Would you expect that 19% could not read contemporary English at the level expected of a 10th grader?
To establish a baseline, they had the students first take a standardized reading comprehension test, the Degrees of Reading Power test, designed for the 10th grade level. Almost all the students scored above 80, indicating they read at or above a 10th grade level.
Are you a native English speaker? "whiskers" is a common euphemism for a moustache. I would be very surprised if a native speaker didn't know that, or couldn't infer from context.
> Are you a native English speaker? "whiskers" is a common euphemism for a moustache. I would be very surprised if a native speaker didn't know that, or couldn't infer from context.
It's not euphemism, whiskers are literally what a moustache is made from. A whisker is an individual male facial hair.
I don’t think that would have been very useful, as Victorian English is typically written in a style that seems alien to modern ears.
Perhaps a better title still would be: English students had difficulty understanding a passage written in a different culture and time.
Which seems completely normal and expected to me. The issue is in defining “English” as too broad of a term.
Would you expect that 19% could not read contemporary English at the level expected of a 10th grader?
Look up "whiskers," is a kind of cat. In what world does "whiskers" mean "bearded man"?
Are you a native English speaker? "whiskers" is a common euphemism for a moustache. I would be very surprised if a native speaker didn't know that, or couldn't infer from context.
> Are you a native English speaker? "whiskers" is a common euphemism for a moustache. I would be very surprised if a native speaker didn't know that, or couldn't infer from context.
It's not euphemism, whiskers are literally what a moustache is made from. A whisker is an individual male facial hair.
It’s not that rare of a word, but I wouldn't say it’s particularly common either. Definitely not a common word amongst anyone under the age of 40.
1 reply →
> Are you a native English speaker?
Nope
> Look up "whiskers"
ok: http://dict.org/bin/Dict?Form=Dict2&Database=*&Query=whisker...
Whiskers are a mustache. It's not a kind of cat, it is the antenna hairs that cats have around their nose.
Oh you're right