Keep politicians out of education.

What a pity, jess.

Actually, investigating close-up the colour of bluebells is not as silly as it sounds. It's one of the things on the checklist of how to tell whether a bluebell is the native kind or a "Spanish" import. Native bluebells are a darker blue, almost violet. Then there is the width of the leaves, the droopiness or otherwise of the heads, the colour of the stamens, etc. Not too subtle for Y5, and quite scientifically investigative, but perhaps not of interest to your pal.

I think I understood the subjunctive mood better after I'd learned about it in French. That wouldn't be in Y6.

Yes it is fine in French - well actually no, it is flippin' difficult and I get it right about 20% of the time - but in English?

True about the bluebells, Bags. When we first moved into this house I got quite excited when hundreds of bluebells came up in the spring - I thought we had a wonderful display of British wildflowers - but closer inspection revealed them all to be Spanish...

On the subject of the subjunctive (!), surely English teachers should understand it? I honestly don't understand how some teachers seem to be woefully lacking in certain areas.

No offence to you, Mamie - I certainly don't understand it myself - but shouldn't English teachers be expected to know it?

Well the point is Anagram, that it barely exists in English today. I can only come up with;
Be that as it may
Would that they were taught the subjunctive
Hold me lest I fall

So you mght reasonably ask "Why would you bother?"
I think this is about Michael Gove's obsession with Latin. I certainly don't think it is much use to an eleven-year-old.

This is Michael Rosen on subjunctivitis
michaelrosenblog.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/outbreak-of-subjunctivitis-mad.html

If I were secretary of state for education, I'd forget about the subjunctive (and any other byways of grammar).

Lovely, dry post by Michael Rosen - thanks for that, Mamie!
Yes, I can certainly see that not many 11 year olds would feel inspired to get to grips with something which is only used in 'some very formal writing and speech'!

Yes, thanks mamie. I like Rosen's style in that blog.

If I were you, this is what I would do........

OMG. Gove getting increasingly batty. Does even 1% of the UK popn know what the subjunctive is, let alone care. I did Latin o level. And i got an A* in Spanish GCSE quite recently - and I am with the don't' know, don't care camp.

Another subjunctive (courtesy of Twitter): So help you, Gove.
Also on Twitter:
If I were you
Be that as it may
Learn a subjunctive every day.

Hey! That covers the subjunctive and learning poetry.

mamie did subjunctive at school..secondary aged about 15 but would be hard pressed to recall technicalities today.. got a 'b' for my English O level..was all about clauses, punctuation etc but v little retained..only stuff I needed to use regularly! If I can use the subjunctive correctly without knowing I am is that OK? I drive a car without full understanding of how it works!

I don't think the subjunctive was ever part of any English o level syllabus was it?
I only ever came across it in latin and spanish - where it matters because the words change!

My English language lessons did include it! Mrs B my English teacher was extremely fixated on grammar and precis!

I must have learned about the subjunctive in English as well as in Latin and French, but we all use it without being able to define it, so why is Gove obsessing about it? The reason I suspect many teachers would find it difficult is that most of them are of a generation that didn't learn grammar at school, whereas mine certainly did. I loved grammar because my style of language learning is to look at patterns. Other people learn languages equally well in other ways.

I remember doing it at junior school along with parsing sentences! Does anyone do that now?

General analysis - noun clauses and adjective clauses - lovely!

What I want to know is when does he expect children to learn about the gerund, gerundive and verbal noun?

I think the earlier the better..pre-school maybe?

Classical scholars of the world unite!
I remember Keith Joseph, who was minister for education and science at the time, if I remember rightly, saying that he had never had a science lesson in his life, because he had had "a classical education". But even he never stuck his nose in and told teachers the details of what they should be teaching, fortunately.
His dad owned Porthcawl funfair . So keith got his public school ed on funfair money.

It is interesting how tempted we are to get irritated by incorrect grammar - see Pedants' Corner! But I also wonder if we should not just accept that language develops and changes - as for the subjunctive, it would be pretty low on my list if I were a teacher (?a subjunctive!) and would only feature with very bright children who might benefit from the analytical exercise of grammar in that detail.

Bit of a turn-off for those whose skills lie with their hands.

I am reading a book at the moment where the author uses the phrase "He was sat..." or "She was stood..." and it is getting under my skin - I have to remind myself that this is rapidly becoming standard parlance and I should not be such an old fuddy-duddy!

mishap agree that language is a living thing and does change and evolve.. but funny how different people can tolerate some changes and others find them really grating!

mishap, I agree with you - 'She was stood' etc. is ridiculous and shouldn't be allowed! I continue to be amazed by the spelling and/or grammar errors in printed matter these days - don't publishers employ proof-readers any more, or can't they get decent staff?