I am one of those kids/adults with very poor spelling and grammar. Cannot explain why I "didn't get it" in school. I remember writing my spelling words OVER & OVER & OVER as a kid.

If I spent 3-4 hours memorizing my spelling list in high school, I might get an A or B on the weekly quiz but the list was only 20 words or less! There is just something missing in my brain connections when it comes to these things. I also have a relatively small vocabulary. Eric is forever having to define words in my textbooks.

I think part of my grammar problems stem from a traditional southern family with southern speech. No excuse because I was taught the correct form, it just didn't stick. Commas are my worst enemy. My parents supported my love of reading but they didn't read much- don't know if that made any difference.

At least I know I am lacking in these areas and try to keep an eye on things. I also appreciate all of the editing professors and colleagues do on my work. I never get offended when I get something back with lots of edits. I also love that Word tells me I have misspelled something- but sometimes it cannot figure out what I was trying to spell so I am still stuck with the incorrect word!

no help just owning up to being one of those people who drive you crazy :-)

It is complicated, and I don't begin to understand all of it. But here are a few facets of the problem:

The function of the school has become largely custodial.

The education system has become bogged down by legislation. The iron hand of the state and federal governments leaves little room for creativity and innovation.

The teaching profession has attracted some bright, talented, compassionate people, but there are also those who want the 180-day work year and the union benefits, without bringing much to the job. Tenure (a four-letter word in my house) keeps them there. These are the teachers who do not give writing assignments because they don't want to take the time to grade them.

Kids aren't learning as much at home as they used to. In some households they hardly ever have conversations with their parents. Many kids grow up in front of the TV.

I had a conversation on the subject the other day with a friend who is a college professor. He said I shouldn't blame teachers. I certainly don't assign all the blame to the teachers. One of the classes he teaches is on novels. He said ten years ago he could assign eight novels to be read during the semester, but today he could never do that. I told him at the university library where I work, the vast majority of the books have never been opened.

He said today's Bachelor's degree is like the high school dipolma of years ago, a Master's like the old Bachelor's, and a Ph.D. is the old Master's.

I spent years in school with teachers who really loved grammar and discipline. My spelling is terrible, but who cares? I remember endless ditto sheets teaching the difference between there/their,lie/lay, it's/its, etc. Some of it finally stuck. I don't read much, just a few ladies'magazines. I think I write fairly well. I know how to word a formal business letter. Thank you, teachers at P.S. 61 and Ledgeview Elementary. Now, please, don't anyone critique this post. I'm sure you can find some errors if you want to!

I don't have any children in the school system, so I can't really comment on the illiteracy of today's students. But a friend of mine is a reading teacher (sixth grade, I think), and she constantly complains about how unimportant reading is in her school. Here's an excerpt from an email message from her (the previous paragraphs are about some scheduling issues she was having):

ItÂs my SUBJECT that is not respected. For some reason, READING, the MOST IMPORTANT SUBJECT, gets second-class ranking at our school. While all the other regular-subject teachers teach on just ONE team (four classes on a team), the reading teachers teach on a team and a half. All the other subject teachers see their classes 5X/week (or 6X for math and social studies), but I see my reading classes only 4X/week. So everybody else teaching 6th grade has around 100 students; Christine (the other reading teacher) and I have 150.

IÂve been talking to my principal (and anyone else in administration who will listen) about this issue for YEARS, and IÂve even written a 3-page proposal on how to give reading more time in the weekly schedule. But our reading scores are so good every year when we take the hateful "No Child Left Behind" standardized tests (this year we scored FIRST in the county in reading and math, and second in writing!) that I guess itÂs figured that we donÂt need any more time than weÂve been given. I doubt IÂll ever be able to change the status quo.

You can get a good sense of her frustration with the system just from these few paragraphs. I have a feeling that her situation is similar to schools everywhere. That's probably what the school board trustee you spoke with meant by "it's complicated."

