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English Should not be Compulsory in High School

Robin said:
I am pretty sure that those of us who will never be able to write an essay on what TS Eliot meant by his poems have a great deal to contribute to society and should not have this built in disadvantage at the most important year of our schooling.

I would be interested in hearing other perspectives on this.
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In America:

If you have a disability, you are entitled to accommodations so as to receive a free and appropriate public education. If you can't write an essay because of a problem with executive decision-making might be able to use aids like flow-charts or outline forms. If you have difficulty manipulating a pen, you might be allowed to type or even dictate your answer.

There are also multiple levels of English & Language classes. In my school, there was Resource, Regents, Honors, and AP. All students were required to take the Regents test for a diploma. But that test was very easy. It certainly didn't require a dissertation on TS Eliot's overarching thematic symmetry in his verse-writing. It would present a few stanzas of a poem and ask a couple multiple-choice questions about it. The college-level test presented two short poems and asked the student to write an essay asking them to compare and contrast.

All this being the case, I think ELA is as or more necessary than any other skill taught in high school. The ability to interpret language is of desperate importance seeing as it's the way we, um, communicate. The ability to create an ordered and logical argument is equally important. I'm not sure how any mathematician or engineer could convince anyone of anything without that skill - let alone read the very dense texts they need to master such skills in the first place.

If you are just making a rhetorical point about math: I agree that it should be taught through all of high school. One may argue that one "doesn't use math," but I find this unavailing. It's important to be able to see the precision and logic of the world and appreciate the exacting task of invention and innovation.

We were required to take math through 12th grade and pass Regents tests. The lowest level of math stopped just before Calc. The highest level was Calc. BC (I actually dropped down to Calc. AB because I had no idea what was going on.) I fulfilled my college liberal arts requirement with that AP test and a class on logic.
 
bobdroege7 said:
It is a most necessary skill.

English majors may not make top salaries right out of college, but after 20 years they do indeed catch up.

Say you and another engineer are in competition for a promotion, the other one has a minor in English, but you are the better engineer. I would bet against you getting the job.

If you can't get there, their, and they're right nor can you get your, you're and yore right, better go back to school.
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If someone hasn't got "there", "their" and "they're" right by Year 10 then they probably never will. You don't learn grammar in Years 11 and 12.

In Year 12 you learn to say that when T S Eliot says "Six O'Clock" he is making some point about the alienation and absence of meaning brought about by increasing urbanisation, or something along those lines.

I could never do that, no matter how hard I tried to learn and I can do quite a lot that is useful without being able to do that.
 
I have found that if I'm reading a passage with correct grammar and spelling, I can comprehend it smoothly and quickly. If I encounter a grammar or spelling mistake, then I have to stop and interpret it, which disrupts the smoothness of my reading. That's why I feel that if someone is writing with the intention of being read, they should be using correct grammar and spelling. But that's my opinion, and I acknowledge that other people can have different opinions on this subject.
 
Loss Leader said:
In America:

If you have a disability, you are entitled to accommodations so as to receive a free and appropriate public education. If you can't write an essay because of a problem with executive decision-making might be able to use aids like flow-charts or outline forms. If you have difficulty manipulating a pen, you might be allowed to type or even dictate your answer.
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Same in Australia, but it is not a matter of how you say it, it is rather what you are supposed to say.

Take Eliot's Preludes, and start with first poem. To me it is just a word picture of a winter evening in the city. Rather a good one, it evokes that subject well, but that is all it is to me.

I gather from example essays that it is supposed to convey ideas to the reader about alienation, emptiness and loneliness of modern life.

OK, so the scraps of leaves are grimy. The chimney pots are broken. You can smell steak.

So what?

That is just part of the charm of a city to me, it speaks nothing to me of alienation, loneliness and emptiness. You can be lonely, alienated and empty in a smart suburb with carefully swept streets and neatly clipped lawns.

If I could understand how Eliot is supposed to be getting from the one thing to the other then think I could find a way to convey this to the examiner.

But I can't. And I don't think I could ever learn to do that. No matter how hard I tried.
 
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arthwollipot said:
I have found that if I'm reading a passage with correct grammar and spelling, I can comprehend it smoothly and quickly. If I encounter a grammar or spelling mistake, then I have to stop and interpret it, which disrupts the smoothness of my reading. That's why I feel that if someone is writing with the intention of being read, they should be using correct grammar and spelling. But that's my opinion, and I acknowledge that other people can have different opinions on this subject.
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My father in law left school at 11 to work on the family farm, and never learned English until he was 18 and his grammar was faultless.

If all we had to master in years 11 and 12 was grammar then I should have no issue with English being compulsory.
 
Robin said:
My father in law left school at 11 to work on the family farm, and never learned English until he was 18 and his grammar was faultless.

If all we had to master in years 11 and 12 was grammar then I should have no issue with English being compulsory.
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Let me guess - your father in law read a lot? That was me, too. I was a voracious reader from early childhood. So by the time I did learn the smatterings of very basic grammar that were all I was taught in school, I already had a very good grasp of English. I don't recall ever getting less than 100% in a spelling test. If we had spelling bees in this country, I would have made the nationals.
 
arthwollipot said:
Let me guess - your father in law read a lot? That was me, too. I was a voracious reader from early childhood. So by the time I did learn the smatterings of very basic grammar that were all I was taught in school, I already had a very good grasp of English. I don't recall ever getting less than 100% in a spelling test. If we had spelling bees in this country, I would have made the nationals.
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I can't recall having seen any book in his house besides the Bible and some technical books on building codes. English wasn't his first language, so I expect he took some evening classes.
 
