Prestwick Cafe

BREAKING NEWS: Prestwick House Top Secrets Revealed! (Part 2: YOU can teach your students literary theory ... yes YOU can!)

2012-02-01T07:02:00.000-03:30

by Douglas Grudzina

If you’re like many English teachers, you have (a) degree(s) in education with a minor or a concentration in English or communications or something like that.

If you’re like most English teachers, your state’s certification requirements don’t include all that many credits or course hours in actual content.

If you’re like many English teachers, you spend a good deal of your prep time, not pondering how to teach, but agonizing over what to teach. You’ve got the pedagogy down pat.

The content ... not so much.

Now, I’m not bashing pedagogy. After all, if we’ve made it into the classroom as a teacher, we ourselves have suffered through many a course taught by the brilliant whatever-ist who hadn’t the faintest idea how to teach.

Pedagogy is important.

But that still leaves the problem of the teacher tasked with preparing his/her students to attain some level of “College and Career Readiness” (the stated goal of the Common Core State Standards).

Are you really supposed to be physically present in your classroom face-to-face with recalcitrant students for some 35 hours a week and then spend an additional 30 – 40 hours grading papers, and then devote your “free time” to learning the stuff no one told you you were going to need to know and then planning lessons—including creating usable materials—to fill your 35 hours of class time?

I doubt that’s even humanly possible ... and that’s why Prestwick House is here.

So you already know that, given a piece of literature (fiction, nonfiction, drama, poetry, it doesn’t matter), you can guide your kids through a literal reading and a search for “theme.” You can march them up Freytag’s rising action and slide them down the other side of the climax.

For fun, you can have them underline all the similes and circle the metaphors. Scan the lines and point out every variation from the iambic pentameter.

Plot the rhyme scheme.

In a recent episode of a popular television show, a student (obviously smitten with her dashing substitute English teacher) complained, “Scansion is mathematics. It destroys the romance.” I have to say that I agree with her.

I suspect a good many of our students do too, and that is why they don’t bother doing the reading, and they sit in our rooms bored and sullen, wondering “when am I ever going to use this?”

But if we abandon the things we know, we’re faced with that not-humanly-possible work week. So, what do we do?

Well, at the risk of sounding immodest, I’ll repeat: That’s why Prestwick House is here.

Last week, we shared with you one of Prestwick House’s best-kept secrets: the Levels of Understanding units that allow you to guide every student through every level of thought for every title you teach (well, as long as we have a unit for it ...).

This week, it is our extreme honor to introduce you to ...Multiple Critical Perspectives guides!

Multiple Critical Perspectives guides are reproducible units that help you introduce your students to literary theory, exposing them to the Feminist, Freudian, Archetypal, Marxist, Formalist, and New Historicist approaches. Each unit introduces three approaches and provides two to three activities to examine the work you are studying from each perspective.

The activities are designed to be completed in a single class period (two at the most) and to require NO ADDITIONAL PREPARATION ON YOUR PART—you might have to copy a few handouts, but that’s it. Seriously, these activities are so easy to implement even a Cave-substitute could do them.

Each Multiple Critical Perspective guide also includes discussion questions and writing prompts for each of the approaches covered in the unit.

Here’s one of the Marxist Approach writing assignments for the Animal Farm Multiple Critical Perspectives guide:

Analyze the trade relationships Napoleon enters into with his neighbors Mr. Pilkington and Mr. Frederick as the foundation of a capitalistic economy. Consider the characteristics of such an economic system by describing what makes this system work and what jeopardizes it.

And here’s a Formalist prompt from the Life of Pi Multiple Critical Perspectives guide:

Throughout the novel, Martel uses a number of forms and narrative techniques (italics, plain text, the special font for Okamoto and Chiba’s side comments, bulleted and numbered lists, unnarrated dialogue, sound effects, etc.). Write an essay in which you analyze the use of these techniques and evaluate their effectiveness.

The Life of Pi Multiple Critical Perspectives guide also includes the Mythological/Archetypal approach. One of the activities invites the students to examine the carnivorous island as a “Perversion of the Garden of Eden.” After the students examine the pertinent chapters and sections of the included notes on archetypes in literature, the activity culminates in a discussion:

With the full class, discuss the possibility of this Island’s representing the opposite of Paradise. Consider the significance of the following from this viewpoint:
Pi’s bath in the freshwater pool
the meerkats’ lack of fear, and unawareness of predators
the location of the one “fruit-bearing” tree
the nature of the “fruit”
Pi’s decision and actions upon his discovery of the “fruit

One of the To Kill a Mockingbird Multiple Critical Perspectives guide's Psychoanalytic activities invites students to apply Atticus Finch’s definition of a hero to several characters in the novel:

Have the students read (or reread) Chapter 11, focusing on Atticus’ definition of a true hero. Divide the class into small groups and assign each group one of the following characters:

Aunt Alexandra
Tom Robinson
Mr. Underwood
Calpurnia
Judge Taylor
Boo Radley
Scout
Jem

Then have each group develop a thesis that states whether or not its character meets Atticus’ definition of a hero. Have the groups peruse the book for specific incidents to support their theses.
Reconvene the class and have each group report. Where two or more groups working with the same character disagree, have the full class examine the evidence and discuss.

Because they deal with literary theory and multiple ways of viewing the same text, Multiple Critical Perspectives guides do not have an answer key, and many of the activity discussions come with the caveat:

NOTE: For such a discussion, the class does not need to come to agreement or consensus. It is important only to express a view and to be able to support that view with an accurate and complete reading of the text.

While Multiple Critical Perspectives guides are intended to supplement, not replace, the core instruction of, say, a Levels of Understanding or an Advanced Placement Teaching Unit, some of the cool things customers report is that they (the Multiple Critical Perspectives guides) prove that “literature has something for everyone” as we keep promising our students. Students might be bored to death after years and years of “the theme of To Kill a Mockingbird is racism. The theme of Animal Farm is the fraudulence of Communism in Russia” and so on. They might be “What-is-the-conflict-“ ed to death, and we know they’re frustrated beyond words trying to figure out how to figure out the “right answer.”

Studying the same text from ... uh ... Multiple Critical Perspectives ... opens up the field for your kids so that they might actually begin to find their connection to the literature we love and teach, that longed-for relevance.

Multiple Critical Perspectives guides are really cool units, and we have them for dozens of titles. They’re one of Prestwick House’s best-kept secrets.

BREAKING NEWS: Prestwick House Top Secrets Revealed! (Part 1: Your students can be engaged, critical readers and you can win free products!)

2012-01-24T16:38:00.000-03:30

by Douglas Grudzina

Here’s an all-too-typical scenario: you’re just back from a full-day in-service workshop (maybe it was the Friday of the Martin Luther King Day weekend, or it’ll be the Friday of February’s Presidents Day weekend) …

… in any event, you’ve just spend your day, rear-end pressed again the hard composite material of a student desk in an under-heated library (or auditorium or cafeteria), drinking bad coffee and eating stale donuts, listening to a guest lecturer who’s just converted his old overhead transparencies into a PowerPoint presentation and is telling you that you’ve got to get your kids beyond merely understanding the surface of the literature they read.

Higher Order Thinking Skills! the presenter advocates.

Analysis! Synthesis! Evaluation!

