Have recent generations forgotten correct spelling and grammar?

CASTLEGATES · Oct 25, 2009

I make a big distinction between casual "chatting" on a forum such as this one ... and more formal writing. Here, I am very tolerant of misspellings and typos as I know that most of us are typing quickly and not taking a lot of time to proof-read and correct all of our casual convesation here.
But I am bothered by the appearance we give of our profession when we nurses use poor grammar on more formal documents. It makes us look very poorly educated when others can see that we don't know how to write in complete sentences, don't know that every sentence needs both a subject and a verb, don't know the right words or meanings of common expressions, etc.
As a part-time faculty member in an RN-BSN program, I grade student term papers. These are formal papers written in APA style, etc. I am appalled by the poor grammar, awkward or incorrect word usage, wrong punctuation, etc. that I see in approximately 33% of my students. Not only is it "not college level writing," it is "not 8th grade level" writing. The same people seem to also have a lot of time understanding the textbook and the nursing articles that we read in class. These students were obviously "passed along" in their earlier schooling without ever having to master the English language. they haven't forgotten it: they never learned it.
While such students may be adequate direct patient care providers, I am always conflicted about how to grade them. I am not teaching physical bedside care-giving skills. Their bedside clinical skills are irrelevant in assessing their academic skills. I am teaching them in their academic classes -- and that level of reading comprehension and writing is simply not at the college (BSN) level. I struggle with that.

In my school, the instructors say, "incorrect spelling or punctuation- one letter grade off". :eek: They'd also add "you're in college and we're not your parents so take initiative". I think it's perfectly acceptable to expect college level writing from a college student. :specs: If they're subpar and passed along again, what does that say of an instructor's teaching ability or the school's reputation post grad? That's mainly what I'm talking about-never online stuff unless it's apparent they just can't spell then my mind goes in to "did they pay attention to xyz in school, as well?" How does a college graduate NOT write like a grade school-er?

I write as I speak so you'll see all kinds of messy stuff that I try to do so you can hear me talking. Given a chart, it's going to be all spelled correctly but I will admit a comma may be off given an added thought mid sentence, etc. Like I said, my 9 year old saw spelling issues and pointed this out. We're college grads; how are they passing this? At least I'm not alone in my observation of the increase...:heartbeat

Here's another thread about the spoken word...what's happening? https://allnurses.com/general-nursing-discussion/learn-say-correctly-312525.html

MedSurgeMess · Oct 25, 2009

I make a big distinction between casual "chatting" on a forum such as this one ... and more formal writing. Here, I am very tolerant of misspellings and typos as I know that most of us are typing quickly and not taking a lot of time to proof-read and correct all of our casual convesation here.
But I am bothered by the appearance we give of our profession when we nurses use poor grammar on more formal documents. It makes us look very poorly educated when others can see that we don't know how to write in complete sentences, don't know that every sentence needs both a subject and a verb, don't know the right words or meanings of common expressions, etc.
As a part-time faculty member in an RN-BSN program, I grade student term papers. These are formal papers written in APA style, etc. I am appalled by the poor grammar, awkward or incorrect word usage, wrong punctuation, etc. that I see in approximately 33% of my students. Not only is it "not college level writing," it is "not 8th grade level" writing. The same people seem to also have a lot of time understanding the textbook and the nursing articles that we read in class. These students were obviously "passed along" in their earlier schooling without ever having to master the English language. they haven't forgotten it: they never learned it.
While such students may be adequate direct patient care providers, I am always conflicted about how to grade them. I am not teaching physical bedside care-giving skills. Their bedside clinical skills are irrelevant in assessing their academic skills. I am teaching them in their academic classes -- and that level of reading comprehension and writing is simply not at the college (BSN) level. I struggle with that.

llg, I agree with you on that. I teach part time, and 2 papers last semester were written by 20-22 yr olds and were written strictly in texting format (yes, cell phone texting). Both had wanted to turn in the papers late, I mean they only had 10 weeks to write 4 pages in APA format. I failed them both, and of course, I'm the mean b**** that failed them, not the lack of common sense that had to do with it. In fact, talking to other instructors in this program, this is not isolated. I'm not dissing younger people, but many are caught up with the texting/IM age that has created this. What you do on a chat site is one thing, what you do on a professional paper/legal document is strictly something else.

JSBoston · Oct 25, 2009

You notice it in the younger generation, but I notice it much more in the older generation of nurses. I almost cringe when I hear "I seen it" or "These ones"... and much more from some of the older nurses I work with, but I'm sure it's seen across the board. Spelling errors happen, even with the best of us. But sometimes I wonder how we have all of these great educated nurses who don't act like they are educated at all!

