<p>Personally, I can’t stand “John and myself are going…” :eek:</p>
<p>haha…diagramming isn’t dated. I learned it freshman year during our HUGE grammar unit (I’m a senior now). It may be just a catholic school thing, though…</p>
<p>Diagramming AND penmanship is still taught at the parochial school my son attends. Success in writing/grammar has been strongly evidenced by elder siblings who moved on to a public h.s. All of them scored in the above average/perfect range on standardized testing. The learned skills came in very handy with the new SAT writing section.</p>
<p>I was never taught grammar in any coherent way; I learned everything I know from reading style manuals from the local public library when I’d just moved to the US in middle school. Sad but true. :p</p>
<p>I learned diagramming in a public middle school in MD. My teacher loved it.</p>
<p>She also gave us a weekly proposition quiz…we had to memorize and list every single one in alphabetical order…aboard about above etc etc etc etc.</p>
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<p>“Fishes” is not archaic. It is still in modern use in the world of biology: “fish” is the plural used to indicate simply more than one fish. “Fishes” is the plural used to indicate more than one type or species of fish.</p>
<p>I heard a young lady once say that she was on the diagram.</p>
<p>True, coureur, just as “peoples” and “coffees” are used in that way. I think jlauer was talking about a simple plural (within a single type), thus the implied irritation. </p>
<p>Of course, I could be wrong about what anyone was thinking.</p>
<p>Thought about the OP this morning while all of the tornado victims stood outside their demolished homes saying, “Me and Bubba ducked for cover. It come from over yonder and just blowed us away.” (I did take some creative license here.)</p>
<p>Having grown up in tornado alley, it always amazes me that the people who speak proper English are never interviewed. It’s a running joke around my family.</p>
<p>TheDad, you are priceless. <em>whatever name you’re going by</em> ;)</p>
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<p>Same here! And don’t you also love it when they say, “I seen it”? Seems like everyone they interview on the TV news uses “seen” instead of “saw”. Drives me nuts!</p>