You’ve heard it all before. And you probably also agree that there’s more you could (and should) be doing with your literature students than reviewing plot and character facts, examining themes, and justifying why, if they were in Hamlet’s shoes, they would or would not have killed Claudius immediately, been so cruel to Ophelia, sent poor Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to their unsuspecting deaths … and so on.

You know you want your kids to see the connection between the court of eleventh-century Scotland and the current White House administration (regardless of what year it is and who is in office!).

You’d love to get your kids talking about Harry Potter as Hero—not good-guy, protagonist “hero” but full-blown epic, tragic, Romantic … capital H hero, with a Quest and a Mentor and … (well, you know what I’m talking about).

You don’t want to have to point out every metaphor and explain to them why each bit of irony adds humor or suspense or quirkiness to the text …

You understand quite well what Bloom was talking about when he organized his taxonomy and proclaimed that real understanding … useful understanding … the kind of understanding that actually becomes a part of a person’s psyche … emerges during the process of analysis, synthesis, and evaluation.

(You may also be frustrated by trying to teach literature to students who have previously been taught only to react and evaluate without ever really examining the text to know what they were reacting to or evaluating!)

You know you want your classroom to be that kind of challenging, academic environment, but the reality is you simply do not have the time to reexamine all of the literature you teach and revise all of the materials you use—and your school’s text book may not be conducive to the kind of literary study you know you want to perform with your students.

Well, Prestwick House has a secret for you: You don’t have to reinvent the wheel because we’ve done it for you!

Levels of Understanding: Using Bloom’s Taxonomy to Explore Literature is the tool you’ve been longing for.

Each specific Levels of Understanding guide contains five types of questions from the lowest level of Bloom’s hierarchy of skills (comprehension) to the highest (evaluation). The lower-order questions often provide scaffolding for the higher-order questions:

Comprehension questions assess the students’ basic understanding of the text: plot facts, character identification, etc. To prevent the comprehension section from becoming a tedious “march through the text,” however, the questions point students toward surface facts that might be difficult to grasp or will prove to be important later in the work.
Reader Response questions ask the students to relate the text to their personal experience or to present an opinion on a character or event.
Analysis questions require students to examine how various techniques and literary or theatrical devices (diction, symbolism, imagery, metaphors, asides, soliloquies etc.) function in the text. For the most part, these terms are not defined in the question; nor do analysis questions ask the student to merely identify a literary or rhetorical device.
Synthesis questions bridge the gap between analysis and evaluation, requiring students to look at other sections in the text and draw conclusions about themes, motifs, or a writer’s style. On occasion, a synthesis question will require students to draw on their knowledge of allusions, history, theory, or literary techniques to answer the question.
Evaluation questions ask the student to make a qualitative judgment on the text and determine whether a particular aspect of it is effective or ineffective, necessary or redundant, worthwhile or not, etc.

Here are some examples from our Their Eyes Were Watching God Levels of Understanding:

Comprehension:

What is the key surprise about Joe’s character?

Despite his surface slickness, Joe appears to be a solid man with genuine love and regard for Janie. He also has a completely different attitude toward life from anyone else we have met in the novel up to this point except Janie herself, and conducts himself in a more assertive, self-possessed manner—much like Janie herself. He actually proposes marriage, says he wants to treat her like a lady, and is waiting with a carriage when she flees her home and meets him.

What else stands out about Joe for Janie? How is he different from other men? Cite the passage.

He is a self-determining character, not content to work within the confines of a white-defined world. “Every day after they managed to meet in the scrub oaks across the road and talk about when he would be a big ruler of things with her reaping the benefits…but he spoke for far horizon. He spoke for change and chance…”

Reader Response:

What is your first impression of Phoeby? Why?

Unlike the resentful, judgmental women who are overly critical of Janie and her life choices, Phoeby accepts Janie on her own terms. She even defends Janie to the other women, correcting their prejudices and misinterpretations. She also brings Janie some food, knowing she will be hungry from her travels.

How do you feel about Janie’s emotional response to Joe’s death? Is it appropriate or not?

She is both saddened and relieved. The death is tragic, but also a release for both Janie and Joe. Both are released from the suffering of Joe’s illness; it also releases them both from the conflict and unhappiness of their marriage. While she feels genuine grief for Joe, she also knows that with his death comes a new freedom for her—something she has never experienced. This is understandable and appropriate, given the happiness and the turmoil that she experienced during her life with him.
Other students, however, might cite all of the good things Joe did for the town and especially for Janie and argue that Janie should feel a stronger, more sincere grief and should remember Joe with gratitude.

At the end of Chapter 9, do you expect Janie to marry again? What kind of man would she be likely to marry?

It is an open question at this point in the narrative; on the one hand, she tells Phoeby how much she loves her freedom; on the other hand, she has yet to have the kind of fulfilling, loving relationship she has pined for since childhood. It seems likely that any man who would have any chance with her at this point would have to be romantic, loving, kind, and gentle, and more focused on her needs and the relationship than on anything else.

Analysis

What element of Janie’s portrayal is reiterated and furthered in Chapter 5?

Janie has always been envied because of her beauty. In this town, she is envied for her beauty and for her position as Joe’s wife.

Where is Janie in her character arc at the beginning of Chapter 7? What should the reader be expecting to happen?

Janie seems to have reached a leveling-off period in her development. Through most of the book, Janie has been developing and growing (rising action). Now, she is not in falling action yet, but the upward slope does not seem as steep. At such a point, the reader should expect some crisis, some big event that will either propel Janie to the climax of her arc or to rouse her and return her to the rising action of character growth.

What is the significance of Tea Cake’s two disappearances in Chapter 13? Why does Hurston have this happen twice in the same chapter?

Tea Cake’s two disappearances from Janie emphasize the fact that she has left behind a safe, predictable existence for something wilder, riskier, and more dangerous. Tea Cake’s first disappearance is due to boyish impetuosity—he takes and spends Janie’s money just to see what it feels like to be rich, however fleetingly. But the second disappearance illustrates the implicit danger and uncertainty of the life he lives as a gambler; he comes back injured after having to fight another gambler angered at losing. In embracing Tea Cake, Janie now must embrace the risk of losing him, and possibly everything she has.

Synthesis

What theme is suggested in the first two paragraphs of Chapter 1? In what way might this be interpreted as a feminist theme? As a black theme?

The first two paragraphs convey the difference in the perspectives and lives of men and women. The first paragraph opens, “Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board,” describing the relationship men, perhaps especially black men, have with their aspirations—a distant dream, perhaps to be fulfilled but equally likely not to be, with sorrow and resignation the result. On the other hand women, most specifically black women, are portrayed in the second paragraph as having an altogether different relationship with their dreams: “Now, women forget all those things they don’t want to remember, and remember everything they don’t want to forget. The dream is the truth. They act and do things accordingly.” Women are seen as more resilient than men, less apt to break when confronted with disappointment. The author thus sets the stage for a story that will be centered on a strong heroine.

Compare the conversation among the men about Joe at the end of Chapter 5 and the townspeople discussing Janie in the opening chapter. What is the common thread or theme?

