> Lolita,
> :)
> yes, i think many of us feel this way.
> no special thanks to me though, i know now that many have a strong
> grasp on the situation.

> still, thank you.

Hi, Ladies & Gentlemen:

I am not here to argue, but just to mention some truth.

NOWADAYS, whoever is a "Native speaker" is entitled to misspell words and no one matters. Whereas those who are learning English as a second language are supposed to spell them correctly. Hence native speakers are hired, non-natives are not, no matter how good their pronunciation and spelling are.

Being a teacher, I expect to offer the best of my knowledge to my students. I wish that they'll be better than I in the future. So, in class, I always try to make sure my spelling is correct. In case I was in doubt, I would rather check it out by myself, or ask the students to do so. I don't pretend at the time.

On the board, some teachers print the words in a dis-ordered way. Students from their classes are likely to write their papers in a messy way. Their penmanship are poor, and many even couldn't read the cursive writings. I deliberately show them how to write cursively inline.

In order to let them understand the varied accents from different lands, I tried to input some radio recordings from many countries, and hopeful they would be familiar with the varied accents without being shocked in future communications with the foreigners.

In this forum, most of us making mistakes in spelling or typo errors. We could avoid them by using the spelling and grammar checking tools to correct those mistakes; but somehow we took it as granted and let it as is. This kind of laziness tends to last to the classes, and hence to give our students a false impression. We should try to avoid it. The simple and best way would be pre-editing the text with a word processor. For the good of the students, we should try all the means to improve our teaching.

Alex Wu