Don't get the big head, but you write well

I am a member of another forum, most members of which are college grads, and there is an active thread there regarding the decline of English language writing skills in the United States.

I know what they mean, but I find most of the posts here to be well written, at least in terms of clarity, grammar and punctuation. I say "most." There is the occasional poster who will write that "the Orange man is going to loose big!" (That's not laziness, because it takes more energy and time to write "loose" than "lose," but it's still wrong.)

So ... to you who write well, to what do you attribute your skills? Strict parents? Lots of classics by Dickens, Melville, Austen, or Clemens/Twain? Sci-fi, like Orwell Heinlein, or Vonnegutt? The Penthouse Forum?

 

Mom was big on grammar, and encouraged an extensive vocabulary, learned through many, many games of Scrabble. Reading was encouraged also. Those three helped a great deal in the formation of expressing one's self via the written word.

 

IDK. Spellcheck has pretty much ruined my ability to spell. That said, sometimes my sentences will go sideways because either I decided to restructure how I was writing them mid post or because I had to stop and do something then finish them (like shooing a cat off the keyboard). Autocorrect sometimes causes weirdness as well.

 

I may speak with a distinct US accent but I can type on the internet in the King's English with zero errors. This ability has served me well.

 

I went to school prior to participation trophies and social promotions. And I learned the use of condoms from practical experience instead of using cucumbers as part of my kindergarten curriculum.

 

The things they want to teach our kids in schools these days. Will they never stoop too low?

 

Complex question. I grew up when there were only 3 TV stations so we watched less TV than kids do today. I remember sitting in my backyard during summer vacation reading Dickens. He was paid to write by the word so reading him exposes you to a wondrous amount of vocabulary. My mom was a nurse and dad went to Cornell, so they ere both well spoken and that helped a lot. Being well spoken is as important in a job interview as being well dressed. Kids today seem to think it just doesn't matter.

 

I'm not sure, and maybe I'm being presumptious including myself in this, but growing up in the late 60s/70s (graduated high school in 1979) that was just what you did. Dad was a very over-educated architect (long story but he's the only person I know that spent more years getting a bachelors than me- I took 7 years) and Mom spent much of her youth in Nazi occupied Norway and had a lot of catching up to do when she got back to the states, but doing well in school was just an assumption. Never explicitly discussed, just assumed. My younger brother (RIP) still spoke well despite dropping out in the 10th grade. I graduated college with a major in English Literature and minors in math and physics (don't ask how that happened) and went to work as an automotive engineer.

Somewhere along the way (I trace it to the advent of ISO 9000 in the mid-90s) school stopped being about learning and creating with that learning and became more about punching a specific career ticket.

I can't really attribute my writing to anything other than at one time writing was an adjunct to quality of life. Unforetunately, no more.

By the way, if I misspelled anything here it's because this device doesn't have automatic spell check. Still, I'd bet I'm 90%+ just on muscle memory.

 

Well written post.

I'm not sure that it does as much as it used to. There's a shortage of labor.

 

Manual laborers ... yes. Management and executives? No. When I left the Army and I went to work in aerospace, my interview process included a dinner where I was watched carefully about how I chose the wine, which of the forks I used when, and how I comported myself.

 

The best education system in the world: Northern Ireland.

 

When did Northern Ireland get to the moon? Invent the Internet? Build the first airplane? Construct nuclear powered ships? Design something like the F-35?

Oh... you mean read classics and study philosophy... not really DO anything.

OK.

Good beer though.

 

Oh well then, from what you're telling me, the US education system is totally AWESOME!

 

Well... it did get us to the moon. It got us a space station. It got us the internet. You can't argue with RESULTS.
Today's lazy students that just want a free ride on Uncle Sam and won't study don't make those accomplishments any less.

 

So then schools in American are definitely not failing then?

 

Some are... some aren't... thus it has always been... thus it will always be. I made sure to send my kids to good schools.

 

Kind of a different generation of education, no?

 

Different generation of KIDS.

 

Yeah exactly. So when comparing Northern Ireland education to US education TODAY, you can't go back to the education system which educated the inventor of internet, or those involved in getting to the moon. Development of the F-35 is obviously more recent, but I'm not aware that Lockheed Martin only allows American engineers.

 

Irish engineers make great beer and Jamieson whiskey. That cannot be denied. Wait... that's the south. What has Northern Ireland done?

 

What has Northern Ireland done before, or what has Nothern Irish people done before? Remember, we are talking about education systems and the sort of people who come out of them.

 

In my world, education is about gaining the knowledge to contribute to society. That means accomplishment and achievement. You don't measure the success/effectiveness of education by how good it makes you feel, but how much it enables you to achieve and be successful. Want to feel good? Have a beer. Want to DO good... get an education.

 

I agree, but do you not agree that when comparing education systems TODAY, you can't go back to the education system which educated the inventor of internet, or those involved in getting to the moon?

 

Why not? Such education is still quite available... although not as common.

 

I actually think there's a little of both going on. Kids don't study much, and the teachers unions place the interests of the union members ahead of every thing else. The school boards who think the top priority is diversity, equity and inclusion don't help.