The men are respectful and grateful toward Joe, but also harbor secret resentment of his power and influence over their lives. It is said that “you kin feel a switch in his hands when he’s talkin’ to yuh”; he’s “a whirlwind among breezes,” and has “uh throne in de seat of his pants.” The episode echoes the gossip of the town folk about Janie in the first chapter, and underlines the theme of jealousy and resentment that lies beneath sanctimonious criticism.

Evaluation

Does Hurston’s manipulation of the narrative voice help further the story, or hinder it? Why or how?

As the novel progresses, the narrative voice becomes increasingly conversational and idiomatic, frequently reflecting the colorful, imaginative quality of the dialogue. This is effective in that the novel feels increasingly like a tale told to us by a specific onlooker, one who inhabits the same world as the characters. “Take for instance that new house of his. It had two stories with porches, with banisters and such things…And then he spit in that gold-looking vase that anybody else would have been glad to put on their front-room table. Said it was a spittoon just like his used-to-be bossman used to have in his bank up there in Atlanta. Didn’t have to get and go to the door every time he had to spit….”

Is Hurston’s portrayal of the Everglades—or “de muck”—simply a picaresque narrative, or is there a motif that is being furthered here?

Answer #1: “De muck” is colorfully conveyed as a boisterous, freewheeling and raffish way of life; but it is also a life that is close to nature, bonded to the cycles of the earth and focused on the momentary but concrete facts of existence, as farm workers must be. Janie, who has always had a particular connection with nature, as with her favorite pear tree during her childhood, takes to this life as a fish to water. Even the fact that the migrants refer to the Everglades as “de muck” shows a lack of pretense, and certainly an embrace of the earthiness of the lifestyle there. It also furthers another aspect of Hurston’s nature motif in the book: the true spirituality, in terms of a sense of self and peace with that self, that is found in being closely connected to nature. In choosing the life on “de muck” with Tea Cake, Janie claims not only her own voice and self determination, but her spiritual side as well.

Answer #2: Hurston spends a great deal of the narrative in this section detailing the lifestyle, characters, and hi-jinx of “de muck”; it seems to serve mostly as comic relief and entertainment for the reader, but doesn’t particularly connect to any important motifs or metaphors previously developed in the novel.

Is Phoeby a fully realized character, or just a structural conceit for the novel?

Answer #1: While Phoeby is utilized primarily as a framing device for the story, she is still a believable, sympathetic character and perhaps the one true woman friend Janie has throughout the whole book. She is also a foil for Janie; while a loving and empathetic friend, she is not as determined or brave as Janie, and sometimes counsels Janie to conform to the expectations of others rather than follow her own nature. Nevertheless, she is a steadfast friend, who defends Janie and her choices to any who criticize her. By the end of the book, it is apparent that she wishes to have Janie’s strength, and is inspired by it, making her the only character other than Janie and Tea Cake who experience a personal change by the end of the book: “…’Lawd! Phoeby breathed out heavily, ‘Ah done growed ten feet higher from jus’ listenin’ tuh you, Janie. Ah ain’t satisfied wid mahself no mo’. Ah means tuh make Sam take me fishin’ wid him after this. Nobody better not criticize yuh in mah hearin’..”

Answer #2: Phoeby exists primarily as a structural vehicle for Hurston to bring the reader into the story. As a character, she is too good to be true; too steadfast, too sympathetic, too adoring of Janie.

She never sufficiently challenges Janie; whenever she gives her advice Janie doesn’t want to follow, she accepts her reasons without question. Aside from serving as a window into the novel, she only seems to exist to point out how fine and strong a woman Janie is. She only appears at the beginning, once in the middle, and in the final chapter, and doesn’t figure as an active participant in the narrative.

So that’s how our Levels of Understanding works. Every chapter, act, scene, or however the text is divided has questions representing every level of Bloom’s taxonomy. Students who love to rush to evaluation—often dismissing the plot, characters, and theme—are still encouraged to evaluate what they’re reading, but the evaluation must be based on a careful reading and close examination.

Students who want to react, to agree or disagree, sympathize or condemn are still encouraged to make those subjective connections, but those connections are treated as the means to an end, not the end in itself.

It’s exactly what you’ve been wanting to do in your classes—all of your classes, to allow even your reluctant and challenged students to experience deep and meaningful inquiry.

It’s exactly what this morning’s in-service speaker was bellowing at you to do (bellowing in the sense of encouraging and motivating).

Can't wait to get your hands on a copy? Visit www.prestwickhouse.com to see a full list of titles and keep an eye out over the next couple of months as we create more.

Want a chance to win a free downloadable version of the title of your choice? Leave a comment on this blog post including your email address between now and February 1, 2012 for a chance to win!

Tuesday Trivia

2012-01-03T10:38:00.000-03:30

The moons of all planets except for Uranus are named after Greek gods. What are the moons of Uranus named after?
Where does A.A. Milne’s classic children’s character, Winnie-the-Pooh, get his name?
Which well-known 20th century, British author held his first civilian job after WWI was at the offices of the Oxford English Dictionary as an etymologist?
How many times did Leo Tolstoy’s wife edit the cumbersome, handwritten manuscript for “War and Peace”?
What best-selling author opened the first Saab auto dealership in the United States?

Last Week's Answers

How many words are in the longest sentence in Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables?

The longest sentence in the book Les Miserables is 823 words long. After Hugo’s editor had read the manuscript, Hugo sent a letter that only said “?” to find out what they thought. They sent the manuscript back with the response “!”

Which well-known 20th century, British author was a member of the Inklings, a group associated with Oxford University, alongside other pertinent authors such as C.S. Lewis?

J.R.R. Tolkien and as his son Christopher were both avid members of the Inklings.

Which English author, poet, essayist, literary critic, and playwright enjoyed taking off his clothes and climbing mulberry trees?

D. H. Lawrence enjoyed taking off his clothes and climbing mulberry trees.

What Alfred Hitchcock movie title is drawn from Shakespeare's Hamlet?

North by Northwest, in which Cary Grant feigns madness. The title is taken from Hamlet's words: "I am but mad north-northwest; when the wind is southerly, I know a hawk from a handsaw.”

In what year was the first English-language Encyclopaedia Britannica published?

The first English-language Encyclopaedia Britannica published in Edinburgh, Scotland, in 1771.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-12-27T12:05:00.000-03:30

How many words are in the longest sentence in Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables?
Which well-known 20th century, British author was a member of the Inklings, a group associated with Oxford University, alongside other pertinent authors such as C.S. Lewis?
Which English author, poet, essayist, literary critic, and playwright enjoyed taking off his clothes and climbing mulberry trees?
What Alfred Hitchcock movie title is drawn from Shakespeare's Hamlet?In what year was the first English-language Encyclopaedia Britannica published?

Last Week's Answers

Which gothic writer was better known during his lifetime as the personal assistant of actor Henry Irving and business manager of the Lyceum Theatre in London?

Bram Stoker

The moons of Uranus are named after characters from the works of which two famous writers?

Alexander Pope and William Shakespeare.

Washington Irving got the idea for the story of Rip Van Winkle from which ancient poet?

Washington Irving got his idea for Rip Van Winkle from the story of the Cretan poet Epimenides, who lived around 600 B.C. In the story, the main character takes a nap in a cave and awakes almost 60 years later. When he returns home, he finds his younger brother has become an old man.

Which author’s genius work ignited a scientific revolution, but failed financially — going out of print for many years after its initial publishing in 1543?

