Re: Grammar in HS (Was: Re: Argument Structures)

On 23 Aug, Nicole Perrin wrote:


>Maybe this is a silly question, but is grammar of one's native langauge
>taught in countries other than the US?  Because here almost everyone
>grows up without knowing even what subject and object are.  I always
>think it's a stupid practice (or non-practice) but I wonder what it's
>like in other places?
    Well, to hear my kids and their friends tell it
(They're all native Hebrew speakers),
Hebrew grammar is definitely "taught" in the
schools here in Israel, generally using a curriculum
from one of the lower reaches of Hell!
(But then, again, at their age, I also suffered in
grammar classes in school (In the US). Fortunately
it didn't prevent my interest in linguistics and langs!)
    My kids also run into problems with English grammar.
They are both fluent in English (but the _American_
variety of their parents) and this sometimes clashes
with the grammar being taught, if it is British English
and the teacher is not flexible. Things like

"The team have won" (British)
"The team has won" (American)

    Sometimes the variety of English doesn't matter, and when
I get questioned about grammar at home, I run into
the same problem IIRC that's been already mentioned on this
list: the gut feelings of a native speaker versus some
possibly silly grammar rule that may be in the books,
but just doesn't sound right to me. (such as
never ending a sentence with a preposition  --- something,
as Winston Churchill was famously heard to protest---
"up with which I shall not put!" [it should have been, of course:
 which I shall not put up with] ).


Dan Sulani


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likehsna rtem zuv tikuhnuh auag inuvuz vaka'a.

A word is an awesome thing.