By Gabriel Princewill And Gavin Mackintosh-
British primary schools must Improve their teaching on punctuation to prepare them for secondary school and later life, including University. Five primary schools found lax in their teaching of punctuation have been asked by The Eye Of Media.Com to thoroughly train their pupils in proper punctuation. We have greed not to mention them by names at this stage.
It comes after it emerged that a number of primary schools have a lackadaisical approach to their commitment to teaching about punctuation, leaving many primary school pupils deficient in punctuation. Research conducted by this paper shows that a number of secondary school pupils, and even University graduates, have poor level of punctuation.
Our researchers have spotted consistent issues of punctuation among secondary school pupils, and even University graduates. Issues of punctuation have also been spotted on numerous occasions in the past among some writers from this publication, causing delays in final submission due to the need for the articles to be revised and the errors eliminated. Most of those issues have been overcome internally, but punctuation continues to be a problem common all the way up to university level.
Many graduates who graduated with good degrees still struggle to identify the right time to pause in a sentence. This shows that not enough attention is paid to this area at primary school level, despite punctuation being one of the areas schools are instructed to adequately train their pupils. However, it is quite conceivable for some primary and secondary school teachers not to have perfected this often overlooked area of academia.
Guidelines from the Department Of Education state that:
”Teachers should develop pupils’ reading and writing in all subjects to support their acquisition of knowledge. Pupils should be taught to read fluently, understand extended prose (both fiction and non-fiction) and be encouraged to read for pleasure. Schools should do everything to promote wider reading. They should provide library facilities and set ambitious expectations for reading at home. Pupils should develop the stamina and skills to write at length, with accurate spelling and punctuation. They
should be taught the correct use of grammar”.
The mandate from the government is clear, but schools need to do more to ensure the implementation of these guidelines. school should not get n outstanding Ofsted rating if majority of its students display poor levels of punctuating skills. Ofsted tke into account many other considerations when ranking a school, but their ranking ought to be affected by the absence of any one key consideration integral to academic development.
PENALISE
The Department Of Education told The Eye Of Media.Com that Universities set their own standards when it comes to marking criteria.This may be true, but they should be overseen to prevent the continuity of any glaring oversight on the part of Universities.
Most British Universities do not penalise punctuation errors, but assess students on their factual knowledge of a question. Their examination extends to their ability to present their answers in a clear and understandable fashion. Not a lot of emphasis is placed on punctuation in institutions of higher learning, the price paid being the ability of adult graduates not knowing how to punctuate a sentence very well, even when it is well written.
Many university students can pass exams well despite flaws in their punctuation and the construction of their sentences. This needs to be mastered at primary school level, with teachers using several examples of sentences with good punctuation to both improve pupils reading ability and master their use of punctuation. Good academic ability and presentation can co-exist with poor punctuation, yet the ability to develop the former can be applied in perfecting the latter.
South Bank’s Professor of Radiography, Rachel Pincto told the Eye Of Media.Com: ”Punctuation is definitely an area that can improve in education. I have had to mark so many essays with poor punctuation in my time, it is unbelievable. It will take more teaching and practise in the earlier years of educational development”.
FLAWLESS
British newspapers for example, are generally flawless in punctuation, but from time to time punctuation errors do occur, do typo errors. This can happen since humans are fallible. Punctuation errors have been submitted to this publication on numerous occasions in the past, some have even been spotted after publication to our own embarrassment. The problem here is that such errors cannot always be distinguished from a lack of understanding about the appropriate timing of a pause.
Punctuation is one of the least attended areas in education; one that needs to be addressed sooner rather than later. An error of punctuation can change the way a sentence is presented, and the meaning understood by the receiver of the receiver of the sentence.
Failing to master punctuation can affect the smooth logic of an individual’s mind when expressing themselves. Schools need to take time to address this problem carefully, right from primary school. It is also important that Universities do not ignore the problem of punctuation flaws because it part of the academic presentation and training of a student.
The Department Of Education has promised to look into our findings, and will be sending us a response on Monday.