A* in GCSE English but can't spell - even at Harrow!

[speedymama]

I sniggered when I read this .

I thought that one of reasons that parents pay exorbitant fees for the privilege of sending their children to private/public schools was that the smaller classes enables pupils to receive more attention from their teachers. Maybe they need to concentrate on teaching the children the basics as well as intensively coaching them to pass exams to maintain their position in league tables.

I congratulate the head of English on his candour though - he could have easily come out with some spurious line that the education his pupils receive far exceeds that of the proletariats in the state sector. I do wonder however, that if he is the head of English, wasn't this problem evident through the course work and essays that pupils write before they embark on taking their exams?

I don't think you can communicate without accuracy. And clearly, given that I can charge a fair bit to disentangle other people's writing and rewrite it, a lot of organisations agree.

And saying 'spellcheckers can do the job' is like saying you don't need to know your multiplication tables because calculators can do the job, I think - you need to know how these things work.

nooka I have visions of someone inventing a nuance checker

with a little pop up saying do you really want to tell the CEO that and a "suggested alternative"

except of course it would also be a software programme written by a computer geek and end up with babelfish problems...

Frankly at my children's primary school, the head can neither spell, punctuate nor write coherent prose. Dd1 amuses herself by re-writing the headteacher's weekly newsletter in comprehensible and accurate English -- I'd like to think he writes badly on purpose for just this reason, but I fear that is not the case.

but you don't need to know how to do long division or work out percentages because you can use a calculator

you need to know how to do that and how to use a dictionary/thesaurus and even fowler's use of English if necessary or delegate

I think a fellow hack and I traumatised our school staff at our polite criticism of a misplaced apostrophe in the Dad's (sic) Newsletter . Admittedly that wasn't what the parents' evening was for....

frogs is he a good leader and manager, does he have good relationships with outside agencies etc etc?

I don't agree! You do need to know how to do long division. And to know what a percentage is and how it's worked out. Otherwise the world is just a kind of soup of numbery things swirling around there. They aren't rocket science.

Spelling is a pig, I totally agree; I frequently find myself trying to explain or excuse the variety of the English language to my five year old as she picks her way along the lines of a book. But grammar isn't. It's a set of rules and structures by which the language is constructed.

Lovely stuff, language. Fabulous stuff. And to use it and play with it and enjoy it, you need to know how it works.

I can't remember any of my times tables apart for 2 and 10.

And my spelling is not good either. And I wasn't taught much grammar and didn't bother teaching myself. But I genuinely think I am generally a good communicator. I get by pretty well with the help of the dictionary and spellcheckers and my ear usually tells me when something sounds really wrong, I think. Am I just kidding myself?

I do try to get over myself, I really do. And I accept that it is possible to have a happy and fulfilled life without developing a nervous twitch every time someone confuses 'disinterested' with 'uninterested'. Or utters a construction like, 'He told my husband and I...'

But all the same.

I don't agree over long division or percentages..

I did learn how to do them, just like I learned logarithms and how to use a slide rule but I have long since forgotten

in fact I can scarcely remember why you would use log tables

but I use a calculator everyday to do the work for me

I enjoy language too. I used to place a much greater sense of importance on spelling, but i think there is quite a sea change going on at the moment which hasn't happened in our language as suddenly probably since Caxton.

Confession - I cannot remember how to do long division. Well, I can remember that wierd bracket thing, so could probably have a stab at it but not confident! Can do percentages without blinking, though.

OLP, you make a very good point about checking the dictionary. So many people apparently can't be bothered. It's not hard, there are free online dictionaries, it must be that people just don't care. Which is very sad.

Zippi, you may well be right, although it's always impossible to judge until afterwards. But that's no reason to neglect the teaching of spelling and grammar, which is what the OP was about. That doesn't prevent people explaining that language changes, or talking about different versions of spoken English.

Ben Zephaniah's poetry, for instance, is easily understood but not in standard English (impossible to read aloud without sounding like a tit if you aren't of Carribean descent, though). And I do have traumatic memories of having to study the plays of, I think, Arnold Wesker, who wrote in Norfolk dialect. For a child growing up in the North, it was really hard to understand!

I think the article was taking the piss out of GCSEs rather than making a point about Harrow per se. I took the artilce to be saying "GCSEs must be totally useless and crap now if thick as two short planks Jonny Whitherington-Horsey from Form 5C and his equally dim mates can get an A*"

Good point Piglit!

gcses have course work and opportunities to draft, mark and resubmit so very often the work is going to reflect that process.

Harrow is going to work very hard to see that their pupils get those grades regardless of ability/skill.

I suspect that there have always been plenty who don't learn these skills but before they didn't get the grades because that aspect was a)marked and b)it was a timed exam.

Completely agree with edam et al. It is essential to be able to spell and write properly, and if anything more so in science than anything else. There are endless examples of words that mean the precise opposite of each other when spelt very slightly differently. Proof reading won't help if hypomethylation has been written instead of hypermethylation, because the paper will never have reached publication stage. Precision is essential.

But in that case tamum then the scientist just wouldn't be using those words unless he was spelling them correctly..that's different

and you don't generally learn those distinctions at gcse, if you did/do then they would be precisely explained/taught

No, I agree it's not going to be taught at GCSE, but if you give all children the impression that spelling isn't important it would be nigh on impossible to reverse. Don't really get the first point I'm afraid.

sorry I meant a hypothetical scientist wouldn't be working in his field unless he appreciated the difference between hyper and hypo and would be well aware that he needed to spell them correctly

I'm not saying that spelling should be done away with I'm interested in the theory that it is not as much a prime concern in communication as you might imagine. And I have advocated pretty strongly the use of tools to help you write accurately ie a dictionary etc

Well, I understand, but it's just that I see that kind of error constantly in exam papers written by students who haven't been taught to spell properly. It's impossible to award marks just because they're saying the opposite of what you think they probably mean.

I don't think that is a spelling error it is an error in understanding and learning as they mean quite different things..

I would think the onus was on the teaching to emphasise that distinction.

That is an interesting example because I would wish anyone who was diabetic to be educated in the difference between hypoglycaemia and hyperglycaemia. And if they had a tendency to muddle the two then simply say lowered or raised blood sugar level.

Most people are familiar with the word hyperactive as being too active and I would use that as a way of remembering.

I'm sure I learnt about hypo and hyper when I was at school - it's not that complicated a concept. And I've seen intelligent people get them wrong, as a simple mis-spelling rather than lack of understanding.

Agree with Zippi that context is usually helpful in understanding even where there are spelling mistakes. But not always. And poor spelling plus poor grammar can make it very difficult to grasp what someone is trying to say ? if they aren't clear about the subject of their sentence, for instance, or about past, present or future tenses (never mind anything more complicated).

Message withdrawn

I think in science, you tend to learn these opposites together, eg hydrophobic, hydrophilic. So you know both, and have to remember which is which rather how to spell just one.

In other areas, you may only have come across one of them. Or different versions eg euorphile and eurosceptic. In fact one of my pupils did once suggest hydrosceptic as the opposite of hydrophilic.

europhile

check spelling on threads about spelling!!!!!

LOL at hydrosceptic, have an image of someone looking sternly at a glass of water.