What is correct SPAG?

[Jess]

I like teachers!

Anyway, back to topic!

Yes, I think you are correct. We were told about these tests you have to take when you are from a non-English speaking country and want to study in ie. the US last fall (as I study English at the university). There are different parts to the test, focusing not merely on grammar and the ability to write English but also if you can communicate orally. Most Western people have no trouble with this - at least here the teachers aim for lessons where the students take an active part, eg. talking and using the language, whereas Japanese and Chinese students are not used to this. All they do is learn the verbs!

What you said about shrinking vocabulary is true. We are told that a wide variety of words is nice in an essay and therefore at least I look up synonyms in dictionaries when writing. I know most of the usual, but I don't want to use the same word too many times. Now, I have always been told that I have a very wide vocabulary, and I always score well in spelling/vocabulary/ability to communicate my arguments, but I guess I will never match up to a native speaker.

That's not true! Looking at your posts, I, for one, would never have guessed that English isn't your mother tongue!

I think that if English people were taught in the same manner as those who learn English as their second language, we'd be a hell of a lot better! In the UK, all the teachers seem to care about (in my experience at least) is making sure that everyone passes the exams. Now, I know that these exams are meant to test students' ability and competence in English, so in theory the teaching should be sound, but I think we are taught by 'rote' ie merely writing things in each section of the exam to 'please' the examiner and not to improve our own linguistical abilities. So therefore, when exams are over many students leave school with a very poor standard of written and aural English. If the emphasise was less on exams and more on 'learning' then I do not think that this would be the case.

[MarMar]

I see what you mean. I took a course in English Literature after 1950 in the spring semerster, and when I in the mid-term exam wrote about how Doris Lessing's The Summer Before the Dark can be seen as a novel about female self-discovery and realisation, I summed up all my arguments into the coclusion. When I got it back, the professor had written "I do not agree with this" and nothing more about my conclusion - it all ended with me writing what I knew he would want me to write, eg what he thinks in the final exam.

[Jess]

That's shocking! So just because he didn't agree with your arguments he penalised your essay? Grrr!

[MarMar]

I got an A, but it's still frustrating. I though, ignorant as I am, that we shall think for ourselves. Obviously not when you have a professor who's been teaching the same book for the last 20 years.

[katya]

I hate lecturers like that. It bugs me because the study of literature is all about personal responses. I was quite lucky in that my lecturers were all really open-minded, and so long as we could back up what we said, it was fine.

[MarMar]

There were no notes about a lack of arguments, so it was simply that he didn't agree. *Growls*

[katya]

Did he offer any comments at all? Or did he just say that he didn't agree?

[MarMar]

They do this spread-sheet, so it was A on everything (grammar, vocabulary, arguments etc etc), so I suspect that my conclusion was better than anything he could manage to come up with.

[katya]

My essays always came back with comments all over them. It could be quite dis-heartening at times!

[John]

Since I retired a few years ago I do some work in the adult trade training sector. If you think Mercury Girl's experience with University lecturers is bad you should see this. In order to get accreditation students have to reproduce the exact words used in the text books and all assessment are marked by computer!!