Stephen Colbert interviews Stephen Greenblatt, author of Will in the World, about the Shakespearean qualities of both presidential candidates:

What’s the fastest way to pique student interest in a book? Tell them it’s been banned. They immediately what to know why and to decide whether they agree with the decision.

That’s the thinking behind Jessica Hagy’s blog post, “The allure of big fuss.”

Jessica’s note cards are compelling enough, but the comments left by readers are often just as good:

• “The forbidden fruit always tastes the best,” one observed.
• “We could have some real fun with this and create an infinite loop. Ban something completely unreadable such as Faukner and watch the kids’ heads explode,” another joked.
• “I once heard someone say we should just outlaw reading for anyone under ten,” someone else added. “Think of the underground that would pop up! Reading would instantly be the coolest thing around.
• Perhaps the most insightful: “What’s funny is, this truth applies all they way up the ladder of maturity. Kids want banned books because they don’t trust that the people who banned them are acting in their best interests. For the same reason, nothing sells me on an iPhone app more than hearing that Apple pulled it from their app store.”

Jessica and I are both a little late to celebrate Banned Books Week, which was last week. But the conflict continues, and I want to give Jessica a nod for this observation.

Let’s face it — English is a crazy language!

There’s no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple.

English muffins weren’t invented in England or French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies while sweetbreads, which aren’t sweet, are meat.

We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square, and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig.

And why is it that writers write but fingers don’t fing, grocers don’t groce and hammers don’t ham? If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn’t the plural of booth beeth? One goose, two geese. So one moose, two meese? One index, two indices?

Doesn’t it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend, that you comb through the annals of history but not a single annal? If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?

If teachers taught, why didn’t preachers praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? If you wrote a letter, perhaps you bote your tongue?

Sometimes I think all the English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane. In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell? Park on driveways
and drive on parkways?

How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites? How can overlook and oversee be opposites, while quite a lot and quite a few are alike? How can the weather be hot as hell one day and cold as hell another?

Have you noticed that we talk about certain things only when they are absent? Have you ever seen a horseful carriage or a strapful gown? Met a sung hero or experienced requited love?

Have you ever run into someone who was discombobulated, gruntled, ruly or peccable? And where are all those people who ARE spring chickens or who would ACTUALLY hurt a fly?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling out and in which an alarm clock goes off by going on.

English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race (which, of course, isn’t a race at all).

That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible. And why, when I wind up my watch, I start it, but when I wind up this essay, I end it!

(This staple of e-mail inboxes has been attributed to Richard Lederer.)

Young learners in Gloucestershire, England, will no longer be tested in spelling, at least at one school.

Whitminster Endowed Church of England Primary School has suspended the practice. Head Teacher Debbie Marklove explained to parents that some students could spell the words perfectly at home but were unable to do the same for their teachers at school the next day. “Also,” she commented, “many children find this activity unnecessarily distressing.”

Teachers will continue to teach spelling, and it will be assessed in student writing, just not in traditional spelling tests.

I can see why parents might object to suspending the tests — they’re a staple of English class. If today we give up on spelling tests, what might we leave out tomorrow? Parts of speech? Shakespeare?

But really, there’s more than one way to determine how well a student spells. I applaud the teachers of Whitminster Endowed Church of England Primary School for trying something different. I hope they will keep track of the results of this approach and publish them for the rest of us.

How parents (and teachers) can understand teens? Learn about cats!

1. Neither teenagers nor cats turn their heads when you call them by name.
2. No matter what you do for them, it is not enough. Indeed, all humane efforts are barely adequate to compensate for the privilege of waiting on them hand and foot.
3. You rarely see a cat walking outside of the house with an adult human being, and it can be safely said that no teenager in his or her right mind wants to be seen in public with his or her parents.
4. Even if you tell jokes as well as Jay Leno, neither your cat nor your teen will ever crack a smile.
5. No cat or teenager shares your taste in music.
6. Cats and teenagers can lie on the living-room sofa for hours on end without moving, barely breathing.
7. Cats have nine lives. Teenagers carry on as if they did.
8. Cats and teenagers yawn in exactly the same manner, communicating that ultimate ecstasy–a sense of complete and utter boredom.
9. Cats and teenagers do not improve anyone’s furniture.
10. Cats that are free to roam outside sometimes have been known to return in the middle of the night to deposit a dead animal in your bedroom. Teenagers are not above that sort of behavior.

