As an English teacher, I find myself studying the English language making sure I understand the ins and outs before I teach it. I often find myself doubting or wondering why something is the way it is. For instance, I never stopped to think about the rules for the simple present tense in English. I understand the rules for the same thing in Spanish, but I had to learn them by trial and error so I could teach them to my non-English speaking students. If you're wondering, the verb stays the same except for the 3rd person singular (he/she/it), which gets an "s" at the end. I jump, you jump, he/she/it jumps, we jump, you all jump, they jump. Interesting...not really, but it's how I spend my days.
When I got married, I had to stop and study how to write my new name, Brooks. Jenny Brooks is only one person, but it ends with an "s", so what do you do when it suddenly becomes plural and there are more than one Brooks? Well, here is what I found out...
Jenny Brooks (Singular)
The Brookses (more than one Brooks)
Mrs. Brooks's classroom (singular possessive)...looks funny, but it's correct
The Brookses' house (plural possessive) ...looks even funnier
Who would have thunk...
If you're interested in other common errors in English, this website by a WSU professor Paul Brians is amazing. http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/errors.html. I'm hoping to get his book or desk calendar for Christmas. I'm a dork.
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3 comments:
Dork yes check!
- me too
OK blog updated...request granted yes it is 6am on a Sunday morning I have been up since 4 writing 2 new blogs just for you guys!
okay this has nothing to do with your grammar post, but I clicked on the Krista Crotty blog link, and -too funny- Krista is the sister-in-law to my good friend Laura and her husband Matt Crotty (see link to Double L etc on my blog)! Is this a small world or what?
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