SPAG tests & questions, and language play

[briantrumpet]

I'm a bit nerdy about English - I can be both fussy and laissez faire at the same time. (In case you haven't had children subjected to them, 'SPAG tests are the dreadful spelling, punctuation and grammar assessments inflicted on Y6 children in England.)

Anyway, language is the most excellent playground, and it fascinates me. So this is not about all your pedantic pet hates (for which there's another thread), but playful stuff, as well as questions people might have. A lot of us probably never had old-fashioned grammar lessons (me included); despite that most of us are miraculously adept at it in everyday language, but we can get a bit fuzzy when writing it down.

I genuinely think that human language is one of the wonders of the universe, having evolved with our brains to be learnable, in all its amazing complexity, by infants. Yep, that's right, that screaming ball of little human still beats LLMs (large language models) in what it's doing.

First up: semicolons. Who knows how to use them? And does anyone care??

Test your skill here: https://www.theguardian.com/science...ne-semicolon-use-english-books-study-suggests

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

I have learned something today; I genuinely do not remember ever being taught what one was!

I scored 6/10.
@classic33, are you keeping scores here? 🤣

 

[briantrumpet]

I have learned something today;I genuinely was never taught what one was!

I scored 6/10.

I can't remember them being 'taught' beyond using them in lists or in contrasting clauses, and that was only brief, AFAICR.

Curiously, one of my very good friends, who is a linguist and proof-reader for translations into English (so his English has to be A1), didn't have formal grammar lessons at school either (it basically was expunged from the school curriculum in the 1960s, as a reaction to the formal teaching of grammar based on the principles of Latin which had held sway since the early 20th century). Despite that we both have a fascination for the subject... possibly as the fun of it wasn't killed by having it drilled into us before we were ready. Of course, we like to catch the other out if we can. That's what friends are for.

 

[bikingdad90]

Arrhh the Y6 SATS which are purely to see how well a child is performing against a government standard and is then not really used by secondary as most prefer to do their own assessments for streaming/setting of high to low classes.

 

[Drago]

First up: semicolons.

Nope. Never had a colostomy.

 

[briantrumpet]

Arrhh the Y6 SATS which are purely to see how well a child is performing against a government standard and is then not really used by secondary as most prefer to do their own assessments for streaming/setting of high to low classes.

I could go on at length about how I detest those tests (for all sorts of reasons), but that probably belongs in the politics section. But, basically, human language is just the most amazing and fascinating subject, and by banging on about arcane terminology and prioritising test scores over engendering a curiosity for the subject, they make people think it's both boring and scary, despite most people being absolutely brilliant with it.

Go into a playground and listen to the noise of dozens of children coming up with an infinitely diverse range of ideas on the spur of the moment, mostly 'grammatically correct' (and who cares if it's not when they are chasing each other around), and then you start to appreciate what an incredible phenomenon it is. Especially when you consider that *no-one taught them how to do that* !

 

[All uphill]

I too find language a fascinating playground. I recommend Albert Costa's book, The Bilingual Brain, if you are interested in how we can manage to speak more than one language.

 

[briantrumpet]

Nope. Never had a colostomy.

Not your bag then.

 

[briantrumpet]

I too find language a fascinating playground. I recommend Albert Costa's book, The Bilingual Brain, if you are interested in how we can manage to speak more than one language.

Thanks. Will have to look that one up. I'm deeply jealous of those who have been genuinely raised bi- or tri-lingual. The encoding in their brains is something else. I know it's been studied quite a bit, and it's really recommended that if parents have different native tongues, they should use them with their children from birth.

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

Nope. Never had a colostomy.

I do, as a few people on here can attest too!

Not your bag then.

Just as I read that, my stoma made the equivalent of a fart, as if in protest!

 

[briantrumpet]

I do, as a few people on here can attest too!

Just as I read that, my stoma made the equivalent of a fart, as if in protest!

Sorry, couldn't resist. The Bike Radar refugees have had a couple following the fashion too.

 

[mistyoptic]

9/10. Must have been my grammar school education 😉

 

[briantrumpet]

9/10. Must have been my grammar school education 😉

I have to say that one or two of the questions I'd put as debatable, even if I did get 10/10 😉

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

Sorry, couldn't resist. The Bike Radar refugees have had a couple following the fashion too.

It's fashionable?

Praise be, it's the first time ever in my life that anybody has ever described THAT about me!

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

I had got Colitis out of the blue a few years back. The end result (pardon the pun) was that I had to have my large intestine removed in an emergency operation.

They could not reverse it afterwards.