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Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Commended by JJJ-thebanisher on 9/19/2019 2:41:38 PM

This is the quiz I just gave my students on additive sentences and quotation mark usage.  One point for a perfect response, .5 point for a partly correct response.  Can you beat their average score of seven out of ten? 

You may PM your answers to me if you like, and I will grade them and post the results here.

 

 

 

Instructions:

Please punctuate each sentence correctly by adding commas, semicolons, and quotation marks.  There will be no need to add/subtract words or capitalize.  Do not rearrange the word order. 

 

1. I won the Super Bowl and had some tea.

 

2. I can’t remember if I robbed the bank today or yesterday.

 

3. I went to high school college and graduate school in St. Louis.

 

4. I have to work late on Fridays but that’s just part of my job.

 

5. Yellow bananas and those weird brown bananas are both half price today.

 

6. I can't draw Arnie said but Ira can.

 

7.  THERE’S A ZOMBIE IN MY BASEMENT! shrieked Doctor Campbell.

 

8. We all felt that you didn’t deserve a promotion however you got one anyway.

 

9.  I may open a bakery next year the neighborhood could use one.

 

10.  I have nothing to offer you but blood sweat and tears you can count on me.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
It's really cool that you gave up your tenure to go and teach disadvantaged fourth graders.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

As funny as that is, it is going to end up less funny if the cumulative CYS score doesn't crack 5...

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Oh, you misunderstand me. I was referring to our site members.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I am scared of doing really badly but i will try to.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
I will give actual points to each participant depending on their score.

Send your answers to Gower, don't put them here.

And no comparing notes. If you are approached, snitching is encouraged and will be rewarded.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Ninja'd because I'm idiot who posted my answers here.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
I’m going to attempt this. I sent my answers to Gower.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I am sending answers to Gower. All of them were typed in notepad to avoid spell check and copied over.

 

I am a bit unsure of my grammar skills without internet/spellcheck help, so we shall see...

I was a bit unsure of if we were allowed to use colons and semi-colons, so I stuck with just commas and quotation marks as much as possible.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Same thing to me I think i did terrible

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I am sure you did fine, I am the disadvantaged fourth grader Mizal mentioned.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I  am a grammar foreign student . so we are in a similar situation, but we are both  here to learn.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
"Please punctuate each sentence correctly by adding commas, semicolons, and quotation marks." Always carefully read the instructions! Yes, you can use semicolons.
I'll try this too. But far too many of these sentences look like they don't need fixing at all, and this worries me. I must be missing something.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Whoops! I used one colon that should be a semi colon in that case. Reading is usually a strength of mine, I am slipping.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Are we allowed to post our grades here? If so, then I got 9,5 points out of 10, only fucking up at the 5th sentence. Much better than what I thought I'd get!

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
This only makes my wait for grades back more maddening.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Wait Gower already graded yours?

Edit: Never mind he graded mine too.

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4 years ago

Grades:

 

Shadowdrake:  5

Turnipbandit: 5.5

Mara:  6

Lordcarpark:  6

Chris: 7

Castorgreatpoet: 7

Corgi: 7.5

C6H8O6:  7.5

The BrokenGod: 9

Mayana: 9.5

Cricket: 9.5

 

Collectively, you have totally defeated my students.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Hurray! I tied with the Slovenian! XD

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Ugh. I knew I should have left a few of those sentences untouched. If you ever do one of these again I’ll remember that.

I need to prove that I am literate.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I wasn't aware we were allowed to leave any of the sentences alone, so I tried punctuating things I thought were correct.  And I got knocked down half a point because I wound up spelling "Fridays" as "Friday's". Guess I should have just copy and pasted things.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Yeah same. For some reason I thought that every sentence had an error somewhere and that we weren’t supposed to leave them alone.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

A dangerous assumption, I just, put, commas, everywhere, for this, test.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Putting, commas, everywhere, definitely, is, a, good, strategy. Plus, it’s, really, annoying, to, read.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Ahh this reminds me of my actual grammar skills before I met Gower.

Not that I have imporved much...

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Well, I thought that since the directions stated to "Please punctuate each sentence correctly by adding commas, semicolons, and quotation marks" that each sentence had something wrong with it. 

