What is correct SPAG?

[Marieh]

That's why we have this thread!

And because we don't want "txt"-language on our forum

[MarMar]

I know I'm gonna score a lot of negative stars on this, but... I'm getting so fed up with people who seem to be unable, or just too lazy, to write 'I' (as in first person singular) the correct way - as a big I. Not i. I. I! I!

I thought this was something you learned as a very young child, I know we did, and I'm not even from an English-speaking country. Is it just laziness?

[sarahandkatie]

I know I'm gonna score a lot of negative stars on this, but... I'm getting so fed up with people who seem to be unable, or just too lazy, to write 'I' (as in first person singular) the correct way - as a big I. Not i. I. I! I!

I thought this was something you learned as a very young child, I know we did, and I'm not even from an English-speaking country. Is it just laziness?

I think perhaps that for people to want their forum to ' look nice' they shouldn't focus too much on spelling and grammer and just on text speak. I don't see what the problem is in not having put a full stop or missing a capital letter out as long as people can undastand. Alot of people in this world have problems spelling and not using grammer and it is just life. To see a topic on spelling is disheartening to those of us with speeling difficulties, and makes some people feel bad. It will eventuallie cause people to stop wanting to write on the forum. I for once am scared of checking my pms incase there's a message from one of the mods 'shouting' at me. I know they are only doing their jobs and trying to keep the forum nice. But I know when I got the pm going on at me, not only was it long and scary to read it was also very disheartening. A long pm comes in your messages telling you you are not spelling correctly or using your grammar. I think the only time people should pull you up is in school or at college where ever you are learning to write, not when you are using a forum to talk about something you like. It's aa leisure thind not a school, or at least i thought so. I am very dissapoointed that such actions are being takem when people just want to talk about home and away etcetera. I know these are harsh words but it is how i feel. I for one will not be usinf the forum too many times for fear of showing myself up or being told off for spelling wrongly.

[MarMar]

I know not referring to people with dyslexia or other difficulties. We have many members with different learning, reading and writing-problems and for most part, we know who they are, and they will not receive warnings. If you have dyslexia or other problems it's best to let a moderator or administrator know so that it can be made a note of in the moderator section for future reference.

What I was referring to is the members who just don't bother.

Now, you can take it whichever way you want. Some choose to take everything personally and to be honest, I don't care if you or anyone else do.

[Cal]

I hate 'i'.

I know when I got lazy one time and I didn't put a capital 'i' in my posts, I got a warning, a friendly warning - because they knew I could write normally, but was just being lazy.

[Zetti]

I think perhaps that for people to want their forum to ' look nice' they shouldn't focus too much on spelling and grammer and just on text speak. I don't see what the problem is in not having put a full stop or missing a capital letter out as long as people can undastand. Alot of people in this world have problems spelling and not using grammer and it is just life. To see a topic on spelling is disheartening to those of us with speeling difficulties, and makes some people feel bad. It will eventuallie cause people to stop wanting to write on the forum. I for once am scared of checking my pms incase there's a message from one of the mods 'shouting' at me. I know they are only doing their jobs and trying to keep the forum nice. But I know when I got the pm going on at me, not only was it long and scary to read it was also very disheartening. A long pm comes in your messages telling you you are not spelling correctly or using your grammar. I think the only time people should pull you up is in school or at college where ever you are learning to write, not when you are using a forum to talk about something you like. It's aa leisure thind not a school, or at least i thought so. I am very dissapoointed that such actions are being takem when people just want to talk about home and away etcetera. I know these are harsh words but it is how i feel. I for one will not be usinf the forum too many times for fear of showing myself up or being told off for spelling wrongly.

I agree with everything that was said there. I am not the worlds greatest speller so spelling causes problems.

[Marieh]

I know I'm gonna score a lot of negative stars on this, but... I'm getting so fed up with people who seem to be unable, or just too lazy, to write 'I' (as in first person singular) the correct way - as a big I. Not i. I. I! I!

