HS Comments on the Fly

If I type a mistake or even a typo, should I be banned from blogging?

What if I’m just a horrible proofreader and can’t see my own mistakes? Does that mean I should refrain from posting online?

Am I a bad representative of homeschooling because I don’t know that I should use pique instead of peak?

Should we apply the Strike Out method to our reading? Why or why not?

I don’t know. But I do wish there was some way to post all the absolutely hilarious mistakes I’ve seen without embarrassing the authors. There is an error today on a homeschooling blog that just has me in stitches, but I can’t share it. I can’t even save it for later, because it will be saved on the internet for years and years and you’d be able to see who the author was if you searched on the quote I provided. But it is funny. Okay, it might be funny to about 20% of the population. So, not that funny, actually. But I like it. It’s so funny when people get all bent out of shape, telling people that they’re oh-so-very intelligent and then they go and make a mistake in the next sentence.

I will have to save it to share with my life partner who should be coming through the door soon.

Oh, you know, it’s kind of like that quote from Pride & Prejudice where Elizabeth’s dad says:

For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and laugh at them in our turn?

Yes, I’m sure there are lots of errors in my very own online journal and other web pages. My apologies to those whose finer sensibilities upon which I am trodding.

Okay, so I’m out reading homeschool news. I find Thoughts from Kansas. Today’s entry has something to do with teaching science vs. creationism.

So I start to read it and get to the first sentence:

Cato defends childrens’ liberty to be wrong.

I start in on the second sentence, which is a little beyond me because … well, I’m not so bright. And my eyes are drawn inexorably back to the first sentence. And I realize that there is an error or typo … you pick.

Then I remember John Walker’s most noble essay which gives me permission to quit reading at the first error. So I do — even though I know that somewhere in the article homeschooling is mentioned. To be totally truthful, though, the article doesn’t seem too awfully scintillating, so I’m not really feeling terrible about skipping the article.

Yes, please do use Walker’s Strike Out system on my writing also. That’s fair enough. And I know I make plenty of errors and typos … both! When you read the essay, please be aware that Europeans (Walker is likely in Switzerland.) place the periods outside of the parentheses … meaning don’t stop reading when you see that because it’s not an error.

Audrey Goodall will be a homeschool graduate this coming May. However, she’s already a published author, and you can buy her book, Three Years Seven Furlongs, through Amazon.com.

Here’s the blurb from Amazon:

Ann and Lea have dreams, just like any other girls their age, but theirs seems like they’ll never come true. Never, that is, until an old gruff trainer at their hometown racetrack hires them as exercise riders. Becoming jockeys seems within reach as the girls settle into life on the backstretch and become friends with several who cheer them on. As time passes, though, obstacles come up, accidents happen, and they begin to face surprisingly fierce opposition. The girls aren’t so sure of their dream anymore. Should they just give up and quit like all the others who attempted before them? Anne and Lea are up for a challenge. Through it all, they begin to realize that it isn’t just about the dream, it has a lot to do with the One getting you there.

You can read Audrey’s story online at Ozarks Newsstand.

So, when you say, “Everyone should eat their cake,” is there always someone nearby correcting you?

Well, no more!

I was cleaning out some papers, amazingly, and found an old comment about they being used in the singular by Shakespeare. So, I searched the web for more info and found this at crossmyt.com:

So it seems that it was only in the late 18th century or early 19th century, when prescriptive grammarians started attacking singular “their” because this didn’t seem to them to accord with the “logic” of the Latin language, that it began to be more or less widely taught that the construction was bad grammar. The prohibition against singular “their” then joined the other arbitrary prescriptions created from naïve analogies between English and Latin — such as the prohibition against ending a sentence with a preposition.

One person put it this way:

Latinizing grammarians and other small-minded pedants claim that no self-respecting lover of the English language can use “their” as a singular pronoun — as in: “Anyone who loves English will watch their grammar.” Well, this page shows that “singular their” has a long history of use as fine English since the 1300s….

This discussion paper seems to cover it all, though I didn’t take the time to read it. I’ve printed it out to go over with my student later.

Melanie Fields’ English 291 class at Northern Kentucky University (yes, university!) was asked to write letters to the editor to showcase their persuasive writing abilities. They were published in The Enquirer.

This is an excerpt from Shannon Croxson’s response to an article on unschooling that had previously appeared in The Enquirer:

How do some parents believe that child-led learning is best for our children?

I don’t understand how a grown adult believes that another child can teach a child everything they need to know in life.

Oh, dear. I don’t think that Shannon Croxson knows what child-led learning is.

Read more here.

And just what does she mean by “… our children,” anyway? I am teaching and have taught my children.

The Journal in Martinsburg, WV, has just added a new reporter to their crew: Tabitha Johnson, homeschooler.