i went to visit a private school today and...

[beforesunrise]

... one of the girls in Y10 or 11 (sorry not sure), explaing her choices of GCSE, said "I chose topic x because that's what i am most best at" none of the teachers present made any attempts to correct her either.

this school costs 13/14k per year and they can't even speak properly??? I was appalled....

Why did donnie and I not come out of this very well?

Did you read Beforsunrise's post? The answer is right there.

I agree with before as well. I would be a bit perturbed by the grammatical error but I wouldn't let it put me off the school. BTW I am English.

I was not singling out the poor girl, rather the fact that IMO the school didn't provide good value for money (I understand that's a bit of a pet obsession in Britain isn't it when it comes to education..)- when there's only 12 pupils per class I would expect each and every one of them to be able to string a sentence together.

And of course I am not perfect in "that area", but I really hope that my children, if they grow up in the UK, will be.

Anyway, to conclude: I didn't like the school so dd won't be going there!

Pippi I think we come from the same foreign country :-)

Yes, I read it and responded to it. I still don't see what point you're trying to make. Are you equating having a different point of view to the OP with 'not coming out of this very well'? Or are you suggesting that because I object to her criticising a teenage girl for not having a perfect grasp of grammar when she doesn't have a perfect grasp of grammar herself that I should in some way be embarrassed? Or are you suggesting that I should feel embarrassed because English is not her mother tongue? I don't; I stand by what I said, and I think that the points I have made are valid.

But feel free to drop by and patronise a little any time you're at a loose end.

slayerette- once again, I was not criticising the girl, I was criticising the school!

maybe the girl has poorly educated parents who can't string a sentence together either.

A wild stab in teh dark, but I think there were probably far more obvious reasons why you didn't liek the school, sunny

I'd have been more put off if the school HAD said something. It would have meant that they cared more about appearances than the children's self-esteem. For all you know they may have made a note to discuss grammatically correct sentences in the next English lesson. And, it's not JUST the school's fault, parents, peers, TV and role models also have a part to play.

maybe if that's all £13 - 14k can muster then you'll have to fork out a bit more cash then. £25k p/a ought to do it.

How much do you know about this child? Do you know her background? Do you know whether she has any learning difficulties? Do you know whether she has english as a second language? Do you know what her family's home language is like? Do you know if she was feeling nervous and a bit out of place on the day? Do you know if she just made a one off slip, as many other teenagers (regardless of their school) do, this time?

If the school had corrected her speech inf ront of visitors I would have been very disappointed in the school and the teachers invovled. It would have been very improper and rude to have done so.

I am assuming this is not the right school for your child.

are we? so what are you doing not joining thetassles/tassels girls !!!

I am a stickler for correct grammar, I act as a proof-reader to scholarly journals and I make a living teaching Latin grammar at university level. However, I am not so ignorant of the difference between a speech situation and written text, that I would write somebody off because a spoken sentence did not come out as it would have been written on the page.

If you have ever read interview transcriptions, you will find that even the most educated people do not speak in completely fashioned sentences- they umm and ah and change the course of what they were going to say halfway through the sentence, ending up with what looks like incorrect grammar.

Very likely the poor girl started off intending to say something else (most interested/most proficient/most keen) and then changed her mind halfway through. As we all do.

I don't think you need to wait until your daughter is a teenager to find this out for yourself; just have somebody do a sneaky tape recording of yourself chatting to your friends when you are least expecting it and you will find out what all linguists know: that the way we speak is not the way we think we speak.

I still don't understand you oP though.

You are horrified that a girl made a mistake.
She may usually speak beautifully but stumbled because she was nevous - or just because we all do occasionally.

My son is at a private school and is the same age as that girl. He is bright, articulate and charming. He is still completely capeable of mangling a sentance when under pressure. As we all do.
I have another son with a severe speech problem.So that also factors in to my touchiness at your expecting this girl to be publicly corrected for what may be a slip of the tongue.
Anyway - more to the point - I agree with pointy and hulababy.

