Coding grammatical errors in language samples

[George Hunt]

The forms could of, might of, should of etc are also common in adult
writing, including that of education students. I had always assumed that
the writers were simply making a graphophonic analogy with forms like kind
of, sort of, some of, many of. When these are spoken, the vowel of the
last syllable is reduced to schwa, making these syllables identical with
those of the abbreviated modal forms. When these writers were mentally
reconstructing the full forms for spelling, perhaps they drew upon the
'kind of' forms. However, this does not explain the direction of the
analogy - why don't we as often see forms like kind have, many have etc?

It might be interesting to talk to the writers to see whether or not they
are making conscious choices between possible spellings in the process of
writing these non-standard forms. I once tried to correct a student by
pointing out the difference between the full forms of the modal
constructions, and contrasting them with kind of etc. She replied, 'I know
that, but in my dialect the full form is should of'.

B.J.Richards at reading.ac.uk writes:
>Re Jay Mclelland's example of "your welcome", I wonder whether with such a
>formulaic expression speakers and writers really are always aware of the
>base form.
>
>One phenomenon that has always puzzled me in children's writing, including
>older teenagers is using 'of' instead of 'have/ve' after modals: 'It must
>of
>been...', 'they might of done...' Any thoughts?
>
>Brian
>
>*************************************
>Brian Richards
>Professor of Education
>The University of Reading
>School of Education
>Bulmershe Court
>Earley, Reading, RG6 1HY, UK
>*************************************
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Beverly Flanigan" <flanigan at ohiou.edu>
>To: "Jay McClelland" <jlm at cnbc.cmu.edu>
>Cc: <info-childes at mail.talkbank.org>
>Sent: Wednesday, September 04, 2002 11:31 PM
>Subject: Re: Coding grammatical errors in language samples
>
>
>> Strictly an orthographic error.  The writer knows perfectly well what
>the
>> base forms are.  It drives me crazy, but it's not a linguistic error,
>any
>> more than written its=it's=its' is.
>>
>> At 04:52 PM 9/4/2002 -0400, you wrote:
>>
>> >I couldn't resist passing this bit of email I just received
>> >on to the info-childes list in the context of the present
>> >discussion:  In reply to an email of thanks,  I received
>> >this reply:
>> >
>> > > Your welcome!
>> >
>> >How do we think about this kind of 'error'?
>> >
>> >   -- Jay McClelland
>>
>>
>>
>
>





George Hunt
Department of Educational Studies
University of Edinburgh
Moray House Institute
Holyrood Road
Edinburgh EH8 8AQ
UK

0131-651-6600
george.hunt at education.ed.ac.uk