Copernicus' revolutionary book arguing that heavenly bodies move around the sun ignited a scientific revolution, but it was a financial flop. Published, finally, in 1543, it was overpriced and allowed to go out of print. A second edition was not printed until 1566, the third, not until 1617.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-12-20T10:29:00.000-03:30

Which gothic writer was better known during his lifetime as the personal assistant of actor Henry Irving and business manager of the Lyceum Theatre in London?
The moons of Uranus are named after characters from the works of which two famous writers?
Washington Irving got the idea for the story of Rip Van Winkle from which ancient poet?
Which author’s genius work ignited a scientific revolution, but failed financially — going out of print for many years after its initial publishing in 1543?

Last Week's Answers

What was Pulitzer Prize-Winning author John Sanford’s reason for deciding to become a writer?

His journalism schooling was paid for by the Army.

Which author gave his 1949 Nobel Prize acceptance speech and was met with only a smattering of polite applause because it was virtually impossible to understand what he was saying?

While William Faulkner’s speech was unintelligible to the audience in attendance, it was universally acclaimed as one of the best acceptance speeches ever written after its newspaper publication the following morning.

What was Judy Blume's maiden name?

Sussman

Which poet was returned to his city of birth upon his death to be buried but was hidden in a wall to prevent anyone from stealing the corpse — a hiding place was forgotten until 1865, when a construction worker unearthed it during church renovations?

Dante died of Malaria in 1321 and was returned to his native Florence. A construction worker found the corpse during construction in 1865, and in the time it took to rebury him, several pieces of Dante’s body mysteriously went missing, taken as trinkets.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-12-13T11:59:00.000-03:30

What was Pulitzer Prize-Winning author John Sanford’s reason for deciding to become a writer?
Which author gave his 1949 Nobel Prize acceptance speech and was met with only a smattering of polite applause because it was virtually impossible to understand what he was saying?
What was Judy Blume's maiden name?
Which poet was returned to his city of birth upon his death to be buried but was hidden in a wall to prevent anyone from stealing the corpse — a hiding place was forgotten until 1865, when a construction worker unearthed it during church renovations?

Last Week's Answers

Which famous sci-fi author’s father choked to death in a restaurant while on a business trip and when his mother was unable to tell him, she hired someone to inform him of his father’s death?

William Gibson

Which famous author was both born and died on a Halley’s Comet year?

Mark Twain 1835 - 1910

Which author died while on a tour of the White Mountains in1864 and is buried in the Sleepy Hallow Cemetery in Massachussetts?

Nathaniel Hawthorne

The epitaph 'Blest be the man that spares these stones, and curst be he that moves my bones,' was written by whom?

Shakespeare

Yelping with Cormac

2011-12-09T14:46:00.004-03:30

The Yelping with Cormac tumblr, a compilation of posts detailing how Cormac McCarthy might rate establishments on Yelp.com is definitely worth a look (and a laugh).

Tuesday Trivia

2011-12-06T11:54:00.000-03:30

Which famous sci-fi author’s father choked to death in a restaurant while on a business trip and when his mother was unable to tell him, she hired someone to inform him of his father’s death?
Which famous author was both born and died on a Halley’s Comet year?
Which author died while on a tour of the White Mountains in1864 and is buried in the Sleepy Hallow Cemetery in Massachussetts?
he epitaph 'Blest be the man that spares these stones, and curst be he that moves my bones,' was written by whom?

Last Week's Answers

What was George Eliot's real name?

Mary Ann Evans used the pseudonym George Eliot.

Which young adult author is the grandmother of controversial musician Courtney Love?

Paula Fox, author of Slave Dancer, had a daughter named Linda in 1944 that she put up for adoption. Linda Carroll, the adopted child, is the mother of controversial musician Courtney Love; making Fox Courtney Love's grandmother.

Where does the “Hey Diddle Diddle” nursery rhyme come from?

This Nursery Rhyme originated in the court of Queen Elizabeth I. The queen is said to have teased her courtiers (not unlike a cat teases mice) and was very fond of dancing to fiddle music. One of her courtiers was called "Moon" and another "Dog," and there was also a gentleman of the court called "Dish" who eloped with Mistress “Spoon.”

Which U.S. President was a Finalist for the National Book Award?

John F. Kennedy was a nonfiction finalist in 1957 for Profiles in Courage.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-11-29T11:46:00.000-03:30

What was George Eliot's real name?
Which young adult author is the grandmother of controversial musician Courtney Love?
Where does the “Hey Diddle Diddle” nursery rhyme come from?
Which U.S. President was a Finalist for the National Book Award?

Last Week's Answers

Which author was married on April 1, 1993 — a deliberate play on her husband’s belief that only fools get married in the first place?

Meg Cabot, author of The Princess Diaries.

What is the title of Shakespeare’s lost play?

The play Cardenio that has been credited to the Bard and which was performed in his life, has been completely lost to time. Today we have no written record of its story whatsoever.

What English literary classic was inspired by the adventures of Scottish pirate Andrew Selkirk?

Robinson Crusoe. Daniel Defoe wrote the tale after hearing the story of Selkirk's four and a half years on uninhabited Juan Fernandez Island off the coast of Chile.

Which word was accidentally omitted from a 1631 publication of the Bible, therefore encouraging readers to commit adultery?

In 1631, a printer accidentally omitted the word "Not" from the seventh commandment, encouraging readers to commit adultery.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-11-22T11:43:00.000-03:30

Which author was married on April 1, 1993 — a deliberate play on her husband’s belief that only fools get married in the first place?
What is the title of Shakespeare’s lost play?
What English literary classic was inspired by the adventures of Scottish pirate Andrew Selkirk?
Which word was accidentally omitted from a 1631 publication of the Bible, therefore encouraging readers to commit adultery?

Last Week's Answers

What was the occupation of author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, author of the Sherlock Holmes series of mysteries?

The man responsible for writing the famous Sherlock Holmes mysteries was actually an eye doctor. Because this occupation didn’t pay enough for him to make a decent living, he wrote in his spare time to supplement his income.

What do Laura Ingalls Wilder, Kenneth Grahame, Richard Adams, The Marquis de Sade, and Raymond Chandler have in common?

Each was approaching or over fifty years old before his or her first major work was published. Laura Ingalls Wilder did not publish her first novel in the Little House series of children’s books until her sixties; Kenneth Grahame did not publish until his retirement in 1908 (age 49); Richard Adams’s first novel, the bestseller, Watership Down, was published when he was in his fifties; The Marquis de Sade published his first novel, Justine, after turning 51; Raymond Chandler published his first short story at 45 and his first novel, The Big Sleep at 51.

When was the first novel written?

The first novel ever written contains 54 chapters and is titled The Tale of Genji. It was written in the beginning of the 11th century by Murasaki Shibuku, a Japanese noblewoman.

What does Jane Smiley say she would be doing if she were not a writer?

She would choose to raise horses.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-11-15T11:40:00.000-03:30

What was the occupation of author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, author of the Sherlock Holmes series of mysteries?
What do Laura Ingalls Wilder, Kenneth Grahame, Richard Adams, The Marquis de Sade, and Raymond Chandler have in common?
When was the first novel written?
What does Jane Smiley say she would be doing if she were not a writer?