Very odd. You do realize don't you OP that it is actually perfectly normal to make all sort of 'slip ups' in spontaneous speech that you wouldn't make in writing. The nature of spontaneous speech is that you are thinking on your feet so you hesitate, backtrack, use fillers such as 'er' and non-standard grammar. Everyone does it all of the time. If you record yourself you will certainly find that you do it too. What is odd is that anyone would take this as somehow a reflection of someone's grasp of grammar or education etc. Very, very odd. I teach English Language at A Level and have studied linguistics at degree level FYI.

If thats all you had to criticize thank god youre not visiting my ds state catholic school- Jesus,Mary n Joseph yod have been gone by the end of registration.

Maybe the poor girl was nervous. Imagine if it were your child and she came home from school and told you she had been publicly humilated in front of a visitor. How would you feel? I am apparently a high flying city lawyer and there are times when I'm nervous that I speak complete b*llox (some would say all the time ) and I'm a tad older than 13!

When I did the school visits I decided on what I thought of the head (key to a good school) and the general character of the pupils. I didn't quiz them on their grammar and I didn't 'mark' them down if they failed to obey teacher commands immediately. If good grammar is key for you and you think that this poor child was representative of the teaching then it obviously isn't the school for you. One of the deciders for me was that the boys I met weren't perfectly behaved. Polite, yes but also a bit cheeky. Also I could see my ds at the school. As a result he is very happy to go to school every day and moans when it is the weekend or holidays.

Should add that I can make grammatical errors in 5 languages .

I have by now got the general consensus- I am weird and odd and misguided. Also I don't have very good grammar myself, so I am also hypocritical. Oh and I should be earning a lot more money.

I have accepted that she shouldn't have been corrected- that would have been wrong. I completely accept that we all make mistakes when under pressure, that speech is not writing etc. so in many ways, thanks for pointing out the error of my ways.

However, I don't really understand the vitriol tbh. I have said that there were a lot of things I didn't like about this particular school -not the girl, she was fine, she was pretty, she was bubbly, she seemed confident, she just happened to make what in my eyes amounts to a pretty basic mistake in the simplest of sentences. You're all trying to offer interpretations of the facts that shed light on the reasons behind this "slip of the tongue", but I was in the situation whereas you lot were not- so I really would appreciate being given the benefit of the doubt.

Grammar is important to me and while I probably wouldn't have given it a thought in other contexts, in this particular case it was the icing on the cake, which made me decide this school is not for us. End of story.

I have by now got the general consensus- I am weird and odd and misguided. Also I don't have very good grammar myself, so I am also hypocritical. Oh and I should be earning a lot more money.

I have accepted that she shouldn't have been corrected- that would have been wrong. I completely accept that we all make mistakes when under pressure, that speech is not writing etc. so in many ways, thanks for pointing out the error of my ways.

However, I don't really understand the vitriol tbh. I have said that there were a lot of things I didn't like about this particular school -not the girl, she was fine, she was pretty, she was bubbly, she seemed confident, she just happened to make what in my eyes amounts to a pretty basic mistake in the simplest of sentences. You're all trying to offer interpretations of the facts that shed light on the reasons behind this "slip of the tongue", but I was in the situation whereas you lot were not- so I really would appreciate being given the benefit of the doubt.

Grammar is important to me and while I probably wouldn't have given it a thought in other contexts, in this particular case it was the icing on the cake, which made me decide this school is not for us. End of story.

beforesunrise not sure why you posted if you didn't want people to comment. Hope you find yore purrfect skool.

It is the usual story. Poster gets judged on what she actually wrote in the OP, then comes back all indignant because the other posters did not understand that she was actually annoyed at something totally different, which she did not state. Why is it that people cannot learn to state their case clearly in their OPs? Is it something to do with the state of education?

sunrise, stop being so snotty. The majority of people - even the majority of mnetters - will disagree with your op.

And I can't bring myself to say End of Story.

Snotty, now that's one more for my award cabinet.

I am off to bed, the story can continue without me...

Snotty, now that's one more for my award cabinet.

I am off to bed, the story can continue without me...