In my opinion, parents today aren't as involved in their child's learning as parents of people my age were. Most mothers work now, children are plopped in front of the TV as soon as they can sit up, and older siblings are too busy with play dates and soccer to help their younger siblings with homework. I had the advantages when I was very young of a mother who didn't work and spoke correct English (and insisted her children did, too), and older sisters who taught me to read, write, and count. (I never went to kindergarten, and I was reading at a 3rd-grade level when I entered first grade.) I don't think many of today's students have those advantages at home. And teachers are expected to do too much, because many children aren't "ready to learn" when they start school (they don't speak English well, have behavior problems, etc.).

Just a sidebar: In my technical writing classes in college, I was taught that any document intended to be read by the general public should be written and edited so that it could be understood by people with a 10th-grade education.

I watched a news program the other day, not sure if it was W-5 or what, but it was a special on Rudeness. They explained that a lot of it comes from technology. When we are on the internet in chat rooms or on a message board, we often shorten our words. KWIM? =o) So by doing that, to not only save time typing we forget how to spell. Texting is probably a huge culrpit in that. Everyone types different in text. I find I cut down my words big time, such as 4 (for) u (you) things like that. Also, teachers don't teach phonics the way they should these days. And kids don't read as many books as they should. I find with my 3 kids, the ones who read the most have the best spelling. My younger son makes a lot of spelling mistakes, he hates to read. BUT, that's no excuse for my sisters kids. They read and read and read. But their spelling is horrible! So maybe my theory is wrong so never mind. LOL

They used to focus on spelling, puncuation, etc... Now that my kids are in school they don't care as much. They do get those things but when they are writing themes or whatever they're called now, they don't even correct spelling. I used to go over my kids work for them and correct spelling and punctuation (sp?) errors to show them what they were doing wrong, but they would tell me the teacher doesn't take off for those errors. All they care about is the content of what they are writing about. I never understood that.

But, I have to say my kids are both smarter and have learned ten times what I learned in school. (I know you aren't supposed to start a sentence with BUT, but...LOL...is anyone else self conscience about writing anything on these type of posts? LOL)

I like Alisande's answers. I also think our society has lowered the standards too far. I can tell a student the correct use of a word, or spelling or grammar. But the student sees the incorrect usage reinforced everywhere else around him/her. How can a teacher fight that? Kids learn what they live.

Even when I correct my own kids' grammar, the incorrect is modeled everywhere else around them. They know if they use "good" as an adverb, no one else knows or cares that it's wrong! Only their picky mother will correct it.

I think it compares to the loss of manners in our society. People just don't even expect it anymore.

I will read all the input later when I have more time. This is an interesting question, and one I have asked of our local educational leaders here.

I personally think some of the problem stems from teachers and parents failing to correct spelling errors always. I also think children don't read as much as we did and that reading does develop language awareness, including spelling. I also think spelling comes easier to some people than others with how their brains are wired. (One of Gardner's intelligences is language.)

Emailing and texting make anything acceptable to the younger generation as long as it communicates. I have seen adult students resist correction because what they are doing in a class paper is how they have communicated in email and office memos, and they feel that level of communication should be good enough for all situations.

The Leave no Child Behind program has made it worse..The schools are "encouraged" to move the children through school. They aren't concentrating on making sure each child grasps what's needed before hand. I've seen children in our school district that should have redone Kindergarten, but instead are pushed through and are STRUGGLING by 3rd or 4th grade worse then ever and then at that point they are held back. At that time it's an emotional hit for many kids. Who just check out as they watch their peers move forward a year with out them. And will continue to struggle emotionally and mentally now.
Also in my state..The "assesment" test is taught. Instead of assessing the children on their retention of the curriculum. The Curriculum is the WASL.

To many class rooms are now teaching to the middle/average kid, and the slow learners are being swallowed up..and the fast learners are becoming bored.

We've started to see a small change in that, in our school system here..they are now teaching in flexible groups. Children are tested quarterly on Math and reading and moved around as they need it.

