I took my GCSEs in 1990. I got an A for English and yet my grammar is terrible. It was the year of ‘anything goes’. My English teacher had been instructed that you could not mark students down for poor grammar (or spelling or punctuation) if it did not impede the comprehension of the piece in question. Unfortunately as a professional the world is not quite so forgiving. Children were sent out into the world of work without the skills that they needed to write without embaressment. Luckily I read a lot and mainly manage to write in a way that is comprehensable even if I don’t know why…
Affect and Effect
I’ve just found out that these words actually mean different things. I’m very excited as it will prevent lots of professional embarrassment. I had had it explained to me that they were verbs or past participles or something but as I had no idea what these mean it didn’t really help. Feeling rather desolate about a writing project that will engulf much of my summer and would require both words to me used often I looked them up in the dictionary and discovered that they are not different forms of the same word but different words. As they have different meanings its fairly obvious were you would use one or the other.
Affect: make a difference to
Effect: a result or bring about a result
Obviously I’ve used the dreaded colon in the above and I’m still not sure about these. I did once buy a book on grammar but I think it may have been the wrong one as I didn’t understand a word of it.
June 17, 2009 at 12:12 pm |
I did my GCSEs in 1997 and I entirely agree. My english is terrible and I’m really embarrassed by it. My girlfriend suggest I buy fowlers modern english usage to try and get hte grammar rules.
I’m sure there must be a market for books on ‘what they never taughter you in the 80s’
June 17, 2009 at 5:50 pm |
Stephen Fry has made a start with his ‘poetry- its not anything goes’. Which came as quite a relief after reading a book of poetry to my son whilst thinking…this is not poetry its just really short stories!
June 17, 2009 at 8:41 pm |
And Lynn Truss started with ‘Eats Shoots and Leaves’ but that was mainly a rant, rather than a text book. I don’t think it covered what we really really need to know.
What is an adverb?
June 17, 2009 at 8:51 pm |
Christ…no idea.
June 17, 2009 at 9:13 pm |
I had an Usbourne book, I think it was called ‘Inspector Noun’, when I was 3 or 4, it basically a story of an Inspector who went looking for things that were nouns ‘Inspector Noun looks at the CAT’
But there was also a character called Mrs Adverb who did things to verbs, ‘Mrs adverb is …’ er, well I never really read that far.
I’ve just gone mad on amazon and spent £60 on books that might help. Ok only £40 – the rest are on epidemology that have been on my wish list for ages – same theme though – how to work out stats with a calculator.
June 17, 2009 at 10:26 pm |
An adverb adds something to a verb – ie more information about HOW you do whatever it is. So the verb is run and the adverb is quickly. Or slowly, in my case. Or not at all, really.
Er.
I’ll get me coat.
June 18, 2009 at 7:23 am |
hmm that has undermined my understanding of what an adjective is…
June 18, 2009 at 8:36 am |
Yes I think there was a DC Adjective – he solved a mystery about a dog.
This Usbourne book was the only formal education I had on grammar in 18 years of formal schooling. And this was when was 4 and my parents fromt it.
I will ask my parents to dig it out again.
June 21, 2009 at 3:12 pm |
An adjective does the same thing for a noun, it adds more information about it. So the noun is woman and the adjective is fit.
The woman runs.
The fit woman runs quickly.
Adverbs and adjectives do the same thing, they just do them in different contexts.
June 21, 2009 at 5:13 pm |
I’m impressed.
I have now remembered my school advice on colons and semi-colons…never in any circumstances use either.
June 21, 2009 at 5:57 pm |
My books on grammar are currently at the post office. I do find Amazon slightly awkward from this point of view. I shall have to pick them up tomorrow and report back.
I wonder if I can teach myself what I missed during formal education? Or informal education in our case.
I do have a lovely book on stats though – it’s the follow up to ‘Statistics at Square one’ which is the best book on stats ever: ‘Statistics at Square 2′. I highly recommend it.
June 22, 2009 at 11:07 am |
I’ve just spent the morning proof reading somebody elses work. Its like being tortured…I’m going to Borders at lunch time…
Not sure I’ve got time to fill in all the gaps in my education…I’m currently thinking of taking Maths a-level as my mum disuaded me from taking it…its for boys (geeky ones) and I’ve always regretted it….
When my son starts asking grammer questions I might just direct him to Ben..or you if you read those books!
June 22, 2009 at 5:51 pm |
But surely if you’re as senior as you are in accountancy I’m sure you’ve taught yourself most of what you missed in maths A Level?
I know lots of doctors don’t have biology A level, but I don’t see anyone going back and taking it. The material is all covered in our first term at medical school. Well first six weeks actually.
June 22, 2009 at 6:34 pm |
You are of course correct but I’m writing a book on public policy for publication in sept so I’m missing some good old fashioned number bashing
And of course it’d annoy my mum!