[Archived] English

[Hannah]

I am not meaning to open up a whole can of worms but I am struggling to make the worksheets and I need to teach this tomorrow so here is your way of supporting the education of the little sprogs in my care!

I am teaching them the rules of changing verbs from present tense to past tense by adding ed (We do irregular verbs on Thursday!)

As far as i know there are four rules:

• Change the y to an i and add ed
• Just add ed
• If it ends with an e, just add a d
• If it has a short vowel sound you double the final consonant and add ed

So what do you need to do! I can only think of words like skip and hop that you double the consonant - what other letters other than p do you double? I need about 6 examples of each rule!

Please don't turn this into a rant about the grammar of the youth of today!

[Hannah]

Oh and I nearly forgot I then need each of the examples in a sentence in the present tense for the children to put into the past tense!!!

[Billinge End Blue]

<what other letters other than p do you double? I need about 6 examples of each rule! >

pat patted

pet petted

nip nipped

dam dammed

tar tarred

bin binned

You can construct the example sentences!

[colin]

Change the y to an i and add ed

to try - tried

to fry - fried

to mystify - mystified

to claify - clarified

to justify - justified

Just add ed

to jump - jumped

to walk - walked

to thank - thanked

to talk - talked

to sketch - sketched

If it ends with an e, just add a d

to hope - hoped

to mope moped (which takes you to a small motorbike)

to poke - poked

to smoke - smoked

to queue - queued

If it has a short vowel sound you double the final consonant and add ed

to shop - shopped

to chat - chatted

to mop - mopped

to hop - hopped

to skip - skipped

[ABBEY]

***abbey goes to bed its all gone whoooooosh*****

is it a joke h? or are things that bad a teacher consults a footy message board to help with marking kids work hahaahaha

[Claytons Left Boot]

Make sure you get the little blighters to use their adverbs correctly.

Because of the way both footballers (amongst others) speak on tv and Americans, the adverb is soon going to be extinct.

The brilliant footballer (adjective).

The footballer played brilliantly (adverb)

The number of times people like Paul Merson say things like, 'he did brilliant' is incredible. Unfortunately viewers watch and copy.

[Claytons Left Boot]

Actually that is a little too good for Merson - he would normally say, 'he done brilliant.'

[AlanK]

Oh and please please drum it in to them at an early age that " you are " and " you`re " are compatible. Not " your ".

[T4E]

....and hammer out of them the desire to say "should of" and "could have".

That drives me potty.

EDIT: Looks like the swear filter picks up "c o u l d o f". Good works moddies!

[Eddie]

Only slight complication is that should have can be should've, although that's obviously not formal English, but when said it sounds basically like "should of".

[Eddie]

just testing

[trueblue]

<what other letters other than p do you double? I need about 6 examples of each rule! >

pat patted

pet petted

nip nipped

dam dammed

tar tarred

bin binned

You can construct the example sentences!

d

skid skidded

[Nate]

Plus there / they're /their. I hate the misuse of them.

[Claytons Left Boot]

Another one that two or three use on here is :-

'We where at the game...........'

Instead of 'we were............'

Aghhhhhhhhh!

[BiggusLaddus]

One that particularly annoys me, on forums especially is people who ask for 'advise' :!:

[American]

Oh and please please drum it in to them at an early age that " you are " and " you`re " are compatible. Not " your ".

Also, that when they don't win or draw, they lose, they don't loose (and Alan, I'm picking on you because you do this one a lot!!).

[AlanK]

Erm, no I don`t.

You looser!

[American]

Apologies, got you mixed up with the other Alan.

And I'm a whiner, er, I mean a winner!!

[adopted scouser]

'laters all'

'is all'

People who have a lazy palate and use V instead of TH. 'Vu problem is....

Black Americans who say Y'all, and 'younowhamsayin' at the end of every sentence.

Question for our American posters. Why do you refer to herbs as 'erbs' ?

[Eddie]

Just a thing they do.

By the way, y'all is far from limited to black americans.

[Lathund]

"would of"/"could have" and the confusion between "they're/their/there" has been enough to on occasion put repeat offenders on ignore. I'm well aware that's overreacting, but I've also seen a correlation between that and posts that, generally, offer absolutely nothing. Now whether that's a real correlation or just something I see because I "want" to see it, is a whole other issue

[Hannah]

Well, that was a cracking lesson! It was like pulling teeth.

They now know that if the verb ends with a y ...and if the verb ends with an e - I hammered that in. Trying to get them to double the letter following a short vowel was a different matter. ARGH!!!

Tomorrow we attempt irregular verbs.

The trouble with all of this is that its not something that you can teach in one lesson. It's something that the children need continually modelling for them and correcting them when they do it wrong. It isn't happening at home as the parents know no better and there is only a limited amount of speech you can correct in one day.

My pet hate is the children missing words out "Can i go toilet?" or "Can I have the toilet?" To which I always reply - no, it belongs to school leaving the children bemused most of the time.

It was always too much to hope that this thread wouldn't turn into a rant about bad English, wasn't it!!!

[American]

'laters all'

'is all'

People who have a lazy palate and use V instead of TH. 'Vu problem is....

Black Americans who say Y'all, and 'younowhamsayin' at the end of every sentence.

Question for our American posters. Why do you refer to herbs as 'erbs' ?

According to Wikipedia it can be pronounced either way (is that EEEEther way, or Ither way?). We consider the h to be silent - maybe a latin thing?