Thus, if you must raise teenagers, the best sources of advice are not other parents, but veterinarians. It is also a good idea to keep a guidebook on cats on hand at all times. And remember, above all else, put out the food and do not make any sudden moves in their direction. When they make up their minds, they will finally come to you for some affection and comfort, and it will be a triumphant moment for all concerned.

Author Unknown (Probably a parent with a sense of humor—and a cat!)

Research suggests that the best way to teach vocabulary is to pull unfamiliar words from student reading. It would be great to make an individual list for each student — great, but impractical.

An organization called Laying the Foundation offers lists of SAT-level vocabulary words drawn from 131 novels often taught in school. Beginning with Agatha Christie’s The ABC Murders and ending with Wuthering Heights, each packet includes a list of words, synonyms, antonyms, and other practice items. The packets also come with quiz questions.

The packets can be downloaded free of charge. Adobe Reader is required for access. I’m using the packet for “The Fall of the House of Usher,” and the words are very well chosen for my students.

Follow links to words drawn from Shakespeare.

We can’t individualize the lists for each student, but here’s some help if we want to pull words from their reading.

“The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” often appears in literature anthologies for 9th or 10th grade students.

In this lesson plan students use a graphic organizer to analyze cause-and-effect relationships in the plot. Then they use those insights to create another episode in Mitty’s “secret life.” They present the new episode to the class using digital storytelling techniques.

It builds literacy, technology, and writing skills while kids have fun responding creatively to their reading. Wouldn’t it be great if EVERY lesson could do this?

When is a bailout not a bailout? When it’s a “bipartisan economic rescue plan.”

This phrase from President Bush’s Monday morning speech reminded me of the importance of choosing words carefully. He needed a message that would reassure the stock market and ordinary investors that our government is working in our best interest. I started a mental list of vocabulary that novice voters should probably be familiar with, words like “nuanced” and “plausible deniability.”

I noticed that the President used the verb “help,” as in “we will help restart the flow of credit.” As I understand it, in this context “help” means “won’t make it any worse.”

He also used “begin,” as in “this rescue plan … will begin to restore strength and stability.” It doesn’t fix things; it just gets the ball rolling. But that’s not what most listeners will hear.

The President is not alone in his careful choice of words — every politician and salesperson does the same thing. We really should teach our students about this. Perhaps we should even teach them how to do it.

Once you’ve painted a picture yourself, you’re better able to identify the technique of the masters.

Last Thursday I wrote about book reports. By the end of that day I was ready never to assign one again.

Jessica’s analysis was incomplete. When I talked to her, she admitted she hadn’t read all of the book. In my class, that’s an automatic “zero” on the assignment. In her case, it also meant she would fail for the first grading period. She burst into tears, and all the usual student lines came tumbling out:

• “I did my best! I have two college-level classes and cheerleading and things I have to do at home, and there just wasn’t enough time.” (She had had a month.)
• “I didn’t like the book but there wasn’t time to pick a new one and start over.”
• “It was too hard to read. I’m not a good reader.”
• “Can’t you just give me partial credit because I tried so hard?”

And a new one:

• “My friends don’t read the books. They just go home and read about them on the Internet, and they get credit for their book reports. We don’t have the Internet at my house. It’s not fair.”

Right after school her mother called. Fortunately, this mother was wonderful — she understood both sides of the situation. We worked something out, and Jessica is going to have a very busy weekend. But if she gets everything done, she at least won’t fail.

Situations like these always make me stop and wonder whether I’m being too strict, too harsh in my penalty. That night I couldn’t help thinking about our current economic threat. Here we are, poised for a global nightmare that could rival the Great Depression of the 1930s. The people who caused it will probably experience no consequence greater than the loss of some money. Their golden parachutes will protect them — and I’m worried about cheating on a high school book report?

My friend Sally pointed out that they’re the same thing. Cheating is cheating, regardless of degree.

So here in the Heartland, the penalty stands. Jessica’s isn’t the only book report getting a zero, though. Monday’s going to be a long day as I hand back papers and try to explain the relationship between high school English class and life in the real world.