In English 326, a number of topics have been discussed or demonstrated: dashes, apostrophes, colons, commas, and finally semi-colons (my personal favorite form of punctuation to include in my own writing). I think the main element of the “lectures” –GRAMMAR IS TOO MUCH FUN TO USE SUCH A DRY TERM AS LECTURE TO CLASSIFY THE TEACHING OF IT– for the week was apostrophes.
The lesson about apostrophe’s stands out most to me because I felt singled out by it–NOT BECAUSE I CAN’T USE THEM, BUT BECAUSE MY LAST NAME IS SMITH. The Smiths/Smith’s/Smiths’ examples were awkward for me to learn from because it felt personal. Now despite me saying that I felt singled out, I really was not unhappy about it or embarrassed. I just felt the proverbial imaginary spot light on me. I am not sure that I mastered the apostrophe unit, but I feel pretty comfortable with them due to the fact that I speak my native tongue fairly well in my own estimation. I imagine for ESL students they are incredibly tough, and I plan on remembering that when I am teaching.
The lesson about apostrophe’s stands out most to me because I felt singled out by it–NOT BECAUSE I CAN’T USE THEM, BUT BECAUSE MY LAST NAME IS SMITH. The Smiths/Smith’s/Smiths’ examples were awkward for me to learn from because it felt personal. Now despite me saying that I felt singled out, I really was not unhappy about it or embarrassed. I just felt the proverbial imaginary spot light on me. I am not sure that I mastered the apostrophe unit, but I feel pretty comfortable with them due to the fact that I speak my native tongue fairly well in my own estimation. I imagine for ESL students they are incredibly tough, and I plan on remembering that when I am teaching.
This past week the thing that was solidified in my mind the most was using the dash. In fact, I took my new found confidence and sprinkled the character in hundreds of places where before I had sufficed to use parenthetical commas or some other element of our writing standards. The parenthetical commas are hard to let go of–THEY WERE THE FIRST GRAMMAR LESSON I REALLY REMEMBER LEARNING FROM MY MOM–but there is just something so… noteworthy. Essentially, the extra emphasis is something that can really make the points in my writing I find to be particularly brilliant stand out. I feel that I can use this strongly in all the areas where I write: fiction, sports (and grammar) blogging, and of course my academic writing. I can see it really taking my sports writing’s statistical analysis to the next level…
"Player A will undoubtedly improve team B more than the critics expect–STATISTICAL CORRELATION I FOUND POURING OVER MY HUNDREDS OF HOME MADE SPREAD SHEETS.
Kyle,
ReplyDeleteI do indeed think you have a firm grasp of the dash--Emily Dickinson would be proud. But remember to make sure that the rest of the sentence is complete: "The parenthetical commas are hard to let go of–THEY WERE THE FIRST GRAMMAR LESSON I REALLY REMEMBER LEARNING FROM MY MOM–but there is just something so… noteworthy [about what?]. But I love your use of ellipses. Most notably, your use of the colon is excellent.
Glad you asked your final question, and we'll be answering it in several ways over the course of the semester. Here's how we've answered it so far: expose students to authentic texts where they see what professional writers are doing, have the experiment with the concepts in their own writing, and make part of the teaching of grammar visual.