In May, a “bad grammar” award was given to an open letter published by academic opponents of the education secretary, Michael Gove. The judges described as “simply illiterate” the following sentence: “Little account is taken of children’s potential interests and capacities, or that young children need to relate abstract ideas to their experience, lives and activity.” If this really is “the worst use of English over the last 12 months by people who should know better”, the judges were making a political, not grammatical, point.
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