Wow, thankfully I'm not the only one who circles errors in newspapers and magazines and such.
Quote:
Originally Posted by djchameleon
Some people feel like grammar isn't important with online activities because of the informal setting but it sucks for the kids that spend so much time online writing informal then make the same errors when handing in a paper.
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I hate that so much. I'm a peer tutor for essay writing and students come to us (it's a writing clinic thing) with their essays and short written assignments so we can edit them and guide them with their writing. I've read term papers on everything including medicine, chemistry, history, music, political science, etc and you'd be surprised at the amount of issues with grammar, syntax, diction, all that stuff that I find. Keep in mind that these are 18-25 year olds in university, writing this stuff. None of them are ESL students or have learning disabilities (all those people go to a different place for help). To get into university in Ontario, you need at least a 70% (or C+/B-), meaning that with those grades you should have some kind of grammar skills. Many of them will give an excuse like, "I'm a chemistry student, I don't need to know proper grammar". Yeah, right.
I think it's getting worse now, with younger people using "txt spk" and whatever. They're not always applying the proper grammar skills that they will need later in life, in a professional or academic environment. As somebody who is an aspiring school teacher, it really upsets me.