On my alma mater's BBS, where I still keep in touch with old friends from college, an apparently new student posted a comment where s/you/u/g and questions didn't end in question marks, etc., and it was generally difficult to read.
I noted that if she had a point, it wasn't getting through, because reading her post gave me a headache, and I couldn't bear to get through it. I wrongly suspected the person might realize from this that communication is a two-way street, that to be understood, you need to be understandable.
She responded that I was overreacting, that there was nothing wrong with how she was writing. I tried to express the idea that most people won't bother to read her posts if she continued, and that they will mostly think of her as a careless, illiterate, sloppy person.
For this, some chastised me, saying all people make language errors, and we shouldn't judge people based on their cultural writing styles.
Flummery! I won't apologize for forming my impressions of people by how they present themselves. Why this is a difficult concept for people to grasp, I do not know.
At some point in the last 20 years, "how a person feels" overtook "whether or not the work is effective" in our school system. Not sure how, or precisely when. But this is the result. We've got a bunch of people who temporarily feel happy, but then go on to lead miserable lives because they aren't told that some things work and other things don't, and that life isn't padded at the corners for their protection.For this, some chastised me, saying all people make language errors, and we shouldn't judge people based on their cultural writing styles.
{sigh}
You don't feel good by ignoring the bad. You feel good by being responsible for all of your outcomes. Why is this so hard to grasp?
Re:2 + 2 isn't whatever you want it to be
ajtaylor on 2002-09-26T14:25:26
Amen merlyn. Say it again brother! How the heck are people going to learn to live in the real world if everything is sugar coated for them? It's a major eye-opener when you realize that sometimes the world is out to get you!Re:2 + 2 isn't whatever you want it to be
mary.poppins on 2002-10-01T09:52:33
It's a major eye-opener when you realize that sometimes the world is out to get you!
Only sometimes? I thought they were *always* out to make a buck off me!
Re:2 + 2 isn't whatever you want it to be
jordan on 2002-09-26T15:39:56
- At some point in the last 20 years, "how a person feels" overtook "whether or not the work is effective" in our school system.
Yes, and it's insidious.
Back when I was a child, we were taught "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never harm me." This good adage wasn't actually taught in schools, but transmitted by society.
My daughter was taught in the public school "Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can break my heart." The clear implication being that psychological damage is far more dangerous than physical assault.
This attitude sets us up for a kind of tyranny, I fear, as nobody will speak for fear of offense and anything you say might be offensive to someone.
Re:2 + 2 isn't whatever you want it to be
gnat on 2002-09-26T17:26:15
Note to self: teach William better versions.Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can break my heartandSticks and stones may break my bones, but words are merely a clumsy discrete representation of a multidimensional continuum of internal images and emotionsandSticks and stones will break your bones and words are how I'll frame your friendsSticks and stones will OW! FUCK! THAT HURT! THAT'S IT, MOTHERFUCKER, YOU'RE DEAD!--Nat
Re:2 + 2 isn't whatever you want it to be
jamiemccarthy on 2002-09-26T16:13:11
Short-term vs. long-term. Put on the game-theory hat. If you're a third-grade teacher, what are your options and payoffs?It's much less of an investment to teach kids to write however they want, restricting spelling/grammar correction to limited times during the year. You don't have to be the ogre, so there's less friction with the kids. You also get more output from them, so it looks more impressive to parents.
The major advantage of teaching kids that grammar and spelling are always important is that, twenty years later, those students will be more-respected.
But you don't see that. Parents don't see that and don't give you credit for it. And you have to do the hard work: explaining why these abstracts are important to young children, enforcing discipline, giving critical feedback. These are all very hard to do. If you're a typical teacher, where's the benefit in this?
Some teachers, sadly very few, believe in the ideals: that teaching is for life, that you teach properly regardless of the immediate rewards or difficulties. I was lucky enough to have some. I can count them on one hand. They changed my life.
Teachers' payoffs will change once everyone realizes that there is no glory in having successfully encouraged a child to be creative. Children are creative. You can do your damndest to suppress their creativity, beat it out of them with a paddle, and they will still secretly write their thoughts and feelings in journals when you're not looking.
If I'm a parent, I don't need a teacher to encourage my kids to write. The teacher is there to help them know how to write -- use of metaphor, story arc, character development, paragraph structure, grammar, and yes, spelling.
As for this particular case, much of writing is knowing a proper degree of formality. I'm not writing this use.perl comment with the same language I'd use for a line in IRC, nor for a paper I'm submitting for peer-review. If you don't have the range across the whole spectrum of formality and correctness, or if you lack the wisdom to pick correctly, you are not as good a writer as you could be.
Re:2 + 2 isn't whatever you want it to be
pudge on 2002-09-26T19:29:04
The teacher I disliked the most in school, was the best at teaching me for life.
I did sorta realize at the time she was a good teacher, but I still didn't like her.:-) Re:2 + 2 isn't whatever you want it to be
kjones4 on 2002-09-26T20:21:42
Hard won accomplishments build self-esteem better and faster than a million pats on the head.Re:2 + 2 isn't whatever you want it to be
jdporter on 2002-09-30T13:44:37
There was a big article in a recent Readers' Digest (not sure exactly which issue) about how cheating is now officially o.k. in a lot of schools. (They were specifically discussing plagiarism.) Idiotic education "experts" pontificate that it's more important to protect and nurture the teacher-student relationship, and that making a big deal of (i.e. penalizing) cheating endangers that relationship.
Not just sad. Disgusting.
Is it any wonder, really, that homeschooling has experienced explosive growth in the last decade?
Re:2 + 2 isn't whatever you want it to be
pudge on 2002-09-30T13:52:28
Several of my nieces/nephews are being homeschooled, or their parents are considering it. We are considering it, too. Homeschooling really seems to have got its footing because of religious reasons; it seems to be taking off because so many affordable schools suck.
Re:2 + 2 isn't whatever you want it to be
mary.poppins on 2002-10-01T09:46:50
Wonderful! (no sarcasm)
The whole concept of forcing a group of children into a holding pen for eight hours or so is pretty heinous. We should not be surprised when people treated in this way periodically do something horrible.
