Rheno747, B.A., M.A., PhD, Hard Knocks U
- 2006-06-29
My students had spelling problems back at my old high school, especially when it came to spelling participles. My answer? I created spelling flowcharts they could use to help them avoid the mind-numbing drudgery of learning spelling rules and all their exceptions. It worked "okay" there, but this idea has really taken off here any my college. My students prefer the flowcharts and claim, at least, that the charts make it easier to learn how to spell words correctly.
I have a collection of about ten flowcharts now. I have flowcharts they can use to spell present participles, past participles, plural nouns, comparative adjectives, superlative adjectives, adverbs, and other "problem" words. These actually function well in my classes.
Robin Day B.Sc. M.Sc. B.Ed.
- 2006-06-28
Your bothered by the metal pencil cases too! Your making another common North American mistake, You're not Your.
Everybody has problems in writing and mine is spelling. I tell my students it is one of the biggest challenges in English. It really is. Here in China the spellcheck won't work (too much delay) and I depended on it.
Its and it's is a difficult rule but just remember to use the ' only when you mean the contraction for it is . You never use it to show posession as in the following sentence.
I have the horse but where is its saddle?
The rule is unusual because it has this exception. Nornally we use ' to show posession but not with its.
I had to check that in a writer's guide so many times to get it right.
A very common grammer mistake that buggs me is the misuse of quotation marks. With computers we can bold words or underline, etc.
On a different note: Yesterday I told my best student that languages are much the same (He didn't believe me.) and that nouns and verbs contain the most important information, maybe 75%-80%. Nouns are vital to begin using and language and verbs come later. That is how I approach a new langauge. They don't intimidate me now. He said,"You mean we don't need grammer?". We don't need grammer, not for basic communication in the early stages of learning.