Another thing that I think strikes a big X..is homelife. Sorry but there are so many parents to busy with their own lives and income earning to make sure their children are on tasks.
I've seen that for the last 10 years I've volunteered in the elementary. It's been progressively getting worse each year. More and more children are "caring" for themselves.

~and I'm sure my punctuation and spelling are off. I'm not a speller either and I type like a talk.

As a society, we're lazy! Parents don't discipline or interact with the kids(TV raises them as already stated) or they are 'raised' by the neighbor kids (we've all heard of gangs). Teachers -- for the most part -- are not allowed to teach. First, they have to discipline..and let's don't hurt little Johnny's feelings when he's being an obnoxious brat.

Kids, for the most part, are not read to, let alone parked in a chair or sprawled on the floor with a book to read for themselves. Why read the book when you can watch the movie? It's been mentioned in a previous post that the college instructor can't assign novels. WHY?? Because the students can't, or won't, read?

The sooner we can manage to get govenment out of the classroom (no child left behind is a sore spot with me...some SHOULD be "left behind") and let our teachers do what they're trained to do....TEACH....the better we'll be. In the meantime, we, as a nation, wonder why other cultures are gaining on us. (Climbing off my soap box for now!) :-)

I agree, mostly. I see math being absolutely drilled in to my kids and grammar and handwriting being overlooked. Ours are suffering because of the NCLB act and the fact that we live in a small community with a high number of ESL students. Our school system really caters to the ESL kids and all our extra money goes to programs that help those kids test higher. Higher aptitude scores over all bring in more funding for our school system.

My older son has been an avid reader for years. He and his brother both get A's and high B's. He has excellent grammar and is often the go-to guy when I have a question about how to say or spell something. He helps his brother with his homework whenever he can. But both of them have terrible handwriting and my younger son can't spell himself out of a paper bag. I have always been a stay at home mom and homework gets done before any free time after school. They get a snack then get to work. We correct/ check their homework every afternoon. I can't tell you how many times I have had my kids re write something because you can't read it or it is just too messy. I have told them their teachers might be going easy on them right now but one day they will have a teacher that will mark it wrong just because it is too much work to try and read it.
Well I am STILL waiting for that teacher to come along. NO one grades or corrects grammar or handwriting anymore. When my two have writing assignments, they only get graded on whether they have a proper opening / closing statement and if they made their point. It makes me crazy. Also no one pushes them to do more than what is good enough. They are just happy to have their kids finish the assignments. I find that sad. In math (algebra) my oldest was getting great grades, but when I looked at his grade history I noticed his homework grades were all great but he often failed his tests. Turns out his teacher gave her kids credit for completing their homework and turning it in on time, NOT for how well they were doing. I don't know if she was grading the homework at all. He fell so far behind in that class. He is doing really well now, but it is still a struggle for him, and for us.

I do agree that many (not all) parents are too busy and don't take the time to sit and go over their kids work. That and many also don't have the skills themselves to teach or correct their children's work. JMHO

how ironic you posted while the story is going around about the 13 yo and her text message bill that was the size of a phonebook...if her dad hadn't made sure she was on unlimited texting it would have cost him over $2000...

Here in Texas we say "thank God for Mississippi" or we'd have the absolute worst educational system in the US. I just read that Mississippi's system is now better than ours. Oh, well . . . .
Children do not read, mostly because their parents do not read. Seeing words over and over, used correctly in complete sentences in books encourages correct spelling and proper grammar.
Schools are teaching bicycle safety; emphasizing "personal best" rather than meeting a standard; and the curriculum has been watered down so more dumb kids can pass the dumbed-down tests.
Excellence in sports is rewarded with attention and applause. When was the last time you saw a four column newspaper report on how well a student did on an intellectual exercise?
Improving our schools is only part of the solution. We need to improve our priorities, also.

Susanjf - Did you also see that the 13 year old texter was often texting her best friend that was sitting right next to her? They do that so they can have private conversations.

Marlingardener- Interesting. My cousin is a GATE teacher in Mckinney and says she can always tell when a new student is from California (where I am from) because they are so behind the Texas students. Is that a false statement?