Last Week's Answers

Which American short story writer and poet continually called the name “Reynolds!” the night before his death?

Edgar Allan Poe shouted this name, although no one knows to whom they dying man was calling.

How did Voltaire rid himself of tiresome guests?

Voltaire got rid of boring guests by pretending to faint.

The average person uses a vocabulary of approximately 8,000 words. How many did Shakespeare use?

William Shakespeare used a vocabulary of 29,066 different words.

What first name did Arthur Conan Doyle give to his famous detective before he came up with Sherlock?

Sherringford. The name was used in a short story Doyle wrote in 1886. Holmes's sidekick in the story was called Ormond Sacker — soon to be renamed Thomas Watson.

What famous writer claimed she did most of the plotting for her books while sitting in a bathtub munching on apples?

Agatha Christie

Tuesday Trivia

2011-11-08T08:17:00.001-03:30

Which American short story writer and poet continually called the name “Reynolds!” the night before his death?
How did Voltaire rid himself of tiresome guests?
The average person uses a vocabulary of approximately 8,000 words. How many did Shakespeare use?
What first name did Arthur Conan Doyle give to his famous detective before he came up with Sherlock?
What famous writer claimed she did most of the plotting for her books while sitting in a bathtub munching on apples?

Last Week's Answers

What French novelist inadvertently provided actress Ruth Davis with her stage name, Bette Davis?

Honore de Balzac. Davis took her stage name from the title of his 1840 novel Cousin Bette.

Which piece of American literature containing over 50,000 words does not once use the letter “e”?

American author, Ernest Vincent Wright wrote Gadsby: A Champion of Youth, which, except for the introduction and a note at the end, does not use the letter “e.” Every word is properly spelled and all narration is grammatically correct. He actually taped down the letter “e” on his typewriter to avoid accidentally using it.

The high-speed ferry between Dublin and Great Britain, across the Irish Sea, is named after which 18th-century satirist?

Jonathan Swift.

Which author once ate an apple under the Arch de Triomphe to try to overcome his insomnia?

Alexander Dumas

What book was once banned by the Eldon, Missouri library because it contained 39 "objectionable" words?

The American Heritage Dictionary.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-11-01T15:09:00.001-02:30

What French novelist inadvertently provided actress Ruth Davis with her stage name, Bette Davis?
Which piece of American literature containing over 50,000 words does not once use the letter “e”?
The high-speed ferry between Dublin and Great Britain, across the Irish Sea, is named after which 18th-century satirist?
Which author once ate an apple under the Arch de Triomphe to try to overcome his insomnia?
What book was once banned by the Eldon, Missouri library because it contained 39 "objectionable" words?

Last Week's Answers

Who is the most successful textbook author of all time?

Elements, by Euclid, was written circa 300 B.C. and has gone through more than 1,000 editions since the invention of printing.

J.K. Rowling’s short story, “The Tale of Three Brothers” is based on which famous tale?

“The Pardoner’s Tale” by Geoffrey Chaucer in Canterbury Tales.

Which famous writer was buried in the Fluntern Cemetery, Zurich, Switzerland, and is so close to the Zurich Zoo that the zoo's lions can be heard from his grave?

James Joyce was buried here and shares his plot with wife Nora and son Georgio.

What best-selling author opened the first Saab auto dealership in the United States?

Kurt Vonnegut.

Where does the phrase “often a bridesmaid, never a bride” come from?

The phrase "Often a bridesmaid, but never a bride," actually originates from an advertisement for Listerine mouthwash from 1924.

NaNoWriMo

2011-10-31T13:34:00.002-02:30

OMG! It’s time for NaNoWriMo again!

For several years now, Prestwick House has been a strong advocate for the entire concept of NaNoWriMo … just a fun and furious way to get your kids writing, thinking like a writer, excited about literature—the potential benefits are limitless.

Do you have younger students? Don’t forget that there is a Young Writers’ NaNoWriMo, too!

It’s not too late to register and get your kids writing! More important, it’s not too late for YOU to register and get writing!

How to Find the Perfect Teaching Guide

2011-10-27T18:16:00.003-02:30

Visit PrestwickHouse.com today to see our new, Interactive Teaching Guide Comparison Chart and find your perfect Teaching Guide!

Interview with Head of Prestwick House Digital Resources, Keith Bergstrom

2011-10-26T15:07:00.002-02:30

This week, I sat down with Prestwick house General Manager and Head of Prestwick House Digital Resources, Keith Bergstrom to learn a little bit about Prestwick House’s digital learning tools and the new Vocabulary Power Plus Online program released earlier this month.

Prestwick House has been selling their reproducible products as downloadables for years. What is your new focus on digital products and how is it different from what we’ve already seen?
We’ve been a leader in digital distribution because we’ve always been focused on how teachers can use technology in the classroom. In the past, we’ve focused on using the power of the internet to make it easier and cheaper to get ready-to-use resources into the classroom, but we’re finally reaching a point in which access to computers is pervasive enough that teachers will be able to make technology a core part of their classroom.

We certainly don’t believe that books are dying—they’re certainly a fantastic way to deliver information to students, and I don’t think they’re going away anytime soon—but beyond the page there are tremendous opportunities to empower teachers to have a more dynamic classroom.

So, beyond these downloadables, what has Prestwick House Digital been working on?
Well, over the last few years we’ve been expanding our delivery methods to a variety of ebook readers. You can now find Prestwick House books on Apple iPads, Amazon Kindles, Sony Nook’s and other popular eBook platforms. While these are not yet available in most classrooms, we’re starting to hear rumblings from teachers, so we’ll be ready when they are.

In terms of mobile platforms, we released our first iPhone/iPad application last year to help students study for Vocabulary Power Plus for the New SAT, and we’re working on developing more apps for other popular series.

The tool that I think is developing the fastest is the use of digital whiteboards and presentation technologies. We’ve released a variety of ready-to-use Power Presentations to teach grammar, introduce new novels, and help teachers with lectures. We’ve been creating new presentations to accompany each resource book that we’ve released this year. We want the classroom teacher to have a wide range of materials available to teach the books in any way he or she sees fit, without needing to spend hours preparing slides.

Finally, I’m really excited about our new online extension to the Vocabulary Plus series, Vocabulary Power Plus Online.

Vocabulary Power Plus Online launched earlier this month, what exactly is it?
Vocabulary Power Plus Online is a digital version of our best-selling program, Vocabulary Power Plus for the New SAT. It’s our first foray into a completely digital arena, and we’re really excited about the possibilities this opens up.

It includes all of the exercises and resources from the series in an easy-to-use cloud-based program that puts an interactive version of the books directly onto student screens. Students can securely log in to an online program and see what’s been assigned, do their homework, practice for tests, and even take quizzes and tests online. Teachers can manage grade books, make assignments, and see reports on student progress. The system will automatically grade student work and give them instant feedback on where they need to improve. Teachers should really appreciate the automatic grading of multiple choice and fill-in-the-blank exercise while students will love having the ability to do their homework online.

So, does Vocabulary Power Plus Online supplement the books, or replace them?

We designed the program with both methods in mind. We know that many teachers will be hesitant to replace the book in their classroom. Those teachers can just use the online program to manage assignments and grades, but teachers that are ready to go completely digital will find all of the resources from the books available online.