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

It is fair, if you actually know the subject matter recognizing a correct sentence is part of that.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I did realize that many of the sentences appeared correct. I just thought that the directions were telling me I had to punctuate them anyway. I took the directions literally and looked like a fool because of it. And I own up to that.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I have been defeated, and shall cry in a corner for the remainder of my internet life.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Note that much of this list is ESL and/or twelve. Gower, your students are a disappointment.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
What age students does Gower teach?

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
College.

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4 years ago
Oh lol. That’s pretty funny.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

My writing students this year are excellent so far.  They've really impressed me.  Grammar stuff is always a challenge, but in terms of straight-up interesting writing, they are great.  I'm expecting wonderful things from them. 

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
That’s cool. I feel like grammar isn’t as important as interesting writing and ideas because other people can help edit for grammar, whereas ideas have to come from the one person.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I totally agree.  But there's this cool middle ground between commas and semicolon sentence construction and ideas, where you can create really interesting and creative micro-stories out of single, well-constructed sentences.

When people hear "grammar" they usually think of the boring part, but there's so much there to explore that creative writers can get a lot out of.  Anyhow, working on a few articles about it--*eventually* they'll be done.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Alright. I look forward to those articles.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I am also excited for these Professor!

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

That explains it, grammar did not exist when I was in college.

After I graduated I got a job in a technical writing position (engineering documents), and found out the hard way that grammar was real.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Okay, How in hell could we defeat College English Native students? Poor Gower with this new generation 

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Mara you have an excuse to not have done so well at least

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
If native speaking collge students are getting 7 on average, she did great. Everyone did, except for Shadowdrake. Let's all glare judgementally at Shadowdrake now, it'll be fun.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Shame on you, Shadowdrake. tsk tsk Shame on you.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Yeah what a loser!

.... wait...

*covers face with hands and cries*

The shame!

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I recommend what I am doing this last week. Read a grammar topic and realize at least 3 tests about grammar. I also study each day one phrasal verb. today was Get through.

I am still being terrible, but less terrible than before

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Sent mine in late, but hopefully it still gets graded. 

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4 years ago

9 out of 10!

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I had to submit my own responses to this quiz, to see how I stack up. My problem, though, was that I saw multiple correct answers, depending in part on the context of the sentence.

Years ago I remember coming across this line in a Guiness book of world records, because it had won a contest for "worst sentence":

The lovely woman-child Kaa was mercilessly chained to the cruel post of the warrior-chief Beast, with his barbarian tribe now stacking wood at her nubile feet, when the strong clear voice of the poetic and heroic Handsomas roared, 'Flick your Bic, crisp that chick, and you'll feel my steel through your last meal.' 

The judging criteria were "anticlimax, wordiness, misplaced modifiers, overblown triteness and parody." Regrettably, I have seen this sentence's spawn multiple times in the nether regions of CYS... but I don't think those writers were intentionally trying to be bad.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Bill receives a fine 9.5/10.

Some of the questions do indeed have more than one correct answer. 

 

And this is the site that collects the very best worst sentences:  Bulwer Lytton Contest

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

These are hilarious: 

"Cassie smiled as she clenched John's hand on the edge of an abandoned pier while the sun set gracefully over the water, and as the final rays of light disappeared into a star-filled sky she knew that there was only one thing left to do to finish off this wonderful evening, which was to throw his severed appendage into the ocean's depths so it could never be found again--and maybe get some custard after."

 

She was like my ex-girlfriend Ashley, who'd stolen my car, broken my heart, murdered my father, robbed a bank, and set off a pipe bomb in Central Park -- tall

 

Upon hearing he was to appear immediately before the Seturia Nebula's Supreme Council, where, in high ceremony, he would be unclothed, bathed in the sacred Waters of Torg Jas, and presented the uniform of a Qadon Shuu Guardian as reward for his courageous defense of the TH-174 Diijoss Collective against Gnar-al troops from the Xinon-Thur Horde, space adventurer Sunspot Carson could only think, "I picked a helluva Baldorian day to wear ladies panties." 

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
These aren't bad at all. They're brilliant.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Love the Bulwer Lytton Contest! Entered a few times, but my writing must be too good to win haha!

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Figured I'd try this, too, because why not?

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Grade:  7/10.  You have battled my students to a standstill!

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4 years ago

Let's see how a person who was originally banned because his grammar was so bad they thought he was a troll stacks up.

