Open Novella Journal 2024

Grammar/Spelling - The Thing Most Of Us Are Good At

So...

ONC made another announcement that may upset a few writers, in particular, any writer for whom grammar/spelling is a potential panic button issue.

Let's start off with why grammar/spelling is a potential panic button issue for certain writers.

In our education system, there are English teachers who aren't good teachers because they teach their students that committing a single grammar/spelling mistake is a cardinal sin that is enough to make an A-grade-range story into a B-grade-range story while also teaching other students that their perfect grammar is good enough always to get their essays a grade in the A-grade-range.

In reality, a few rather than a single grammar/spelling mistake is more of something that should take, say, an A+ essay down to an A essay rather than an A+ essay down to a B essay, but that's effectively how the scoring for our stories works. By this, I mean it's not something that's going to drop us down in a significant manner when it comes to our stories, whereas an essay that struggles to get its point across with perfect grammar isn't ever going to be an A+ essay - the spelling/grammar is what is keeping say a C essay from being a C- essay, or a D- essay from getting a big fat F.

And no, this isn't honestly what those who brag about their perfect grammar want people to because--

Well, to be honest, if someone is bragging about an essential skill, there is a chance they're struggling with a less basic skill, but in the case of our stories for ONC, that would be things like "narrative voice," "relation to theme/prompt" and "creative execution." Of course, there are those who brag about their grammar skills because they also have the skill set of being able to edit other people's work, and they want to help other writers out, but the way to tell--there is a definite difference in tone between these two types of people.

Of course, there may be some who are upset that there are some entries that have already gone through the judging process despite it not being March 1st yet.

The thing to keep in mind before getting upset is that a.) grammar/spelling plays more into picking, say, the round winners, and you've got to honestly do well in the other. judging criteria to get to that point. B.) They've got a lot of entries to go through to make sure they qualify.

Am I fond of the judging starting before March 1st, no, but part of it is about getting who moved onto round two out sooner possibly.