What kinds of assessment materials are available with Vocabulary Power Plus Online?

We’ve turned all of the weekly quizzes, unit tests, and pre- and post-tests into online assessments. All of them are included with a subscription. Teachers can proctor the exams in a computer lab because all of the answers and questions are scrambled to keep students from cheating, and all of the assessments are instantly graded.

Where can our readers find out more about Vocabulary Power Plus Online?

I’d love to schedule demos for any readers that are interested in learning more. Click here to sign up for a free web demo.

So, what’s on the horizon for Prestwick House Digital Resources?

As I speak with teachers, I’m learning a lot about what they’re looking for in terms of online resources. Many companies are making online programs full of cute animations that may entertain students, but they’re not actually teaching students. We’re focusing on developing pedagogically sound resources that empower teachers to do what they do best – make a personal connection with students and foster learning. We believe that a teacher will always be the center of a classroom, so we’re at work developing tools that make teachers’ lives easier and their classrooms more effective. Right now, we’re evaluating tools to improve a teacher’s ability to use our curriculum resources, and we hope to unveil more online resources in the coming year.

To schedule a web demo of Vocabulary Power Plus Online, click here, and Prestwick House will contact you in 24-48 hours.

2011-10-25T07:10:00.000-02:30

Who is the most successful textbook author of all time?
J.K. Rowling’s short story, “The Tale of Three Brothers” is based on which famous tale?
Which famous writer was buried in the Fluntern Cemetery, Zurich, Switzerland, and is so close to the Zurich Zoo that the zoo's lions can be heard from his grave?
What best-selling author opened the first Saab auto dealership in the United States?
Where does the phrase “often a bridesmaid, never a bride” come from?

Last Week's Answers

Which great author received the meager sum of 10 pounds for his greatest work of literature?

John Milton sold the publishing rights to his epic verse work 'Paradise Lost' to a Samuel Simmons in 1667 for only ten pounds.

As far as number of lines is concerned, which is the most demanding of Shakespeare’s roles?

Hamlet is the most demanding of Shakespeare’s roles with 1,422 lines or roughly 36% of the total number of spoken lines in the play. Hamlet’s role is made up of 11,610 words. The character Falstaff has the most lines of any character in all of Shakespeare’s plays combined with 1,614 spoken lines in three different plays: Henry IV, Part I; Henry IV, Part II; and The Merry Wives of Windsor.

Which writer’s common-law wife was the madam of a Jacksonville brothel called the Hotel de Dream?

Stephen Crane

Which winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature was born in a ladies’ room during a dance?

Winston Churchill

2011-10-18T13:07:00.000-02:30

Which great author received the meager sum of 10 pounds for his greatest work of literature?
As far as number of lines is concerned, which is the most demanding of Shakespeare’s roles?
Which writer’s common-law wife was the madam of a Jacksonville brothe called the Hotel de Dream?
Which winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature was born in a ladies’ room during a dance?

Last Week's Answers

In 2004, which world-renowned author’s daughter discovered a 5,000-word story entitled "The Incident of the Dog's Ball" in the attic of her home?

Agatha Christie’s daughter found this 5,000 word story in 2004, and had it published in Britain in September 2009 by The Strand Magazine.

Which famous American playwright choked to death on an eye drop bottle cap?

Tennesee Williams’ cause of death was choking on an eye drop bottle cap in his room at the Hotel Elysee in New York. While holding the cap in his mouth, Williams leaned back to place eye drops in each eye and accidentally swallowed the cap. The police report suggests his use of drugs and alcohol contributed to his death by diminishing his gag reflex.

Which famous author was both born and died on a Halley’s Comet year?
Mark Twain 1835 - 1910

What did writer Edgar Allan Poe and singer Jerry Lee Lewis have in common pertaining to their choice of wives?

Both married a 13-year-old cousin.

2011-10-11T13:04:00.000-02:30

In 2004, which world-renowned author’s daughter discovered a 5,000-word story entitled "The Incident of the Dog's Ball" in the attic of her home?
Which famous American playwright choked to death on an eye drop bottle cap?
Which famous author was both born and died on a Halley’s Comet year?
What did writer Edgar Allan Poe and singer Jerry Lee Lewis have in common pertaining to their choice of wives?

Last Week's Answers

In the book Gone With the Wind, how many months actually pass during Melanie's' pregnancy?

Approximately 21 based on the battles mentioned in the text. When this was pointed out to author Margaret Mitchell, she reportedly replied that “a Southerner's pace is slower than that of a Yankee.”

What book was Mark David Chapman carrying with him when he killed John Lennon on December 8, 1980?

J.D. Salinger's The Catcher in the Rye.

Which female author was also considered the world’s first computer programmer?

Augusta Ada King, a writer and the illegitimate daughter of Lord Byron, was known for her work on Babbage's analytical engine. Her copious notes on this machine that would become the precursor to the modern computer include the first algorithm intended to be processed by a machine — making her the world’s first computer programmer.

What writer contemporary to T.S. Eliot nicknamed him "Old Possum"?

Ezra Pound, a poet, critic, and a major figure of the Modernist movement, famous for his work with major contemporaries such as Robert Frost, William Carlos Williams, Ernest Hemingway, and especially T. S. Eliot gave Eliot the nickname “Old Possum.” Eliot later used the nickname in his work Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats.

Which word in the English language has the most definitions?

Of all the words in the English language, the word ’set’ has the most definitions.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-10-04T12:31:00.001-02:30

In the book Gone With the Wind, how many months actually pass during Melanie's' pregnancy?
What book was Mark David Chapman carrying with him when he killed John Lennon on December 8, 1980?
Which female author was also considered the world’s first computer programmer?
What writer contemporary to T.S. Eliot nicknamed him "Old Possum"?
Which word in the English language has the most definitions?

Last Week's Answers

Which French author was shot in the leg and left with a permanent limp by his nephew, a young man who suffered from paranoia?

On 9 March 1886, as Jules Verne approached his own home, his twenty-five-year-old nephew Gaston, who suffered from paranoia, shot twice at him with a gun. One bullet missed, but the second entered Verne's left leg, giving him a permanent limp. Gaston spent the rest of his life in an asylum.

True or False: Heath Ledger was named after Healthcliff in Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights.

True. Heath was named after Healthcliff, and his older sister, Kate, was named after Catherine Linton nee Earnshaw. Both are names of characters in Wuthering Heights.

Which 16th century Italian painter was considered by his contemporaries to be one of the greatest poets of all time?

Though it is not widely known, the Italian painter Michelangelo (1475-1564) was considered by his contemporaries to be one of the greatest Poets of all time. About 250 of his Poems and sonnets have come down to us today and are still read by scholars, historians, and Poets.

Which of Shakespeare’s close friends and fellow authors is buried in a standing position in Westminster Abbey?

To save costs, the body of Shakespeare’s friend and fellow dramatist, Ben Jonson, was buried standing up in Westminister Abbey, London in 1637.

Which 20th century French Journalist wrote an entire book one letter at a time — indicating the next correct letter by blinking only his left eye?

