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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I teach in Fairfax County, and it's the same deal here.  I don't think they're stupid, I think there is a lack of motivation/effort/experience that contributes to no background knowledge.

My students thought Mount Vernon was a mountain, and Chile was in Europe.  They are 8th graders.[/quote]

Teacher here.  That made me chuckle.  We can blame this on the non-existent content curriculum in elementary schools.  My son studied "communities" in elementary school social studies for K-3.  WTH?  Why can't they learn actual history and actual geography?  Everything he knows about geography, he learned from me.  It's sad.  Now he's in private school and he learns actual "stuff" in social studies.  It's his favorite class.[/quote]

This.  When I was in school we were given explicit grammar lessons about homophones, and exercises to reinforce the lesson.  Our papers (both the homophone exercises, and later compositions) were graded.

Here (MCPS), grammar is not taught in a systematic way.  Homework is typically not graded.  Moreover, in curriculum meetings, I've been informed that teachers (at least on the elementary level) are instructed not to correct all errors in a composition, because it is too discouraging for the student.  I have actually been told in those same meetings, that while there are many ways to teach students new vocabulary (like having the students act out the word), the one way they felt didn't work was for the students to look up words in a dictionary.

MCPS is so focused on teaching "higher-order thinking" (an admirable goal), that it isn't teaching enough basic content for students to think about or skills, like grammar, to effectively communicate their thoughts. [/quote]

MCPS does not teach grammar and punctuation.  It is pathetic.  No grading on homework and no emphasis on grammar/punctuation.

Where are the kids supposed to learn that?

We taught both kids this at home.  [/quote]
My kids go to a non W school. They learned about punctuation in school.  I also recall my 6th grader learning about adverbs, etc... in ES.

As for grammar, I think the best way to learn is by reading a lot.  When I was a kid, I remember diagraming sentences, but honestly, that's not where I really picked up correct grammar from.  It came from reading a lot.[/quote]

My experience is that some teachers will take it upon themselves to teach grammar.  One of my children had a teacher in fourth grade who used her daughter's private school curriculum as a guide to teach grammar.  Some other teachers in middle and high school have covered grammar as well, but it always seemed like something they were doing outside the curriculum.

As a bookaholic, I agree that reading can be a great way to learn grammar (and vocabulary and spelling).  However, I also found explicit instruction in those areas helpful, and frankly, I wish I had had more.  I learned a lot about grammar from studying a foreign language.  Moreover, I recognize that most kids don't read as much as I (and apparantly you) did.  For those kids, I think explicit instruction is critical.

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