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Yes...this is ALL about me, and mine. Marvellously self indulgent, feel free to tell me how splendid I am, leave comments, nice ones please, I have little kids and teenagers who can do the rude stuff. I am a grandma, to the glorious Joshua, I'm allowed to look frazzled and weary, I earned it. The older I get, the more I see that hanging on and being patient is worth it! They ( whoever 'they' are) are so right when they say you never know what is around the corner, it isn't always an articulated truck! It is vital to make the time for making memories, friends are the greatest treasure, I love mine. I am rich!

Wednesday, August 24, 2005

Only in America.

"MUM!" said Sophie. "What's a noun?"
"It's a naming word"
"What's an active verb?" ( no idea what she was doing on the computer but it sounds a bit hopeful and unlikely to be something I should be checking out, except for the sheer wonderment value that whatever it is didn't involve lyrics to songs that otherwise seem to have no lyrics, or checking out cute people on the face to face thing that scares me witless)
"Its a 'doing' word that is actually doing something...like kicks as opposed to kick. Get it?"
"what's an adjective?" ( lawks a mercy, what IS she doing on that thing?)
"It's a word that describes a noun, like the purple ball"
"so what's a plural noun"
"Sophie, I am pretty sure that if you thought about it, you could work that out"
"oh just tell me, I don't want to work it out"
"Sophie it is the plural of a noun, remarkably enough, like ballS, rather than ball"
"MUM! what's......."
"SOPHIE, STOP! Didn't you get taught any of this stuff in school" I asked, a tad nervous about her exam results due in tomorrow.
"Only in America"

Does that seem a bit weird to anyone else?

4 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

How awful for her. Proper grammer is taught here in grade 7, so for 12 and 13 year olds. I thought the British system was supposed to be so far superior!

Deb

4:27 pm  
Blogger The other me said...

I suspect that she has been taught....whether she listened is another question altogether!!

4:38 pm  
Blogger Jenn said...

Well, it actually kind of makes sense if she was in America in 2000, was oh 11 say, which would be 6th grade there, and she would have been taught some grammar.
If she went back to England shortly after, then the British schools may have covered it in more depth while she was away and just assumed she knew it, as it isn't really covered in greater depth in America until 7th and 8th grades.
She may have missed a lot by being educated in two countries that don't cover the same things at the same time. Does that make sense?
Or she may have just been goofing off ;)

9:23 pm  
Blogger The other me said...

it does make sense Jenn...If you look at how I explained it to her that is because I was quite young when I was taught " it's a doing word / naming word" etc she was 10 when we went to the states, from 5 until 9 she had debilitating epilepsy, then 4 years in the Us and when she came back here she was just at the age where impressing your friends is more important than learning.

9:27 pm  

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