Stupid, Thought-Provoking Stuff (Yes, STUFF)

I've decided to post something from my youth leader's MySpace. For all of you grammerly-challenged people out there, you might want to read the following (the losers!, gosh! just kidding.) For those of you who don't know, Kevin is my youth group leader (he's awesome!!!), and Kelley is his wife.

There Their They're

I don't (do not) know what's (what is) being taught in our public schools, but here's (here is) a little grammar lesson.

Their shows POSSESSION. "This is Kevin and Kelley. The car is THEIRS." (When you use a possessive word like "theirs" or "yours", you don't use an apostrophe.)

There shows LOCATION. "I love Hawaii, but I've never been THERE."

They're = THEY ARE. It's (it is) a CONTRACTION. "They're (they are) going to the movies."
Its is a word, not a contraction. Its shows possession. "The truck can pull three times its weight." NOT "The truck can pull three times it's weight." It's is a contraction.

It's ="it is." "It's going to rain." NOT "Its going to rain."
Further, YOUR is another POSSESSIVE. "The hat is yours."
You're = YOU ARE. You're is a CONTRACTION. "You're (you are) going to the mall."

I realize that grammar is hardly being taught in high school anymore. (Anymore = nowadays, or presently.) "It's not summer anymore." NOT "It's not summer any more."Any more = additional, more. "Do you want any more Fruit Loops?" NOT "Do you want anymore Fruit Loops?") Nevertheless, you still have an obligation to use correct grammar. It's not "cool" to use bad grammar, whether you know better or not, when you leave comments on MySpace, write emails, etc. It just makes you sound dumb. If you write "your" for "you're" because it's shorter, stop being lazy. You only saved two keystrokes. And you sound dumb.

You may get "passed on" in public school, because public school's motto is "no child left behind" (even if the "child" needs to be left behind to learn what he/she didn't learn the first time). But, trust me on this - when/if you go to college, your grammar will be graded. Professors will assume that you know how to write properly. When you don't, your papers will come back to you looking like this, all over the page. And, you just might "luck out" and get a professor who overlooks bad grammar. But, the time will come when you'll be rejected for not understanding how to write properly. Kelley is going to all kinds of recruiting sessions, as she will be finishing grad. school next year. These recruiters have told all kinds of stories of potential employees writing them thank you letters, sending resumes, etc. with terrible English. The recruiters use these letters as bad examples, display parts of them to show what NOT TO DO, and have all sorts of fun with them. Furthermore, they don't hire any of the writers.

If you DON'T KNOW how English works, get an elementary school grammar book and learn some basics. I surely don't know every rule in the English language, but I'm learning more and more of them as I turn in papers and get them handed back to me with red ink! No high school student should be ignorant of the basics, though. It's a shame to hear people complaining about so many Spanish-speaking people here. "They need to learn English if they want to live or work here." We're FROM here. I think it's fair to say that we need to learn English, too.

By the way, you cannot...(don't write "can not." That's wrong. Cannot is a word.)...you cannot use contractions in term papers, anyway. When you do, they'll all be circled with red ink, and you lose (lose = decline, or fail to win. LOOSE = not tight) points for each.