This Thursday was a humbling experience for me. I admittedly am not the best writer in the world but I have always thought that grammar is where I shine. When to use they're, there, and their? - Child's play. When to put commas, semi-colons, etc? - Simple and straightforward. Well, on the first sentence structure quiz I got a 27/38 and before correcting the second quiz with my team I probably would have received maybe 50%. I'm usually not the arrogant type or the kind of person that thinks he's better at something than he really is, but these realities sunk in fast.
While I say these quizzes humbled me, I am obviously half-joking, because, for starters, the quizzes didn't count. Also, I think it's important to keep everything in perspective and even if those quizzes did count, it would have taught me the same lesson that I have learned anyway: I need to study grammar. Thankfully, I think that these quizzes helped me most by realizing the importance of paying attention all aspects of the sentence. There are many possibilities for error and each one of those possibilities should be checked (and in my case double-checked). I struggle a little with noticing everything the first time, as I try to be as efficient with my time as possible. My goal for the grammar exam is to check for these "possibilities of error" previously mentioned in a timely fashion and to study the material thoroughly.
Last Thursday was very eye opening, to say the least. I never knew there were so many different components to sentence structure. After we got through the quizzes and went over them I think it's a little bit more understandable. I totally agree with you on having to check for every single possibility. Something that caught me up on the quizzes was only looking for things that weren't there. I was completely focused on missing things instead of paying attention to things that were there that shouldn't have been. We will definitely have to pay attention to the smallest of details in this class.
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