I thought this was something you learned as a very young child, I know we did, and I'm not even from an English-speaking country. Is it just laziness?

That was one of the first things I learned when we started english in 3rd grade (..?) and I still remember the teacher telling us that .

And I don't really see how much time you'll lose by clicking shift+i at the same time

[freakybuffy]

I know not referring to people with dyslexia or other difficulties. We have many members with different learning, reading and writing-problems and for most part, we know who they are, and they will not receive warnings. If you have dyslexia or other problems it's best to let a moderator or administrator know so that it can be made a note of in the moderator section for future reference.

What I was referring to is the members who just don't bother.

Now, you can take it whichever way you want. Some choose to take everything personally and to be honest, I don't care if you or anyone else do.

I'm dyslexia, but it's not something i like to tell people as you get treated differently and i bet a lot of other people feel the same.

To see a topic on spelling is disheartening to those of us with speeling difficulties, and makes some people feel bad. It will eventuallie cause people to stop wanting to write on the forum. I for once am scared of checking my pms incase there's a message from one of the mods 'shouting' at me

I totally agree, I was the same after my first warning, as i don't want a second, third warning then to be banned the forum.

[Si-Co]

It's hard to know how to respond here, because I really think some members are misunderstanding the SPAG issue.

If we are aware a particular member has dyslexia or another learning difficulty, or if English is their second language, we will always take this into consideration before issuing a friendly PM or formal warning about spelling, punctuation or grammar.

Spelling is not our primary concern - no-one is perfect and all we ask is that members do their best to spell a word correctly.

The 'punctuation and grammar' issue is when a post is difficult to undertand because sentences or phrases aren't separated so it all just looks like one long sentence. Also, not using capital letters for character names and (as mentioned above) for the pronoun 'I' often comes across as laziness, rather than a learning difficulty. It is for these sort of posts that I normally send a friendly PM explaining what is expected.

I will post the template I normally use below, which in my humble opinion is not 'shouting' at a member or attempting to make them feel inferior:

Hi (member name)

This is just a friendly PM to remind you of our 'SPAG' rule, that is when posting please try to use correct spelling, punctuation and grammar, eg. start sentences with capital letters and end them with full stops, etc. Please also use capital letters for character names and the names of songs. etc. This also applies in topic titles, (eg. 'Beth and Tony' looks better than 'beth and tony'). Avoid using 'text speak' such as 'b4', 'u' or '2moro'.

The main reason we ask this is because posts without proper punctuation or those using text speak can be very difficult for others to understand, and they also make the forum look amateur-ish and untidy.

We appreciate that some members find it more difficult than others to use correct SPAG for various reasons, and we will always take into account any learning difficulties or similar before we give out warnings. However, we can't do this unless we know about the situation, so please feel free to PM any of the moderators if there is anything you would like us to be aware of.

Please take a moment to check out the Forum Rules . I hope you continue to enjoy reading and contributing to Back to the Bay.

Kind Regards

Si-Co (Moderator)

We are aware that many members try their best to adhere to the above anyway, and 'doing your best' is a personal thing and is obviously different for everyone. If we believe members are doing their best, they won't receive warnings from us.

It is when members appear to be showing little or no effort that action will be taken. This is mainly when they fail to correct typos (NOT spelling mistakes) or use no punctuation (full stops etc) at all.

For example: "Jack talked to Martha about the choclat muffins in the refrijerator' is perfectly acceptable (even though two words are spelt wrong)

"jack talked to Matrha aboutt he chocolate muffinsin the refridgerator' is not really acceptable - because a quick proof-read after you've typed it makes it obvious there are several typos. If you notice a mistake after posting, hit 'edit' and then correct it (I've done that about five times after posting this!)

If we don't 'act' (ie. by sending a polite PM like the one above) then those members will believe it's acceptable to continue posting like that.

Please respond. We are interested in hearing members' feedback.

[Cal]

I don't think I got a PM that long from you, Si.