But as I said, if grammar was the criterion for getting a good grade in English I would have no issue with it being compulsory.
 
arthwollipot said:
I'd like to see kids these days study more English grammar and spelling, because what they have now is atrocious. On the other hand, written language is evolving alongside spoken, and while awful from a grammar traditionalist perspective, it is rarely unreadable.
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I see a lot of claims about how kids today can't read and write proper grammar, but is there any evidence that reading and writing comprehension is lower today than it ever has been in the past?

"Grammar traditionalists" have been bemoaning the decline in grammar for hundreds of years, from those who thought Shakespeare couldn't write proper grammar, to Swift, to Strunk and White, to George Orwell and to modern day pedants like Lynne Truss and Simon Heffer, despite the fact that literacy has risen over those centuries, and the fact that they mistake "What I learnt when I was at school" for "correct grammar", and their books tend to littered with all kinds of errors which are pointed out by actual linguists.
 
I knew someone who refused to do English in Year 12, just didn't turn up to class.

In fact he refused to do anything except maths and science. The school said "without your ATAR you won't be able to get into University" and he contacted the universities directly and they said "How soon can you start?"

Of course he was exceptional in those subjects and other students can't follow this example, but I think, as long as that last year of high school is so critical to success in life, it should be open for people to decide that how to maximise those results, instead of there being this built in advantage for people who happen to be good at English.

After all, the educational system has had 11 years to teach good communication skills.
 
angrysoba said:
I see a lot of claims about how kids today can't read and write proper grammar, but is there any evidence that reading and writing comprehension is lower today than it ever has been in the past?

"Grammar traditionalists" have been bemoaning the decline in grammar for hundreds of years, from those who thought Shakespeare couldn't write proper grammar, to Swift, to Strunk and White, to George Orwell and to modern day pedants like Lynne Truss and Simon Heffer, despite the fact that literacy has risen over those centuries, and the fact that they mistake "What I learnt when I was at school" for "correct grammar", and their books tend to littered with all kinds of errors which are pointed out by actual linguists.
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While the grammar traditionalist in me wails in frustration, he also cannot help but agree.
 
I would like to have students be able to look at statements and say if they are any good. Like look at political propaganda from various sources and then write a short essay about who is talking garbage and who is talking sense.

For maths they should be able to do some sort of budget. Then compare it with how money is spent.

They should be able to use a spreadsheet, emails and edit documents.
 
Maths is a rigorous discipline but it's a small subset of us that can be competent in calculus.

I do think that courses in Logic and Basic Science - the scientific method(s) anyway - should be compulsory.

I was reading poetry from the age of 7 but I hated English classes all through my schooldays - can quite sympathise with OP's friend. I guess the important thing is to make sure that the vast majority leave school being able to read.
 
arthwollipot said:
Let me guess - your father in law read a lot? That was me, too. I was a voracious reader from early childhood. So by the time I did learn the smatterings of very basic grammar that were all I was taught in school, I already had a very good grasp of English. I don't recall ever getting less than 100% in a spelling test. If we had spelling bees in this country, I would have made the nationals.
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Oh, to this I should add that I learned most about English grammar by studying four years of Latin.
 
For all of the talk about electives, the most important thing is that children get through to the end of high school. All research shows that children who get through year 12 do better on average than those who drop out at year 10. So even though I would prefer to see English, Science and Mathematics compulsory to year 12, that is a secondary consideration.
 
lionking said:
For all of the talk about electives, the most important thing is that children get through to the end of high school. All research shows that children who get through year 12 do better on average than those who drop out at year 10. So even though I would prefer to see English, Science and Mathematics compulsory to year 12, that is a secondary consideration.
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I think that's the basis behind Canberra doing the last two years in a separate school with a different structure. Some kids would go from Year 10 to a trade school, while others would go on to do the extra two years, and would be expected to go to university after that.

I did the extra two years, but never went on to uni. :p
 
lionking said:
For all of the talk about electives, the most important thing is that children get through to the end of high school. All research shows that children who get through year 12 do better on average than those who drop out at year 10. So even though I would prefer to see English, Science and Mathematics compulsory to year 12, that is a secondary consideration.
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I don't doubt it, but I wonder if that is more correlation than causation. I know a lot of people at school who were more of the working class persuasion who did badly at school because they were not studying, saw no point in it and were happy to leave as early as possible to get a job, get pregnant, maybe even get married... whereas families that have stable incomes, and can pay for their kids to stay in education and go onto university had no pressing need to leave.
 
arthwollipot said:
While the grammar traditionalist in me wails in frustration, he also cannot help but agree.
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arthwollipot said:
Oh, to this I should add that I learned most about English grammar by studying four years of Latin.
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Very true, and I also learnt most of what I know about grammar while studying Japanese - not that they have similar grammars at all.
 
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