The English Teacher Blog

Finding definitions

carla — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 07:01:23 +0000





Where do you go to find a definition online? 
My students tend to go to Dictionary.com simply because they can remember the name so easily. I encourage them to go to Merriam-Webster.com because the site offers so much in addition to definitions. We may have found a third site that will do in a pinch, though: Definr.com. 



Billed as “incredibly fast dictionary,” I can state without hesitation that it was so fast and clean that some of my students adopted it on the spot as their favorite dictionary site. They even remembered the next day that it has an odd spelling. 
If you use the Firebox browser, Definr offers some plug-ins to better integrate word search. (Click on “Tools.”) And the Word of the Day option could provide some good SAT vocabulary practice. At the end of every week or two, students could review, find connections among the words, and/or use them in their own writing.  
Right now Definr is limited to definitions, synonyms, and word in context. If you’re working with etymology or with antonyms, you’ll need an additional resource. But if you’re reading a short story online and need to look up a word, this site could be helpful.

Almanac Quotations

carla — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 07:01:35 +0000

Every year I buy a Farmer’s Almanac to show students when I teach about Benjamin Franklin. It’s always fun to see what they include and to check the accuracy of the long-term weather forecasting.

Here are some quotations from this year’s Harris’ Gardening Almanac. I’m planning to keep them handy for reflective writing:

Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and places to pray in, where nature may heal and cheer and give strength to body and soul alike. — John Muir
I love the fact that you can go into your garden and concentrate on nature and forget everything else. — Susan Hampshire
More than anything, I must have flowers always, always. — Claude Monet
Never enough thyme in this garden of mine. — Unknown
There is nothing pleasanter than spading whent he ground is soft and damp. — John Steinbeck
Who loves a garden still his Eden keeps, / Perennail pleasures plants, and wholesome harvest reaps. — Amos Bronson Alcott
To forget how to dig the earth and to tend the soil is to forget ourselves. — Mohandas K. Gandhi
Nature does not complete things. She is chaotic. Man must finish, and he does so by making a garden and building a wall. — Robert Frost
A garden is always a series of losses set against a few triumphs, like life itself. — May Sarton

Joseph Bruchac

carla — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 07:01:40 +0000

Last weekend I learned about writer Joseph Bruchac. I wish I could say we sat somewhere and swapped stories all afternoon, but we haven’t actually met. I came across his name while Googling for something else and followed it from title to title (to title!) to interview to lesson plan. I’ll say this: he’s a busy guy.

Bruchac is primarily known as a writer of children’s books, which might explain why I haven’t run across him before. According to his site, he has published 83 titles, including picture books, plays, YA novels, story collections, audio tapes, poetry and an autobiography. Some of his best-known titles (at least among teachers) might include these:

When I’m researching writers who are used in schools, I usually find that, no matter how many titles the writer has published, teachers tend to select one title to use in the classroom. A few writers beat the odds (Beverly Cleary and Gary Paulsen come to mind), but generally schools embrace one title. In Bruchac’s case, though, I found lesson plans for no fewer than 17 of his titles, and there are probably others I haven’t found yet. This is remarkable! The only other author who comes close to this is Shakespeare, for whom I have found lesson plans for 20 plays.

Bruchac draws on his Abenaki heritage — and careful research — to make American Indian people, history, and culture come to life for nonIndian readers. But if his heritage were his only asset, he would fall into the “One Title” category. There must be more to his writing than just the subject matter.

Now that I’ve read so much about him, I want to read something BY him. When I get to school tomorrow, I’m heading for the library.

Explaining Google Chrome

carla — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 07:01:57 +0000





Google’s new browser, nicknamed Chrome, was launched Tuesday. (I’m using it now — it’s slick!)
To prepare potential users for differences, Google offered some explanatory material. I expected text with subheads, white space, and lots of color. 
But no. To explain what’s up with Chrome, Google choose a graphic novel format. 
Let me put that in different terms: one of the most important companies on the Web, a company whose stock is currently selling for more than 17 times the cost of a share of Microsoft, is using 38 pages of cartoons to explain its newest product. And the explanation  works. Nicely. 
What elements of good writing are present in this format? 

Google uses a voice and tone appropriate for its complex audience. The text is straightforward, with visual jokes in the background providing a little comic relief and reinforcing concepts under discussion.
Ideas and content are carefully paced. The reader does not become overwhelmed.
Word choice keeps the geekspeak to a minimum. 
The explanation is organized to move smoothly from one concept to another, each building on and reinforcing previous ideas.
The simplicity of the presentation disguises the skilled fluency of the writers.
Conventions are observed meticulously.

OK, writing teachers, you know where I’m going with this. While this is far from the death of text — the explanation uses a lot of text — perhaps we could take a long, hard look at that 5-paragraph essay. If this is what companies are doing now, just how important will the 5PE be to workers in the 21st century? 


Illustrations from Google Chrome

Huh?

carla — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 07:01:12 +0000

Fact: Most adolescents can hear and process about 140-145 words per minute.
Fact: Most adults speak at about 170 words per minute.
Conclusion: Students might do a little better in school if teachers spoke more slowly.

That’s the suggestion, at least, of Wichita State audiology professor Ray Hull. According to a recent article by Suzanne Perez Tobias, Hull states, “If teachers would slow down, they would be less frustrated, the children would be less frustrated, and children would learn with greater ease.” He also believes fewer students would be diagnosed as having learning disabilities if teachers would practice speaking at about 124 words per minute, the same speed as Fred Rogers of Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood.