Jean-Dominique Bauby, a French journalist suffering from “locked-in” syndrome which paralyzed his body but did not affect his mind, wrote the book The Diving Bell and the Butterfly solely by blinking his left eye. When the correct letter was reached by a person slowly reciting the alphabet over and over again, Bauby would blink to indicate his choice —composing and editing the book entirely in his head.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-09-27T12:58:00.001-02:30

Which French author was shot in the leg and left with a permanent limp by his nephew, a young man who suffered from paranoia?
True or False: Heath Ledger was named after Healthcliff in Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights.
Which 16th century Italian painter was considered by his contemporaries to be one of the greatest poets of all time?
Which of Shakespeare’s close friends and fellow authors is buried in a standing position in Westminster Abbey?
Which 20th century French Journalist wrote an entire book one letter at a time — indicating the next correct letter by blinking only his left eye?

Last Week's Answers

Which American fiction writer began his writing career while working as a pencil sharpener wholesaler in 1911?

Edgar Rice Burroughs

Tybalt, in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is named after which anthropomorphic character?

Tybalt is named after Tybalt/Tibert, the Prince of Cats in the Reynard the Fox stories. Mercutio alludes to this connection between characters when he says that Tybalt is “More than Prince of Cats” in Act II, Scene iv.

The word “girl” appears only once in what world-famous literary work?

The word "girl" appears only once in the Bible in Joel 3:3. The word “girls” appears once in Zechariah 8:5.

Which children’s author wrote his first book in 1936 while crossing the Atlantic on a luxury liner?

Dr. Seuss wrote his first book on the luxury liner Kungsholm. The sound of the ship’s engines annoyed him, and his wife suggested that he use their rhythm to help him write a book in rhyme. The book, And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street, was rejected by publishers 27 times before Vanguard Publishing took a chance and accepted the manuscript.

What was the first book Amazon ever sold?

The first book Amazon.com sold was Douglas Hofstadter's Fluid Concepts and Creative Analogies: Computer Models of the Fundamental Mechanisms of Thought.

Part III: They’ll never learn to ride the bike if we never take off the training wheels!

2011-09-23T11:48:00.001-02:30

Consider the following writing prompts:

Study the following passage from chapter IV and write a coherent, well-written essay in which you argue whether or not Lord Lordly and his wife, Lady Lordly, articulate conventional attitudes toward gender roles in marriage. ***Be sure to establish a clear thesis early on and support your ideas with references from the passage.*** Do not merely summarize the passage.
Arthur Sname’s novel not only presents a frank account of a soldier’s experiences in combat, it also highlights the difficulty of reconciling the life of the soldier with the life the civilian life left behind and eventually returned to. Write a well-organized essay in which you describe the trauma soldiers experience when moving between their lives on the battlefield and their lives at home before or after the war. You may want to focus on one particular character, if you choose to do so. ***Considering Namuv Kairkter’s story in “This is the Title of His Story” is one possibility, but you may choose any character(s) in order to formulate your ideas.***
Authors frequently use irony in order to reveal their attitude toward the subject and characters and to enable readers to evaluate plot developments and characters’ actions effectively and critically. Write a well-organized essay in which you explore the central irony of the novel by ***analyzing the protagonist’s belief that his life will be better if he can only retain his youthful appearance when, in fact, the degeneration of his soul and the confusion of his sense of right and wrong drive him deeper and deeper into a state of despair and anguish.*** Additionally, you may want to consider other instances of irony in the text.

Now, they display a fairly vast array of language and organizational problems (which we can tackle on another day), but today I’m asking you to pay particular attention to the portions between the asterisks (***).

Remember, we’re talking about rigor.

See the problem?

Okay … I’ll tell you (if you’ve already discovered it, please remain in your seat and do not blurt out the answer), but before I do, let me assure you that these are all “real” prompts from “real” sources like a not-yet-published teaching guide, a twelfth-grade English final exam, and a prospective writer’s writing sample. They’re real, and they were all submitted as good and workable.

So … here’s the problem with them.

If we’re talking rigor, we have to allow the kid to do some thinking for himself. We have to be willing to let the kid be “wrong,” and we have to then help the kid learn how and why he was “wrong” in this instance so he can be “more right” the next time.

Every single one of the above prompts does some degree of the kid’s thinking for him.

Prompt #1 is the least problematic. All it does is remind the kid to “establish a clear thesis early on and support your ideas with references from the passage.” [Of course, they would be references _to_ the passage, but what’s a few grammatical errors among friends?] If this were a prompt on a large-scale assessment with lots of stress, it might be nice to remind the kid that he’s writing an essay and that an essay needs a thesis and support.

But in a rigorous classroom, to remind a kid about to write an essay that he needs a thesis and support is a little like reminding a kid about to take his road test that he’s supposed to try and not hit pedestrians or other vehicles. I mean, it pretty much comes with the territory. The prompt specifically tells the kid to “write a coherent, well-written essay.” Try to write that “well-written essay” without a thesis and support? Well, here’s your D. Next time you’ll remember.

Prompt #2 is even worse, less rigorous. Assuming part of the prompt’s intent is to assess the kid’s knowledge of the novel, the statement, “Considering Namuv Kairkter’s story in ‘This is the Title of His Story’ is one possibility” pretty much tells the kid what to write about. _Don’t think about the book, kid, just repeat what we said in class about this particular chapter, and you’ll do fine._

Prompt #3 is the worst of the bunch. “[A]nalyz[e] the protagonist’s belief that his life will be better if he can only retain his youthful appearance when, in fact, the degeneration of his soul and the confusion of his sense of right and wrong drive him deeper and deeper into a state of despair and anguish,” doesn’t leave the kid a whole lot of room to determine a central irony, formulate a thesis, and support that thesis with references to (or from) the novel. Of course, the prompt does continue, “Additionally, you may want to consider other instances of irony in the text,” just in case you know any. So there _is_ some room here for the kid to actually think.

But he doesn’t have to in order to get a decent grade for this essay.

Now … before you start blubbering your protest (but, but, but, but), let me remind you that I have been the twelfth-grade teacher reading the last-essay-of-the-year papers and the final exams less than forty-eight hours before graduation. I have read “essay” after “essay” in which kids who should have known better just string along a series of sentences—maybe even not really sentences. The “essays” have no discernable thesis, they refer neither to nor from the text, and they do choose unlikely or inappropriate aspects of the literature to discuss. They miss the point of the question.

After enough essays and enough years, the temptation to write the “foolproof” prompt is almost irresistible:

Make sure you have a clear thesis. Don’t forget to indent your paragraphs, and to quote from the story whenever possible. Be certain to discuss both language and theme and to use the word _foil_ at least once. Use the correct name of at least one rhetorical device, and make certain you underline any words or phrases of foreign origin. Mention both the protagonist and antagonist …

After all, we want our kids to do well.

But if I _never_ take my hands off the back of my daughter’s bicycle, she’s _not_ riding well. Seriously, how many pairs of training wheels do you see in bicycle rallies and races?

Yes, kids occasionally fall. Yes, they occasionally fail. (See that kind of clever play on words?) And I am not advocating watching them fall and then simply walking away. I am not removing the teacher and the role of instruction from the equation. But I _am_ reminding you that, if you want to “do rigor,” you have to change the kinds of questions you ask and how you ask them. You have to remove the training wheels and let go of the back of the bike.