MissBrittanyRN · Oct 25, 2009

Not to be biased but forget it, this comment is for the 28 and below group. How much do we actually write out on pen and paper? We email, we text, we myspace, we facebook - all informal so who cares? We write our school papers with spellcheck, we chart on a computer, and in my little experience with charting there is almost always a list that you select from, with occasional annotation. Most text messages auto correct for you when you text, so I think we get lazy. I can think of very few things that are expected to be written out on paper with pen. I am personally a list maker so I write to myself frequently with my to-do list, to buy list, etc. But if I actually stoppped to think about how to spell half of the things I write, I would be in trouble

AngelfireRN, MSN, RN, APRN · Oct 25, 2009

Well, to play devil's advocate here...the ones that drive me crazy on here are words that change the whole readability of a sentence, like "bath" for "bathe" and "breath" for "breathe". I'll admit, as much as I talk like a hayseed, those make me grind my teeth.

allnurses Guide · Oct 25, 2009

Not to be biased but forget it, this comment is for the 28 and below group. How much do we actually write out on pen and paper? We email, we text, we myspace, we facebook - all informal so who cares?

Communication in any form matters. Sloppiness in private life should not cross over into your professional life. Yes, we are moving to computer charting, but there are still spaces for individualized notes to be written (or typed).

I took my children (all still under 28) out of public school years ago and homeschooled them, after a comment by a teacher that it wasn't her job to correct the 3rd grade grammar, she "just had them read it out loud and they usually found their own mistakes". That was not the only reason, but it sums up much of our frustration. When my son took his required freshman English at University, the format was to write a paper and spend the semester learning to edit and correct until it was at college level writing. His teacher asked where he had learned to write, as there wasn't anything to correct with his first draft! He replied his mother had made all of them write from an early age.

CASTLEGATES · Oct 25, 2009

You notice it in the younger generation, but I notice it much more in the older generation of nurses. I almost cringe when I hear "I seen it" or "These ones"... and much more from some of the older nurses I work with, but I'm sure it's seen across the board. Spelling errors happen, even with the best of us. But sometimes I wonder how we have all of these great educated nurses who don't act like they are educated at all!

Everyone makes errors; it's the lack of knowledge of how to spell or write that's the point aside from an occasional mistake.

Regarding the older generations; I'm familiar with that; such a phenomenon seems to be more regional as a testament to the education available in that region at the time (I won't stereotype and guess the region). Here you had best speak the language of the land or some oldster would correct you or point it out in the chart. Then again, heavy accents are even frowned upon in some facilities (reasonable since patients can't decipher someone with a thick anything accent.

hey, i forgot to close my parentheses!

There are plenty of jobs out there still that use pen and paper charting or at least large parts are done this way. I can't imagine how one tests on SAT's GRE's, LSAT's without being able to write.

Most of our 8th grade class tested 12th grade English but we stank in math (I don't care if stank is a word...it's fun)! I think after initial education, it's up to the student and a matter of pure motivation. Math and stats were my worst so I worked extra hard and was determined (and got) perfect scores...only because I chose to, not because I had any decent education. It's all about how lazy I am...or not.

FLmomof5 · Oct 25, 2009

Honestly....this is my pet peeve! It grates on me to see posts where the individual states "Their" when it should be "There"....this is NOT a spelling error or a slip since it was in their post multiple times!

I DO believe it started after the DOE was taken over by liberals, but that is my political opinion.

Schmoo1022 · Oct 25, 2009

I am a terrible speller. I admit it. I try to use Spell check, but not so much during posts. I do have a problem when people use words like "cuz" for because and things like that.

MedSurgeMess · Oct 25, 2009

I know that many use spellcheck, but I found out through a computer tech friend that works at Microsoft that if you spell a word correctly, whether or not it is the correct spelling for the particular use that is currently needed, then spellcheck will not pick it up. Kind of like affect/effect, too/to, your/you're, and so on. So don't depend on spellcheck to pick up the mistakes all of the time. For schoolwork and legal documentation, you are ultimately responsible for anything that you put on paper, the spellcheck isn't!

blondy2061h, MSN, RN · Oct 25, 2009

I am always conflicted about how to grade them. I am not teaching physical bedside care-giving skills. Their bedside clinical skills are irrelevant in assessing their academic skills. I am teaching them in their academic classes -- and that level of reading comprehension and writing is simply not at the college (BSN) level.

I think you answered your own question there.

In other news, I'm an avid text messager, and I never understood "texting" language. I can't stand to read it. With few exceptions, I write out entire words in my text messages. "You" is two letters longer than "u" and it makes it a million times more readable to me.

Ruby Vee, BSN · Oct 25, 2009

we all get excited, type too quickly and stumble over our keyboards. misspelled words are annoying at times, but i can live with that. what bothers me is the writing as if one is texting. if you cannot bother to spell out "your" or "late" or "great" or some of the other simple words, i cannot be bothered to read what you wrote. i'm sure the texters can live with that, but there's my two cents!