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4 years ago

Got a 4.5. 

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Can confirm.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
It seems we are still capable of getting graded; I'm going to send one over as well.

Not too late to drag down the average.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

8.5!  A very respectable score.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Going to just point out my two daughters beat the chicken soup out of not just Gower’s students but the rest of you lot as well.

Just as it should be.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

If this test was done with alphabet soup I would have done better! I am very food motivated.

Good to know your daughters will also be amazing writers.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I'm about 95 percent sure he is referring to cricket and maya. 

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
Happy to have not disappointed. :)

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I’m actually pretty proud of my score.

9/10

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4 years ago

As well you should be!  Highly respectable.

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4 years ago

Would you ever show this thread to your class and tell them that we collectively beat them?

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I feel like that would somehow end up in disaster.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
“Yes. Hello my college level students. Remember that grammar quiz you took? Well I gave it to some kids on a website and they scored higher than you. Suck on that!”

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

That would probably end in injuries at worst, and possibly someone throwing a textbook across the room at best. 

However, since I’m not a college student, I’m probably not the best judge of that.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

If Gower can single handedly win the super bowl he can single handedly defeat his class in combat WHILE drinking tea.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Totally, and while he is reciting Shakespeare.  He is The Gower after all.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

As a professional, I feel that would be a poor choice. Knowing students, one will complain to the dean of the school: arguing that their loss caused emotional impairment. The law suit would be too much to handle.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
College isn't highschool, pretty sure they just laugh in their faces when they threaten that kind of thing.

Gower did manage to put a student on anxiety meds once, so that was cool.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Well you never know, I know a person in real life that did something similar because the school said she couldn’t bring her dog to class. She argued that since she got stressed out in class the school had to let her bring an emotional support animal. I do not think it worked as well as she thought it would...

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
7/10 is a perfectly respectable score. Damn those trick questions.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
@bigdude98765

Now you get to try.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago
I really hope you post some more quizzes like this one once your students get to do them, Gower. Sure, I'm still in school so of course have English exams, but since this isn't for school, it's automatically much more fun.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

And you get to see what all of your classmates got

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Jodithewitch received a very respectable 9.5/10, I am pleased to report.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I literally can't comprehend shit like this, punctuation only really occurs to me as I'm writing or editting my own work. (And I'm sure many will attest to the idea that my punctuation is 'impressionistic' at best!) Outside of the most egregrious examples like 6-10, my brain just goes "Yeah, I get the jist of it" and locks up because I "read it right" without punctuation the first time.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Like I tell my students, this stuff isn't important because of the table manners aspect--showing that you understand which fork/semicolon to you, but because it gives you tools to use as a writer.


They dragged the river.  We have some bad news for you.

They dragged the river, and we have some bad news for you.

They dragged the river; we have some bad news for you.

They dragged the river; unfortunately, we have some bad news for you.

 

I like having the different rhythms available.  To lots of people, that's like an artist goobing out over having this yellow and cadmium yellow and canary yellow (I know nothing about pigments).  But here where we all love to write, this stuff is important.  At least, that's what I hope my students gather from my lengthy diatribes.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I understand that but I also add to that the fact of learning how to use correctly,  making people feel emotions or know new stuff that could make them feel better for a while.

Punctuation helps a lot to set the flow and tone; However, in my case, I am too terrible at grammar that is impossible to make people feel something like that for my writing.

Now I am depressed :( 

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

You're doing markedly better than your first time here if I remember correctly. A lot of what makes it more difficult for me to understand you sometimes is that you seem to be addressing thoughts a lot more complex than the words you're using. There isn't a lot of self-explanation, it feels like a sculpture with not enough chisel strokes. I think this will fix itself with time when you get more comfortable with your lexicon and can detail your brain-sauces better.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Yeah, exactly that. I have a concept in the head, but not the tools to express it or enhance the words in English.  That's why grammar and punctuation are so important.  However, many natives aren't aware of how important they are to a language.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Submitted, hopefully I'm not too late.  

 

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

Hi, I pmed my answers to you already and I hope it's not too late.  I'm not an English native speaker and I'm slowly learning it so it's  really helpful to me if you could tell me what's wrong with my answers.

Defeat my Students!

4 years ago

I'll grade the several that I received recently later today.  Thanks!