[BITList] Education: pupils will lose marks for poor grammar andspelling - Telegraph

[Michael Feltham]

Hugh,

From 39 to 43 I was living in Kilmarnock with my brother, staying at an Aunt's house.  I went to local schools and the two of us returned to England in 43 to a town in Lancashire called Colne.  I was a year ahead of pupils in Colne for my age.  Is Scottish education still better than in England ?

Certainly the Tawse kept me in order and learning !

Mike
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On 20 Nov 2010, at 11:09, HUGH wrote:

Mike,
 
You forestalled me.  I got to sleep around 1.30am this morning - younger daughter and elder granddaughter were staying the night and watching Children In Need on TV with Janet.  We needed decent coffee, milk, bread for toasting, toilet roll and tinned grapefruit so, despite feeling nackered, I got up and walked down the hill to the Coop for these items.  The Telegraph headline caught my eye, but it was high up and not well placed for reading the article.  I bought the Herald, and there is nary a word about the matter in it, not even a badly spelled one, so can I assume pupils up here will still be allowed full marks for illiteracy in all its forms?  I hope not.
 
Ever since spelling was invented there have been people unable to spell, and many people have a small number of words they always have to look up, so are we talking here about a relatively new development in which large numbers haven't a clue about grammar and are unable to spell?  By the time it's apparent pupils can't spell, etc, it's probably far too late to do much about it.  I learned to spell over a number of years between the ages of (say) 7 and 11, by memorising a dozen or so words every night for an oral exam the next day.  I no longer have the spelling book, but I've still got the dictionary in which we had to look up the words - Chambers Etymological English Dictionary.  Peer pressure was one factor that dictated progress - the thought of not knowing how to spell "reconnaisance" was a powerful incentive to memorise it, knowing every other young bugger was secretly memorising the long words of 3 and 4 syllables at the end of the book.  Also,  top in the daily test got first pick at the books in the small library at the back of the classroom.  Formal grammar came mostly in high school, before that we learned what I'd describe as style - between the ages of 10 and 11, I (with my classmates) was submitting a "composition" a day on one of a list of set subjects, or own choice.  We got one a week, but it was written in class on one afternoon.  That was Chapelton School, with its old fashioned desks and methods - my father and grandfather sat on the same seats before me.
 
So, they'll take 5% of marks off for bad speling?  I can't work that out.
 
Hugh.
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