A few years ago an inclusion teacher was assigned to work with students in my classes. We struggled to find the right balance between her area of expertise and mine, and, sadly, we never really succeeded. One thing she did that just drove me crazy was to speak to the class very slowly. I used to listen to her and think, “They’re not in sixth grade!”

But apparently she was on to something. She knew that kids on IEPs needed time to let her words “sink in” as she explained how to do something.

My last period class this year is large, lively, and cooperative. I been surprised to find, however, that I have to repeat at least 3 times the same set of directions that needed only 1 explanation in the earlier class. The class presents an interesting mix of educational needs. I’m going to try slowing down my speech and see what happens. I won’t speak as slowly as my colleague, but with practice, perhaps I can match Mr. Rogers.

One could do worse.

In honor of workers

carla — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 13:40:33 +0000

My first job was working in an orange juice factory, but I got canned … couldn’t concentrate.
Then I worked in the woods as a lumberjack, but I just couldn’t hack it, so they gave me the ax.
After that I tried to be a tailor, but I just wasn’t suited for it, mainly because it was a sew-sew job.
Next I tried working in a muffler factory, but that was too exhausting.
Then I tried to be a chef. I figured it would add a little spice to my life, but I just didn’t have the thyme.
I attempted to be a deli worker, but any way I sliced it, I couldn’t cut the mustard.
My best job was being a musician, but eventually I found I wasn’t noteworthy.
I studied a long time to become a doctor, but I didn’t have any patience.
Next was a job in a shoe factory. I tried, but I didn’t last — just didn’t fit in.
I became a professional fisherman, but discovered that I couldn’t live on my net income.
I managed to get a good job working for a pool maintenance company, but the work was just too draining.
So then I got a job in a workout center, but they said I wasn’t fit for the job.
After many years of trying to find steady work I finally got a job as a historian, but there was no future in it.
My last job was working at Starbucks, but I had to quit, because it was always the same old grind.

Fairy Tale

carla — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 07:01:26 +0000

Talking the dress code talk

carla — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 07:01:53 +0000

Challenging the dress code is a rite of passage for most high school students. Enforcing the dress code is therefore an ongoing struggle.

The girls at my school, each apparently believing themselves the next Britney Spears, walk down the hall about to fall out of those overtight little tops or wearing shorts that would make even Daisy Duke gasp. I now understand why high school teachers were scandalized by the miniskirts of a bygone era. Some of them are just too short, while others are, shall we say, unflattering to some girls.

The male teachers don’t even try to enforce the dress code — they know better than to acknowledge that they see anything at all. That leaves it to the female teachers.

What language can we use to discuss the issue and remain professional? I’ve tried cleavage, décolletage, and curves. But I think my principal said it best when she addressed the issue during announcements recently: “Girls, it’s just too much information.”

Punctuation Mark Personalities

carla — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 07:01:38 +0000

“Is the semicolon girlie?” asks the article at Salon. It goes on to quote some unflattering descriptions of that punctuation mark from a Boston Globe article:

“ugly as a tick on a dog’s belly” (Donald Barthelme)
“transvestite hermaphrodites representing absolutely nothing” (Kurt Vonnegut)
“the most pusillanimous, sissified, utterly useless mark of punctuation ever invented” (James Kilpatrick)

The Salon article invited comments on the semicolon from other writers, some of whom described the personalities, so to speak, of other punctuation marks. The em dash, for example, was seen as “straightforward, masculine,” even “phallic” by some writers and as “feminine” by another, who added, “It could have something to do with Emily Dickinson.”

So if the semicolon is “girlie” — let’s concede that, just for fun — how do we see other punctuation marks?

The exclamation point seems like the “mother” mark. It may be related to the number of times a mother has to use them: “Don’t hit your brother!” “Don’t pull the cat’s ears!” “Stop it!”

Periods — those are students. They like things exact, nailed down, finite. Whatever.

And the asterisk — that’s the person with an endless supply of useless trivia. Did you know that the Taj Mahal is actually a tomb? Did you know that Niagara Falls is actually moving backwards due to erosion? Did you know that Henry David Thoreau grew a beard to hide how thin his face was when he was ill?

We have more punctuation marks and room for more personalities. How do you see them?

A tale of two workplaces

carla — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 07:01:06 +0000

A colleague got a phone call not long after he arrived at school this morning — his mother-in-law had just died, very unexpectedly. He recruited another teacher to cover his last period class, which requires special training to teach; made a few arrangements for the substitute teacher of his other classes; and was gone. He knows he can ask anyone for help to keep his kids on track while he’s out.

I didn’t think that was remarkable until I got home and read email from a friend at a different school. Her boss barely speaks to the staff. One of the teachers got another job, and the boss seemed to blame the teachers for her departure. Administrative concern for students is noticeably absent in a couple of areas. The faculty is fractured and pitted against one another. My friend, who wrote and published a textbook designed to address the needs of students at this school, now wants out.

What a difference in the two schools!

How does a workplace develop into either a supportive or a toxic environment? No one wakes up in the morning, yawns, stretches, and says, “It’s a beautiful day. I think I’ll go to work and make someone miserable.” But somehow in the give and take of ordinary activities, patterns develop, personality traits appear, and a workplace atmosphere is established.

I’m lucky to work where I do, and I hope my friend finds a better place for herself soon. But tomorrow I’m going to make an extra effort to keep things positive. A good place to work doesn’t just happen.