Are you irritated by incorrect grammar.

I totally agree Fannycornforth. Picking up grammatical and spelling mistakes on online forums is ridiculous. People are posting quickly while taking part in a conversation. They're not sitting an exam or submitting a proposal to their boss.

Lauren I find that quote admirable of your chap!
It’s quite pragmatic and utilitarian.

My husband is brilliant at crosswords, but cannot spell for toffee.
I don’t know whether it’s because he is dyslexic or barely had an education, I suspect the latter.

He came from a massive, very working class family; and many of his siblings were quite salty characters.
He was consistently the best at maths in his year, but was punished because they thought he was cheating
He was also a talented cricketer but wasn’t allowed on the team because his parents wouldn’t/ couldn’t buy him the kit.

Education these days may not be perfect, but it’s a different world.
DH these days would be considered a huge success story instead of being completely written off.

FannyCornforth

eazybee I always have to really think about practice and practise.

Does anyone know, is there a clever way of remembering which one to use?

A parent once wrote a message to me on his daughter's homework jotter, to reprimand me for spelling practice incorrectly.
I politely wrote back explaining that it was in fact he, who was wrong.

Practise, the verb
Practice, the noun.

S verb
C noun
Got it. I’ll try to remember it like that Mary

FannyCornforth

eazybee I always have to really think about practice and practise.

Does anyone know, is there a clever way of remembering which one to use?

I always check back with "advice" and "advise". There you can hear the difference: the verb has the voiced "s" (the "z" sound) and the noun has the SS sound.

I advise you to take care
I practise my scales

My advice is to take care
My piano practice takes an hour each day.

I think the American spelling is with the "c" in both cases which may be the cause of the confusion.

Thanks Jacky
I didn’t realise that about the US usage

Lack of punctuation (see thread title) can be confusing, but I find too much punctuation hard to read!!!!! Why use so many exclamation marks, or question marks?????

Blossoming in a similar vein, what used to really annoy me on here (but you hardly see it anymore) was far too many full stops in an ellipsis.
You especially saw it in thread titles.
It’s only three folks, not this………………

That too FannyC

In US, it's always practice (noun and verb) and always license (noun and verb) but advice and advise (noun verb respectively). Canada appears to be a mixture of UK and US - 'tire centre' being held up as the perfect example.
I assume most computer software can be US or UK, but can it be Canadian? And does Australia have a similar issue?

I was copied into a solicitor's letter yesterday that contained the following sentence:

Further to the above matter, we have chased the Sellers Solicitors in respect of their clients current position

Has the apostrophe now died?

Has anyone mentioned that the best place for this thread would be in Pedants' Corner?

Marydoll

FannyCornforth

eazybee I always have to really think about practice and practise.

Does anyone know, is there a clever way of remembering which one to use?

A parent once wrote a message to me on his daughter's homework jotter, to reprimand me for spelling practice incorrectly.
I politely wrote back explaining that it was in fact he, who was wrong.

Practise, the verb
Practice, the noun.

Dd1 loathed sewing at school, so I ended up doing most of her cookery apron - the exact same thing I’d made at school 30 odd years earlier!

I was reasonably competent at sewing so was a bit miffed to get only a C+ - ‘Neatness and accuracy are 2 skills which you must practice.’

I still think it was very forbearing of me not to point out that it should have been ‘practise’!

Upthread, it was mentioned that Melvyn Bragg lost his accent to climb the greasy pole. Really? He always sounds as if he should have his towel draped head over a bowl of boiling Vick water?

"I was reasonably competent at sewing so was a bit miffed to get only a C+ - ‘Neatness and accuracy are 2 skills which you must practice.’
I still think it was very forbearing of me not to point out that it should have been ‘practise’!"

That's probably why that particular teacher taught sewing and not grammar.

Gagajo, don't feel so bad. When I attended evening classes I loved the red ink. I was fascinated by the corrections. I was told that in the years I attended school there was less emphasis on teaching grammatical rules. My teacher once mentioned that when she moved North she noticed a differing grammatical emphasis in our speech. However I can't recall what it was.

I love regional accents, including my own. I still remember a time on holiday when I first heard a farmer speaking with a rolling type 'r' in Wooler, Northumberland. Absolutely wonderful. It goes hand in hand with the musical culture of the North East. I spent last night listening to traditional folk music on youtube: Katherine Tickell's, Rothbury Hills, Cushie Butterfield (Owen Brannigan), Alan Hull et al. I loved to hear the regional accents on 'Nationwide' many years ago. Today we are rarely treated to these voices on television. Fred Dibnah springs to mind but that's about it.

Oh yes- some simply jump out -“have I took”, “need advise” and the perennial complaints about trying to “loose weight” <sigh>

It’s and its I am sure catch a lot of us out until we ask ourselves if the apostrophe is to replace the Missing letter i.

I’m always a bit reluctant to post on these grammar threads as I’m perfectly certain that I have made ( and will continue to make) many mistakes over the years but certain things do jump out at most of us.

It seems acceptable these days to say “I was sat” but it always sounds to me as if the person was picked up by somebody and plonked on the chair !!

To the retired English teachers on here, weren’t we taught “I was sitting”
or “I sat” ?

Language evolves though of course so perhaps it’s now deemed ok.

Just thought of another common one, anti-social used when it should be unsociable.

There you are, I even made a mistake on that post with the capital M in missing ?

I should have kept quiet!!

JenniferEccles

There you are, I even made a mistake on that post with the capital M in missing ?

I should have kept quiet!!

Ha ha! Have none of you heard of Muprhy's Law?
It states that any post criticizing the grammar, spelling, or mechanics of another post will in itself contain at least one error!

GrandmaKT ?
Yes, it’s inevitable isn’t it?!!

JenniferEccles

It’s and its I am sure catch a lot of us out until we ask ourselves if the apostrophe is to replace the Missing letter i.

I’m always a bit reluctant to post on these grammar threads as I’m perfectly certain that I have made ( and will continue to make) many mistakes over the years but certain things do jump out at most of us.

It seems acceptable these days to say “I was sat” but it always sounds to me as if the person was picked up by somebody and plonked on the chair !!

To the retired English teachers on here, weren’t we taught “I was sitting”
or “I sat” ?

Language evolves though of course so perhaps it’s now deemed ok.

Just thought of another common one, anti-social used when it should be unsociable.

But ‘unsociable’ and ‘anti-social’ surely have different meanings?

To me they do, anyway - I certainly wouldn’t call them interchangeable.

Re: the discussion around red ink.
Many years ago, when I was working in China, I learned why red ink was best avoided: www.nspirement.com/2021/07/08/red-ink-taboo-names-using-red.html
After reading this thread I was curious to know if there were any countries outside SE Asia where red ink is also taboo. I thought you might be interested in the only result I got after I did a spot of googling: www.business-standard.com/article/economy-policy/australia-says-39-no-39-to-use-of-red-pen-by-teachers-108120501065_1.html

It's easier to understand what someone means when they use correct grammar. It's especially important when advising or instructing others to use proper grammar so they won't get into difficulties. E.g driving instructor, solicitor, nurse, teacher, people who write instructions for flat pack furniture.

Yes they are Witzend but I have heard people describing themselves as anti social whilst saying that they are happiest on their own, when of course unsociable is what they mean.