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Blogs by George E Thompson
Peculiar English Ways 5/1/2008 8:50:08 AM
I just returned from a residency program and have gotten back into the routine of my online course for my doctoral program. Since the course is strictly online, all communication is written and my fellow students and I must read what each other writes in a discussion forum and respond in kind.
One person is consistent throughout her writings. Her subject and verbs never agree! She's not very good at showing possession of objects, either. I can edit what she writes and understand what she is saying, but I have the darnedest time trying to figure out how she got to be a doctoral candidate with such poor grammar.
Granted, spell check in a word processor can do some amazing things and usually will point out subject and verb inconsistences, but it won't catch possessives necessarily. I also don't think she is going to change her ways. We are in our 9th week and she's been abusing the English language since the first day! Those of us who read her response that first day probably just thought her mind was moving faster than her fingers over the keyboard. But, we're prepping to write a 30-page paper in two weeks and I'm sure the instructor will take points off for her grammar mistakes.
I will only stand back and watch this scenario unfold as the travesty it is. If only she would type something, set it aside and then go back to it later to re-read it before submitting, she could at least have a little more perspective about her writing and perhaps catch her errors.
