For those who say that children don't learn grammar any more.....

Or in mumspeak 'thatll certainly help there education wont it?'

I don't understand the point you're making Anya. ' Teachers' is in the plural and gettingon was talking about their grasp of spelling, so since it is a plural with an s, the possessive apostrophe goes after the s: teachers' grasp. Otherwise it would be a single teacher: teacher's grasp. Or have I misunderstood?

Pity their offspring then. That'll certainly help their education won't it?

mamie I spend too much time on Mumsnet. Teacher bashing is very much a "thing" over there.

I would have thought it was an important language skill, to be able to use different registers for different occasions.

So why do you think teachers who use dialect cannot teach grammar?
"While there is a whole school of thought which prizes the use of local dialects which don't conform to the 'rules' of English grammar, and asserts that insisting on such 'rules' is elitist, there is never going to be any consistency in the application of 'grammar'. "
Using dialect doesn't mean that you think grammar is 'elitist" just that you recognise language has different uses.

I think you prove my point, trisher. People do defend the use of dialect and it conflicts with the teaching of grammar at KS2 (and KS3). I was trying not to be judgemental, just saying that it happens.

I always used grammatical English with the children I worked with and I had a different accent and didn't speak their dialect. It didn't seem to be a barrier to communication or establishing good relationships.

Yes you are wrong gettingonabit.
It would be very hard to explain the improved standards achieved at Key Stage 2 if teachers did not understand what they were teaching.
www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/483897/SFR47_2015_text.pdf
I imagine nobody thinks that the tests are getting easier, based on this example.

We noes all abowt apostriffis, banana's pear's and apple's, yeah?

You is all wrong abowt us young wons gramma innit?

Teachers' (sic) grasp of spellings !!!!

MaizieD some people are quite able to distinguish between dialect and colloquialisms and correct grammar. They may choose to speak or write in dialect so that they connect and form bonds with the children they are teaching. They are still able to use the language correctly when they wish. Many children are able to do this as well. Preserving spoken dialects should be as important as teaching grammar. Who wants a society where everyone speaks BBC English?

I'm by no means an expert on these matters, but I'd be concerned that today's teachers wouldn't have a clue about some of these things either. My score was nothing to write home about, but the average score was very poor indeed.

My impression is that, in general, teachers' grasp of spelling, in particular, is woeful.

Maybe I'm wrong?

I spent my career as a copywriter, though would not know a modal verb if it bit me!

90% only, but then my mt is French

I was confused by "adverbial" too. Adverbial what? And modal something? Didn't know what a determiner was either.

I've got a languages degree.

That was difficult. I thought my grammar was pretty good, but....

I don't recall ever having been taught some of that!

They would still be working within the requirements of the National Curricuum even if they held those views in private MaizieD. There can be difficult issues with teachers who speak non-standard English, but schools really have to tackle them if the pupils are going to meet the required standard.

Sorry, Maimie, but I have 'debated' this point on TES with teachers in the past few years, so it's not an outdated view. I have even worked with English (subject) teachers who speak the local dialect and seem quite unaware that they are tacitly supporting the use of poor grammar (which, to be fair, they would probably correct in written work).

My brother is a free lance proof reader and reads a lot of highly technical reports.
I wonder what he would say about the new terminology.
I'm refusing to tell you my score for the quiz

MaizieD I completely disagree with your last paragraph. Whilst you might have found teachers with views like that in the seventies and eighties I can assure that it has not been like that since the arrival of the National Literacy Strategy in the nineties.
Apart from anything else Ofsted would certainly not consider that as acceptable teaching.
This test will be taken by all children in the last year of primary school and
everyone has to teach grammar.

Oh dear, 50%

But it's not because I can't write grammatically, it's because I don't know the terminology. We learned the basic parts of speech and verb tenses at primary school and did some basic parsing of sentences at grammar school. We also did a lot of precis work, which really concentrated the mind on how to convey an idea accurately and economically. We were never subjected to such technical terms.

I really don't understand the need for primary children to be taught the technicalities in such depth. Is it really going to improve their use of English? I feel that, for many children, being able to identify parts of a sentence by their function doesn't guarantee that they will use that knowledge to write better constructed prose. I think they would learn far more from extensive reading of good prose and hearing language 'correctly' spoken.

But this is counteracted by the ongoing debate about what is 'correct' English. While there is a whole school of thought which prizes the use of local dialects which don't conform to the 'rules' of English grammar, and asserts that insisting on such 'rules' is elitist, there is never going to be any consistency in the application of 'grammar'. There are still teachers who will insist that it doesn't really matter how sentences, written or spoken, are constructed as long as the person reading them is able to 'get' their meaning. (Likewise with the incorrect use of words)

Unfortunately it wasn't recognised by me or the 9 year old, Badenkate.
I will have to get a " Modern English Grammar for Dummies" book from Amazon!

Determiners are words that introduce a noun, such as many, some, the, all etc

An adverbial is an adverb, adverbial phrase, or an adverbial clause. It is a recognised grammatical term.