I've seen I would say about 90% of the people on here typing the word a lot like this = alot. I was just wondering where this came from. I used to do this myself A LOT until a writing teacher in college corrected it. Do they teach the correct way to spell this word in middle/high school?
2006-07-08 19:48:52 · 7 answers · asked by Leigh 5 in Education & Reference ➔ Other - Education
Me too... for years I thought it was correct.. and then along came spell check.. Thank God for spell check...
2006-07-08 19:52:39 · answer #1 · answered by oneblondepilgrim 6 · 1⤊ 1⤋
"a lot" is correct; however I don't know how effectively this is taught.
Also, online forums such as this are the last place to look for examples of grammatical excelence. The messages are written on the fly and grammer is seldom considered. This is especially true in this system where people are eager to have the first answer in hopes of obtaining 10 points for the best answer.
As a side note, google returns 63 million results for "alot"! The top results discuss how this term is misused.
2006-07-08 19:59:02 · answer #2 · answered by bogusman82 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I teach English for a GED program and an SAT program. Language is a living, breathing thing. It changes as common usage changes. The standard for using third person singular pronouns used to be simply to use the masculine. Feminism objected to this (rightly so) and began a campaign to re-language us. The third person singular was now supposed to be "he or she: him or her". Only that proved unwieldy. It is now so common to use the third person plural pronoun "they" as a gender neutral singular pronoun, that, within a decade, it was become acceptable. "Ain't" used to be a perfectly Correct word. The tide of Victorianism turned grammarians against it, and it soon became an error. I'm not sure if "alot" will make the cut. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.
2006-07-08 20:00:52 · answer #3 · answered by Rico Toasterman JPA 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I don't think it's a typo. It's more like people don't know. Just like how some people use 'loose' instead of 'lose' and a few other funny ones which I'm sure you can find looking through these Q&As.
2006-07-08 19:54:20 · answer #4 · answered by kaede 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
i think the teaching in this country is becomming an epidemic and our schooling system needs to be seriously overhauled.
2006-07-08 19:52:55 · answer #5 · answered by sandpeople_1 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
ya...sometimes public education isn't the best. this is America yano? lol.
2006-07-08 19:51:55 · answer #6 · answered by superjacque12 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Heh, what about teh?
2006-07-08 19:50:58 · answer #7 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