3 posts tagged “grammar”

Ok. Time for a quick English teacher rant.

Why? Because I'm about to explode. From mines.
I'm not a weapon's expert by any stretch of the imagination, but I've read enough war books, seen enough movies, and played enough video games to know that mines are little things that go in the ground and blow you up when you step on them. Sometimes they can be placed in water. Sometimes they blow up cars. Sometimes trucks. Sometimes boats. They are mines.

Now we have the moment of confusion. When I said they are mines, I was not saying that they belong to me. I was not saying, in other words, that "you should give me back that mine, because it's mines." In fact, I cringe every time I hear the word "mines" used as an adjective denoting possession of an object. Example: "Hey I love your hair! I wish MINES was like that." Newsflash people. It IS NOT A DESCRIBING WORD. IT IS A NOUN in the plural form, meaning more than one mine (yes, technically it can also be a verb meaning "to dig," but this is irrelevant at the moment). And like I said, a mine is a type of bomb! Would you say "that's bombs?!!" Ok don't answer that. True, there may be some smarty pants whining (a smug, satisfied expression of having 'moded' the teacher plastered across their face): "well mines can have different meanings to different people. Yeah."

Ok fine. Mines can also be holes in the ground or in the sides of mountains. You find gold in them. Or diamonds. Maybe coal. Orcs from Lord of the Rings hide out inside. Snow White's seven dwarves clock in Monday--Friday. Those are mines. No, they are not MINE. They are mines. Places or things. Nouns. NOT DESCRIBING WORDS!!!!

I haven't reached my breaking point yet, but I'm not sure how much more "mine abuse" I can take. I fear mines will cause me to explode. Maybe I should just find some of those really big holes to hide in until this whole thing blows over. What do you call them?
Oh yeah. They're mines.

Consider the following quote:
"It's a strange world of language in which skating on thin ice can get you into hot water."

You gotta love idioms. Pardon the slang. Did "gotta" make it into the dictionary yet? Wow. My second sentence, and I'm already off topic. In all seriousness, I can sort of see why English drives people "up a wall" <--idiom. Anyone, with or without common sense, can easily observe that English cannot drive anything "up a wall", let alone people.  Come to think of it, I don't think people can be driven "up a wall" by anything. It is possible, however, to skate on thin ice. In fact, I tried it a couple of months ago, when the volleyball my family and I were using bounced out over a frozen pond. My younger brother was too busy talking to someone unimportant, so he wouldn't retrieve the ball. It was up to me. So I "skated" out over the ice, reached  for  the Wilson sign (I almost felt like a castaway), and then the ice decided it wouldn't hold me anymore. I crashed through. Luckily it was only about a foot deep, but I'll tell you one thing for sure: The water certainly was NOT hot!

Yes, I know, any idiot could have told me the water underneath a frozen pond would be cold, but back to the original question--how does skating on thin ice get you into hot water? And how hot is this water we're talking about? Because if it's jacuzzi-hot, then that doesn't sound like such a bad thing. Talk about a need to be more specific. It should go something more like this: "skating on thin ice will get you into hot water that can and will cause an excruciating death due to third degree burns if you sit in it too long." Thankfully, I don't hear too many people say things like "skating on thin ice" and "get into hot water." No, instead we reel off phrases like "watch your back", "I got your back" "chillin'", "kickin' it", and "let's bounce."  Upon hearing such idioms, the untrained learner of English might wonder what someone's cold backside has to do with kicking something that may or may not be bouncing up and down.

What's my point. Any 8th grader would laugh in the face of what I just wrote, proving that they are capable of understanding figurative language. Not only are they capable--they're experts. So I have hope. Even on those days when I'm being "driven up a wall" I'll remind everyone that "I got you're back, we're just chillin'. Just kick it for 50 minutes, and then you can

bounce."

Then again, that might be skating on thin ice.

Since I repeatedly claim to enjoy the subject I teach, and I supposedly enjoy reading and writing, I figured it would only be fair to lead by example. Then again, as teacher and supreme ruler of my poorly ventilated 20X30 kingdom (aka room 204), I can do pretty much anything I want. It just so happens I want to write. So for the next four weeks, I'll be scribbling away with all of my amazing students, journaling/bloggging/writing about pretty much anything I dang-well please. Because I am an English teacher who shamelessly praises the virtues of correct spelling and punctuation, I will attempt to avoid embarrassing mistakes, including but not limited to: confusing there/their/they're, saying things like "your stupid," and spelling the word "definitely" differently each time, but never quite getting it right.

I firmly believe that one must maintain a mastery of standard English. Nevertheless, words and phrases such as "dude," "bro," "sick," and "what it is" all have their very important places to fill in our daily vocabulary, and I'm not ashamed to admit they sometimes weasel their way into my writing. What it is.

I'll be writing about anything I feel like. I'll be starting off almost every paragraph with some sort of first-person personal pronoun. This is about me, what I care about, what I don't care about, and most of all, what I firmly believe in. And right now, I firmly believe my Jackson Bam has just had a bowel movement.

That's why I'm here.