Tuesday, June 24, 2014
Medill "F!"
Uh-oh. It looks like some of this year's graduates of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern had a typo on their diploma. Not a huge, Damn You Autocorrect type typo, but still, not so good-- they spelled the word "integrated" as "itigrated."
What's fascinating about this is that students at Medill traditionally have gotten a failing grade on any work that contains a misspelled word or grammatical error (obviously, I am not a Medill student or graduate).
As someone who is terrible at grammar but still manages to get stuff written, I have always seen this as overly harsh. Maybe this will give them permission to loosen up a little?
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My daughter is taking a grammar class this summer, and I am realizing how little I know. How on earth am I doing my job?
I don’t know about misspellings but grammar error terror is real. Bad grammar is a pet peeve engrained so deeply by my mother it took me a month before I actually started to talk when I came to America. When I went for my US citizenship exam it was the subject-verb disaccord of the federal officer examiner that saved me from that cold sweat feel, one “you was” erased all anxiety and made the rest a breeze. My mother’s grammar snob was born in another language. Anyway, regardless of grammar trauma one has to agree that if bad grammar happens it cannot come from a journalist.
I went to the same schools as Mark growing up and they did not teach grammar. I learned more on School House Rock than in the class room and in French class. That said my writing skills improved greatly when I first started using Word and turned on the Grammar check. I mix my tenses within paragraphs and this program alerts me to problems so that I can make adjustments.
Teachers HATED teaching grammar... and the 1960's and early 1970's ethos on freedom of expression seemed to make them think they didn't have to. I took English courses in High school that focused on everything EXCEPT grammar -- until I ran into Ms. Seymour second semester Junior year. She drilled us on the rules we should have learned in 7th grade, or earlier.
My Grandmother discovered my woeful ignorance of the subject right before 7th grade. I was put into my cousin's (teacher) class to remedy this. We made a deal - If I could pass her grammar exams at some point during the year, I could spend the rest of the year reading during English class. By December, I was in book heaven!
I had the meanest Grandmother in town - made me learn grammar, spelling, double entry bookkeeping, and typing to 80 WPM. Cruel child abuse!!!! I have since been grateful for all of the things I hated to learn.
Lee
I had the meanest Grandmother in town - made me learn grammar, spelling, double entry bookkeeping, and typing to 80 WPM. Cruel child abuse!!!! I have since been grateful for all of the things I hated to learn.
Lee
# posted by 
: 12:25 PM
: 12:25 PM
Suggest Karen Elizabeth Gordon's very witty little books "The Deluxe Vampire: The Ultimate Handbook of Grammar for the Innocent, the Eager, and the Doomed" and "The New Well-Tempered Sentence: A Punctuation Handbook for the Innocent, the Eager, and the Doomed."
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# posted by : 12:28 PM
: 12:28 PM << Home
