seeline .