I am writing on my blog to prevent me from being rude on a list. When will homeschoolers learn that the plural for "curriculum" is NOT "curriculums"? It is "curricula".
It's like the homeschooler in Hampton Roads whose address is "grammerworks@....".
I die a thousand deaths when I see homeschoolers make mistakes like this.
Monday, November 2, 2009
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11 comments:
Oh my goodness! I can only imagine how times I've made you cringe with my typos/errors =) The one that always gets me, homeschooler or not, is there/their/they're . Seriously, this should be basic!
If it makes you feel any better, and I doubt it will, I once received an invitation from my children's school which read, "Your Invited."
We all make mistakes and isn't 'grammer' an accepted alternate spelling of 'grammar'?
PS-I unsubbed to that list a long time ago. Lots of irrelevant info.
hahahahha... Your (hahaha just kidding)...You're turning into my father!
I don't think I've ever written "curriculums" (or even THOUGHT it) but I know occasionally I write curriculum when I really mean curricula.
I used to be SUCH a stickler for proper grammar and writing. I'm sure you remember my early emails, pre-Julian (who was child #3). Somehow time and many children have conspired to make me a lazy writer. Sometimes I reread messages that I've written and absolutely cannot believe all the mistakes that I made! I know I didn't *think* the mistakes and that they appeared correctly in my mind as I thought them, so how they ended up typed that way is beyond me. Maybe someday I will reclaim my mind from my children.
xo
Alaina
I cringe when this is on public boards or on blogs that I know are cruised by school teachers who hate homeschooling. Otherwise I don't care. As a mom of a bad speller I'm a little more aware of the challenges that some ppl seem to have with spelling. I'm a natural speller and didn't 'get it' before, thought everyone should just be great at spelling if they only paid attention.
I hate wrong words like segue is segue not segway. Or it "piqued my interest" it is not "it peaked my interest".
And worse are the words like sun/son that the spell check doesn't catch but somehow the mom didn't know the difference? Huh?
Well the grade 3 grammar curriculum did teach me that I was doing apostrophes wrong. And I still am a bit confused about capitalization in titles like in a blog post title. I'll learn that someday. LOL.
Hope you have been well.
Thank you! My spell checker would always underline the word 'curriculums' - and I knew it didn't sound right. So, finally (my bad) got around to looking into the correct spelling for the plural of curriculum.
I thought you would like to know that your blog was in the top 3 search results on Google when I searched for, 'plural for curriculum'. Nice work!
Writing a blog surely highlights the need for grammar and writing skills!
Thanks!
Folks, 'curriculums' is just fine as the plural of 'curriculum', as an alternative to the Latinate 'curricula'.
Especially, if you are really teaching your kids, please do not ossify their education by insisting that language is fixed. It isn't, and I'll bet that the regular -s form of that particular plural will in due course outpace the old-fashioned one, just as has already happened with 'stadiums', 'auditoriums' and 'emporiums'.
Martin, there is the "old-fashioned" but correct plural of latinate words and then there is the "lazy" but "current", correct version of the words. I continue to teach my children the correct forms. They learn "emporia" and "stadia". As my mother always said, "Just because everyone else is jumping off the cliff, you don't need to follow". Standards are falling in every aspect of modern life, we don't need to hasten that fall in the language we teach our children. When I see the incorrect use of the plural of "curriculum", I immediately find myself lowering my opinion of the user.
Thank you so much!
Bernie Weisz, historian and book reviewer , Vietnam War
I'm confused by your assumption that "old-fashioned" forms are inherently correct. If language forms and rules aren't allowed to change, or, if its wrong to adopt new grammar and vocabulary, then why are we not speaking Middle English, Old English, Old High German, Old French or Latin?
Other aspects of your "rant" confuse me as well. For instance, why is there a connection between prescriptive grammar rules and the idea of right and wrong? Where is the line of demarcation between understanding the meaning a speaker is trying to communicate and grammar? I'm not arguing that grammar is arbitrary, but I do believe that it is not, as you present it, a black and white issue. As a former home schooler, I feel it is a mistake to represent the home schooling community with this kind of black and white ideology, especially as you claim you base your opinions of others, in part, on their use of grammar. Also, I don't quite see the connection between using "current" (or "lazy", and implicitly, I guess, "wrong,") word forms and "jumping off the cliff."
Thanks for the "rant." I was typing a note and needed the plural for curriculum. The on-line Webster's Dictionary wrote, "curricula or curriculums" not specifying weather these were variations of the word or the plural of the word. I felt uncomfortable with this information so I googled "plural for curriculum" and found your blog. Thanks for posting.
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