Local Aussie students to be taught basic English (1 Viewer)

[KFunk]

MONASH University :
- 90 per cent of his first-year students could not identify a noun

- Half thought plurals were formed by adding an apostrophe-s, as in apple's

These two stood out to me. I'd like to know how the study was conducted - I'm truly amazed that the proportion of students in a given bachelor degree that are unable to identify a noun could be as high as 90%.

Firstly, intelligence was and never will be a value for Australian culture.

I still hold out in hope. Maybe this will change once we have important enough 'hard working migrant' culture? (likely culminating in a World War centred on Camden or some such)

 

[black_kat_meow]

lolwhut? That's unbelievable! That's why I don't approve of the educational system here--why do they learn by speech rather than by writing? So here we have a bunch of idiots who know how to talk but not write. Everyone, go back and do your Singaporean grammar books! I'm so glad I wasn't raised under the Australian system for that crucial part of my schooling.

Actually, at my primary school I was taught this extremely well, maybe it's more just the public school system.

Anyway, I would rather have an actual personal identity than an Asian schooling.

 

[Hello2U2]

I think the reason is that we learn all the basics of grammar in primary school, very early on, and then we never go back on them ever again. I'll admit that I have pretty poor grammar, but I don't do anything about it because none of the teachers recognise the errors or bother to tell me. So it's not that these Monash Aussie kids don't know it because they're stupid, but because we as students under this educational system have not had it hammered down to us frequently enough.

 

[Crates]

The point of writing is to communicate messages. If the messages you are trying to get across are reached, who really cares if there's a missing apostrophe or capital letter?

 

[billbro]

Recently there has been some ( justified) criticism of the standard of spoken English by foreign students, but have a look at the actual condition of local ' strine" English !

MONASH University :
...90 per cent of his first-year students could not identify a noun
...only 20 per cent of English teachers understand basic grammar
...500 students in communication were strangers to English grammar
...no idea how to use apostrophes, or any other punctuation for that matter
...random spelling was in and sentence construction out
...half thought plurals were formed by adding an apostrophe-s, as in apple's

Read it here:

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,24428680-421,00.html

As far as the standard of English utilised by foreign or local students goes, the former doesn't really compare - I've had rather bad experiences.

You can't believe everything you read from the media, they do tend to sensationalise after all. Like others I also question where these statistics came from, sounds highly exaggerated. How hard can it be to pick out a noun from a sentence? The article also mentioned that only 1% could identify an adjective and other parts of a sentence.

I'm not that surprised that students have poor grammar, but this isn't exactly a phenomenon localised to Australia. Personally, my grammar isn't that flash, yet that isn't going to make a reader claw their eyes out in distress.

 

[Crates]

As far as the standard of English utilised by foreign or local students goes, the former doesn't really compare - I've had rather bad experiences.

You can't believe everything you read from the media, they do tend to sensationalise after all. Like others I also question where these statistics came from, sounds highly exaggerated. How hard can it be to pick out a noun from a sentence? The article also mentioned that only 1% could identify an adjective and other parts of a sentence.

I'm not that surprised that students have poor grammar, but this isn't exactly a phenomenon localised to Australia. Personally, my grammar isn't that flash, yet that isn't going to make a reader claw their eyes out in distress.

Exactly my point: It really doesn't matter as long as you get across the message you intend to get across.

 

[Graney]

Those statistics are some hectic anecdotal bullshit.

 

[AsyLum]

Exactly my point: It really doesn't matter as long as you get across the message you intend to get across.

Then why not communicate in grunts?

Or better still fist fights! With chickens.

 

[Crates]

Then why not communicate in grunts?

Or better still fist fights! With chickens.

Come on now, that's just silly. I'm talking really small, technical errors in grammar.

 

[billbro]

Then why not communicate in grunts?

Or better still fist fights! With chickens.

I wouldn't mind communicating with grunts if it didn't severely hamper our ability to articulate and convey ideas. Grunts would certainly make things easier for lazy people like myself xD

 

[whatusername?]

Because of this, secondly, our school system prefers that students can analyse the journey on a CD cover to being able to use spelling, let alone grammar, correctly.

+1
It's ridiculous- my English teacher thought ignominious meant 'special' and spelt falsify with a 'c'. A fucking 'c'. Those are only two of his countless errors which border on ridiculous. And yet he is (supposedly) teaching me English.

I agree with those who say that as long as you can get your message across, you have sufficient knowledge of English, but there are limits. When communicating on bos for instance, or msn, abbreviations, contractions and whatever else takes your fancy is fine as long as it makes sense. But when necessary people should be able spell words correctly and construct grammatically sound sentences with such ease that thought isn't required. That's called being fluent in a language and anyone born in any country should, by definition, be fluent in their mothertongue.

 

[advanced sam]

i think we can also blame the use of txt messages, and the use of spell check on computers, and further more forum and chat sites like this

im not sure, but it could maybe have something to do with all the shortening of words. just maybe...

 

[nutting]

+1
It's ridiculous- my English teacher thought ignominious meant 'special' and spelt falsify with a 'c'. A fucking 'c'. Those are only two of his countless errors which border on ridiculous. And yet he is (supposedly) teaching me English.

.... But when necessary people should be able spell words correctly and construct grammatically sound sentences with such ease that thought isn't required. That's called being fluent in a language and anyone born in any country should, by definition, be fluent in their mothertongue.

Well Said !!
Did you hear that " Mr. Wrong Turn " ?
We must not let entropy dominate.

 

[jb_nc]

Those statistics are some hectic anecdotal bullshit.

Yeah 90 per cent. Whut.

They must have been interviewing international students for this survey.

 

[nutting]

They must have been interviewing international students for this survey.

No , the survey points to LOCAL Aussies as well!

" ......MONASH University will teach its first-year students grammar and punctuation after discovering that most arrive without basic English skills. "

Unless you are saying 100% of first year students are foreigners.

 

[lala2]

I third Pwar on this one. I'm a little surprised it's so high at 90% (would've thought it'd be around 70-80%) but then again I doubt they used international students for this. Haven't you had a foreign lecturer or student that wrote perfect English yet could hardly speak a word? I've encountered quite a few, and that's because the way they were trained (and which we ought to be trained by) is written, then spoken, not the other way around.

 

[jb_nc]

No , the survey points to LOCAL Aussies as well!

" ......MONASH University will teach its first-year students grammar and punctuation after discovering that most arrive without basic English skills. "

Unless you are saying 100% of first year studnets are foreigners.

At Monash I would not be surprised.

 

[nutting]

At Monash I would not be surprised.

You are misinformed.
Monash may have a high proportion of foreign students, but it does not amount to 100%.
ALSO, if those foreign students are from Singapore, their command of English grammar may be better than yours even if they can't speak English with an Aussie accent.

 

[Nebuchanezzar]

ALSO, if those foreign students are from Singapore, their command of English grammar may be better than yours even if they can't speak English with an Aussie accent.

:rofl:

 

[Gay Captain]

truth is "formal grammar" is going to end up a relic of the past, especially now it's not being taught

any form off communication is equally valid as long as it can express the full range of ideas and be understood by everyone

only place you really need it is academia