It was on the Spelling and Grammar paper today (admittedly the one for more able children), and three of us weren't 100% sure of the answer...


What is the proposition in this sentence?

'Despite similar opportunities, we are successful in different ways.'

I thought it was 'despite', but is it?

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and what about this one?

'We were exhausted because our flight arrived at 4am'.

Which is the preposition? Is it simply 'at'? I thought it might be 'because', but when I looked it up, only 'because of' counts as a propositional phrase.

Blimey - the things I've learnt this term that I've managed to get by without knowing for the last 43 years....

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obviously, the first question should have said 'preposition' as well, instead of 'proposition'....

I think it's "despite", as in David Crystal's definition: a preposition expresses the relationship of meaning between two parts of a sentence, and lists "despite" under prepositions which express concession

But, "in" looks like a preposition too, because it often is: "We got in the car". Is "in different ways" a different creature, grammatically speaking? I'm not sure.

Well, I rest my case. If Freebird and EmmaD don't know the answer who the fuck cares?????

"in"

In the second sentence, it is "at".

A preposition is a word (or it can sometimes be a phrase) which does something like specifying a location, or some other relationship that a noun is participating in. Other examples are:

beside
above
below
through
of
with
by
at the side of
away from
in front of


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I agree that "despite" is also a preposition, which means that the question as stated is itself wrong (because it implies a single answer when there are two).

To me, an exam question which can have two correct answers, when the question itself implies only one is required, is unfair and should not be allowed onto a paper. If it is allowed, both answers should be marked correct (and anyone who says there are two answers, and can give them correctly, ought to get an extra mark for knowing).

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I care about this, especially if I'm trying to speak/write Russian. Prepositions in that language always cause a change of case in the noun and adjective which follow. You would have to care in German, too, because 'der', 'die' and 'das' can change when they follow a preposition. So it's fair enough to ask schoolkids such a question, especially if they are learning or hoping to learn a foreign language.

Degree in English, A-level in Russian and I couldn't even remember what a preposition was!

well, I've never really known before and it's not done me any harm! Sometimes I think all this emphasis on the nuts and bolts is actually ruining the creativity in the children's writing.

Thanks, Mr Gove (not!)

But yes, I agree that they shouldn't really have phrased the question as though there was only one possible answer when there were two. I'll wait with interest to see what the answer is when the mark scheme is released..

Sometimes I think all this emphasis on the nuts and bolts is actually ruining the creativity in the children's writing.

I have to disagree with this. Without the nuts and bolts (the most fundamental of which, of course, is the alphabet), kids couldn't write anything. It does no harm to teach them about the other things in the toolkit, including the various parts of speech, and it may well improve their writing ability later if they do have an understanding of all this.

Any language depends on two elements: the vocabulary and the grammar. I think of the former as being the skeleton and the latter as being the flesh. You need both in order to be able to put together meaningful concepts of any complexity.

That's not to say that grammar should be taught for its own sake. It needs to be taught as one of the many tools that gives a person access to rich sources of information about all kinds of things.

What really kills creativity in children's writing is allowing them to crib stuff verbatim from the internet. If they're allowed to do that, they won't see a need to learn anything about how to write.