by Pa Rock
Lifetime Learner
I went to a very small high school, but have never felt disadvantaged by that circumstance. The students in the little school that I attended were close, and in many cases the friendships formed there have endured well for over half a century. We had a desire to learn and succeed which was undoubtedly a result of the hardships that our parents had endured during the Great Depression and World War II, and we were blessed with some extraordinarily good teachers.
Our curriculum was not extensive, but it did address all of the major areas that are still emphasized in schools today: math, science, social studies (basically history and government), and "English" which is today usually referred to as "Language Arts." "Technology" back in the day was a slide rule, and "engineering" involved skills acquired in shop and home economics.
When I was in high school, four years of English were required for graduation, and it was a rigorous discipline. We learned things like parts of speech, punctuation, and subject and verb agreement through written and spoken assignments and even through the arcane practice of "diagramming" sentences. We were also taught to write in complete sentences and compose proper paragraphs, and our senior year had a major project of writing a "research paper" which was a culmination, of sorts, of all of the language arts skills that we had acquired in high school. Spelling was a big part of the English curriculum, right up through graduation week, and, at certain intervals, we delved into literature and poetry where all of the skills that we had been taught in the grammar segment of the class were reinforced through the works of great writers.
The "English" education that I received in high school was so extensive and enduring that today, fifty-some years later, I still cringe when I see or hear the language misused. Yesterday, for example, I was saddened - and a bit appalled - to observe the following tweet from Donald Trump which was being highlighted in the press - highlighted for its errors:
A few teachers took to the internet and graded Trump's tweet, with most assigning it a grade of "F." The obvious errors are in spelling with Trump's "wether" being used instead of the correct "whether," and "Council" being misused three times for what should have been "Counsel." He also mistakenly used the word "the" twice in a row, and omitted the last letter of "been" which became "bee." Trump jumped around from speaking in the first-person to speaking in the third-person - going from referring to himself as "I" to "President Trump." Overall, I would have probably awarded him a grade of "G" for "gibberish."
It's disturbing that the leader of a modern nation does not have a better command of his country's majority language, and it's distressing that someone with ready access to almost unlimited power does not have assistants close by who are able to swoop in and fix his mistakes. But Trump sees himself as a force of nature with no need for restraint or caution. He also made news yesterday when it was revealed that he had deliberately ignored the advice and caution of his staff not to congratulate Russian President Vladimir Putin on his rigged election victory. Advice? Donald Trump doesn't need any stinking advice! Caution? Caution is for sissies!
Trump is the product of a "private" educational experience, and with obvious intellectual deficits as a result of that rarefied form of schooling, he should at least be open to help from others who are better versed in the mechanics of language than he is. He owes that to us, his countrymen, who are judged in the eyes of the rest of the world by the image our leader puts forth.
Lifetime Learner
I went to a very small high school, but have never felt disadvantaged by that circumstance. The students in the little school that I attended were close, and in many cases the friendships formed there have endured well for over half a century. We had a desire to learn and succeed which was undoubtedly a result of the hardships that our parents had endured during the Great Depression and World War II, and we were blessed with some extraordinarily good teachers.
Our curriculum was not extensive, but it did address all of the major areas that are still emphasized in schools today: math, science, social studies (basically history and government), and "English" which is today usually referred to as "Language Arts." "Technology" back in the day was a slide rule, and "engineering" involved skills acquired in shop and home economics.
When I was in high school, four years of English were required for graduation, and it was a rigorous discipline. We learned things like parts of speech, punctuation, and subject and verb agreement through written and spoken assignments and even through the arcane practice of "diagramming" sentences. We were also taught to write in complete sentences and compose proper paragraphs, and our senior year had a major project of writing a "research paper" which was a culmination, of sorts, of all of the language arts skills that we had acquired in high school. Spelling was a big part of the English curriculum, right up through graduation week, and, at certain intervals, we delved into literature and poetry where all of the skills that we had been taught in the grammar segment of the class were reinforced through the works of great writers.
The "English" education that I received in high school was so extensive and enduring that today, fifty-some years later, I still cringe when I see or hear the language misused. Yesterday, for example, I was saddened - and a bit appalled - to observe the following tweet from Donald Trump which was being highlighted in the press - highlighted for its errors:
“Special Council is told to find crimes wether crimes exist or not. I was opposed to the the selection of Mueller to be Special Council, I still am opposed to it. I think President Trump was right when he said there never should have bee a Special Council appointed because…..,”
A few teachers took to the internet and graded Trump's tweet, with most assigning it a grade of "F." The obvious errors are in spelling with Trump's "wether" being used instead of the correct "whether," and "Council" being misused three times for what should have been "Counsel." He also mistakenly used the word "the" twice in a row, and omitted the last letter of "been" which became "bee." Trump jumped around from speaking in the first-person to speaking in the third-person - going from referring to himself as "I" to "President Trump." Overall, I would have probably awarded him a grade of "G" for "gibberish."
It's disturbing that the leader of a modern nation does not have a better command of his country's majority language, and it's distressing that someone with ready access to almost unlimited power does not have assistants close by who are able to swoop in and fix his mistakes. But Trump sees himself as a force of nature with no need for restraint or caution. He also made news yesterday when it was revealed that he had deliberately ignored the advice and caution of his staff not to congratulate Russian President Vladimir Putin on his rigged election victory. Advice? Donald Trump doesn't need any stinking advice! Caution? Caution is for sissies!
Trump is the product of a "private" educational experience, and with obvious intellectual deficits as a result of that rarefied form of schooling, he should at least be open to help from others who are better versed in the mechanics of language than he is. He owes that to us, his countrymen, who are judged in the eyes of the rest of the world by the image our leader puts forth.
Postscript: Yesterday afternoon I stopped at a local drive-in for an iced tea. The carhop who brought my drink was chirpy and pleasant. "How's your day went so far?" she inquired. “Just fine,” I
assured her, knowing that a lesser person would have rejoined with something
like, “Tell me, young lady, who learned
you English?” Had she been home-schooled, or was she the product of some
religious academy? Did she realize that as far as the future is concerned, Trump University is no longer an option?
Betsy DeVoss is on the march, and one day not too far down the path of the dystopian future which she has envisioned for us, we may look back on Donald Trump as being a great intellectual role model. Someday . . . but clearly not yet. Trump may be a genius in the stable, but that self-described brilliance fails to shine through in his tweets!
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