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Friday, October 19, 2007

The It's Its There Their They're Quiz

 
You Scored an A

You got 10/10 questions correct.

It's pretty obvious that you don't make basic grammatical errors.
If anything, you're annoyed when people make simple mistakes on their blogs.
As far as people with bad grammar go, you know they're only human.
And it's humanity and its current condition that truly disturb you sometimes.


This is a quiz designed to find out whether you know the difference between its, it's, they're, their, and there. I doubt very much whether any blogger, or any reader, would get less than 10 on this quiz.

We all make mistakes from time to time. The problem isn't that we don't know the right word it's that we sometimes slip up when we're typing quickly and not concentrating on grammar. I am not one of those people who jump all over a fellow blogger when they make a mistake. I assume they're just like me. We're perfect in lots of things but attention to silly details like spelling isn't one of them.


[Hat Tip: GrrlScientist at Living the Scientific Life (How is Your Punctuation and Grammar?]

13 comments :

Anonymous said...

Way too easy.

My favourite is when people start telling you that your "grammer" is wrong.

lee_merrill said...

"It's a pretty poor mind that can only think of one way to spell a word" (Grover Cleveland?)

What? My gramma is wrong? I think she is fine...

X said...

Pedantic fools. Most errors shown are errors of punctuation, usage, or style, but not of grammar.

Bill Snedden said...

I found it amusing that a quiz purporting to test grammatical usage included an error in one of its questions:

2. Pick the correct sentence:
I know which college you go to, but I don't know its reputation.
I know which college you go to, but I don't know it's reputation.

Neither are correct. Both end the first independent clause with a preposition...

Torbjörn Larsson said...

Maybe you have to be english to make those mistakes. I try to make others instead.

Anonymous said...

bill snedden:

Neither are correct.

Well ... neither is correct.

Terrible lie said...

I got one wrong hahahah
But I don't know which one
It can't spell and I have bad grammer!! hahahah

Anonymous said...

They're convinced that there child is a genius.

Perfectly correct. "That there" is a Southern colloquialism meaning "the thing under discussion."

Anonymous said...

If it isn't it is it's it's.

Pete Dunkelberg

The Ridger, FCD said...

It's spelling, pure and simple, and the fact is that homonyms like this are extremely easy to misspell. I do it, though when I proof-read I (almost) always catch them.

A test of grammar would be to put a sentence like "Their convinced that they are child is a genius." Somebody who thought that was right would be making a grammar error.

Allyson said...

As a writing instructor, your scores made my day!

Not that you've ever given me a reason to think you'd do poorly. I'm just amazed at how many otherwise intelligent, insightful bloggers can't use an apostrophe.

Anonymous said...

As a writing instructor, your scores made my day!

Good grief. You mean either

"As I'm a writing instructor, your scores made my day." or

"As a writing instructor, I was happy to see your scores."

Larry's scores are not a writing instructor.

TheBrummell said...

I'm just amazed at how many otherwise intelligent, insightful bloggers can't use an apostrophe.

Part of it concerns the fact that apostrophes and some other punctuation symbols were neglected when various computer languages or formats were compared. This is why apostrophes often get substituted with weird, apparently randomly-chosen symbols on some websites, including some blogs. I suspect some people may avoid apostrophes all together when writing on-line.