Look at _these_ prompts:

Study the following passage from chapter IV and write a coherent, well-written essay in which you argue whether or not Lord Lordly and his wife, Lady Lordly, articulate conventional attitudes toward gender roles in marriage. Do not merely summarize the passage.
Arthur Sname’s novel not only presents a frank account of a soldier’s experiences in combat, it also highlights the difficulty of reconciling the life of the soldier with the life the civilian life left behind and eventually returned to. Write a well-organized essay in which you examine the anxiety the soldiers experience moving between their lives on the battlefield and their lives at home.
Write a well-organized essay in which you explore the central irony of the novel.

They might not be wordy enough to suit your taste—I myself have to admit that especially #3 seems to want some kind of introduction and conclusion—but they are far, far better than their originals because they at least do not do the kid’s work for him.

After all, if you have to remind the kid he needs a thesis, is he _really_ “well-educated”_?

If you have to lay out the essay for the kid, then what are you assessing when you assign the essay in the first place?

All in all, it’s not really all that difficult to “do rigor” in your classroom. Depending on the grade level you’re teaching and your school and district’s curriculum, it’s often simply a matter of changing your approach, broadening your assumptions, trusting your colleagues, and holding the kid responsible for his share of his education.

Stop introducing everything every year.

Don’t even waste your time on comprehension—except in those rare cases when comprehension might really be an issue.

And don’t do the kid’s work for him.

That’s pretty much it.

--

Want to read more? Check out Part I and Part II of this article.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-09-20T14:55:00.002-02:30

Which American fiction writer began his writing career while working as a pencil sharpener wholesaler in 1911?
Tybalt, in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet is named after which anthropomorphic character?
The word “girl” appears only once in what world-famous literary work?
Which children’s author wrote his first book in 1936 while crossing the Atlantic on a luxury liner?
What was the first book Amazon ever sold?

Last Week's Answers

This little book was the first and most famous of a series of five that included The Chimes (1844), The Cricket on the Hearth (1845), The Battle of Life (1846), and The Haunted Man (1848).

A Christmas Carol

What book was the best-seller of the year in America in 1794?

Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography, which had been published in England the year before--three years after his death.

Which author entered the University of Montpellier to study for a doctorate in medicine, but was expelled because he had previously been an apothecary?

Nostradamus was expelled from Montpellier shortly after they discovered he had been an apothecary, a manual trade, which made him ineligible to study at the university.

Who was the inspiration for the popular sixteenth-century nursery rhyme Little Miss Muffet?

Patience Muffet, the daughter of the poem's creator, Dr. Thomas Muffet, and entomologist who wrote about spiders more often than he did about his little girl.

Which author stood trial in Mexico in 1951 for shooting his wife?

William S. Burroughs stood trial in Mexico in the early 1950's for shooting his wife during a drunken party game. He spent 13 days and was charged with culpable homicide.

How to “Do” Rigor Part II: Enough with the comprehension questions already!

2011-09-19T08:19:00.001-02:30

by Douglas Grudzina

A few weeks ago, Prestwick House had the privilege of hosting an “externship” in cooperation with the Delaware Business and Industry Education Alliance. On the final day, one of the points our teacher-extern made was that, for the past two decades, everyone has been clamoring about (re)introducing “rigor” to the curriculum and to routine teaching and testing practices. Both an experienced Advanced Placement and a relatively new International Baccalaureate teacher, our intern observed that many teachers simply do not know how to “do rigor.” The models of rigorous instruction are few and far between, and often what is labeled “rigorous” is actually the same, old stuff repackaged with a DVD instead of a filmstrip.

At Prestwick House, we like to think that many of our materials do indeed model rigorous instruction and assessment, and we do support initiatives like the National Governors Association and Council of Chief State School Officers’ Common Core State Standards Initiative, which is all about rigor. So…to honor our former extern’s request to help her colleagues know “how to do rigor,” here is the second of a three-part series.

Part II: Enough with the comprehension questions already!

In preparation for this blog post, I did a little homework (actually a _very_ little homework). I went to the shelves about seven feet behind me and grabbed an anthology from one of Prestwick House’s competitors.

It doesn’t really matter _which_ anthology because as student and teacher (40+ years all told) I found all the “big book” anthologies to be pretty much the same. Maybe the literature included changed from edition to edition, but what they did with the literature never did.

Trust me, though, that the questions I am going to cite come from an anthology that is _not_ the fifth-grade-level in its series, and it is _not_ a remedial or introductory level in its series.

One of the poems in the poetry section is Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Bells” (the one with all the onomatopoeia). The text of the poem ends on the right-hand side of the book (even numbered page), and the questions appear on the left (odd numbered page).

The first section of questions, labeled “Recall”1 (and I’ll rant on that in a minute), include:

What do the bells in the first two stanzas foretell?
What bells are introduced in stanza 3?
What bells does the speaker describe in stanza 4?

(Do you see a possible trend developing here?)

The second section is labeled “Analyze”2 and includes this:

Identify the different meanings bells have for the speaker.

And the “Evaluate”3 section boasts this:

Decide whether or not there is a pattern to sentence and stanza length in the poem.

Here are my rants, and then we’ll talk about how to do rigor.

1. If the question comes _on the absolute next page_ after the poem (on the _same two-page spread_ as the poem), we’re not asking the kid to “recall” anything. At best, we’re asking him to flip back a page or two and find the answer.

1. a. Even if we asked the question in an appendix at the end of the book, is the ability to identify “silver bells,” “golden bells,” and “iron bells” the reason we’ve had kids read this poem? Do we really suspect that such identification was the motivation for Poe’s _writing_ the poem?

1. b. Even if we assume that we _must_ ask a certain number of _comprehension_ or “basic, surface understanding” questions (and I think this is a thoroughly anti-rigor assumption), will a march-through-the-chapter series of questions really do what such questions are supposed to do?

2. A question that begins with the verb “identify” is probably ¬_not_ an analysis question—and this one certainly is not. It’s comprehension. It translates into nothing more than, “Go back and paraphrase the word or words the poet uses to describe the feeling he gets from each kind of bell.” Or something like that.

2. a. In a poem that _is_ a huge, extended metaphor; in a poem ¬_full_ of onomatopoeia and other sound effects; in a poem in which the shifting and deteriorating rhythmic pattern _absolutely mirrors the poet’s deteriorating emotional state_, this is the best attempt at “analysis” we can make?

3. This is not an “evaluation” question. It _might be_ an analysis question. It is very close to a comprehension question.

3. a. In this case, the kid doesn’t get to decide anything. Poe already decided that there _would be_ a “pattern to sentence and stanza length,” and he decided what it would be. All the kid needs to do is figure out what that pattern is, and then maybe _evaluate_ the extent to which this pattern helps or hurts the poem (and why).

The first thing you have to do if you want to “do rigor” in your classroom is change the kinds of questions you ask. Everyone talks about Benjamin Bloom. If you’ve been teaching for any length of time, you probably can’t count the number of times you’ve sat through a workshop in which you were told about Bloom as if his first book or article only just came out last week, and memorizing a list of five or six verbs were really going to revolutionize education.

(And among those verbs are indeed, “comprehend,” “analyze,” and “evaluate.”)

Because this is a Prestwick House blog, and because I am a Prestwick House employee—but also because I am very proud of this product and would use it if I were still in the classroom—I’m going to insert this one bit of shameless marketing:

Our new line of reproducibles, _Levels of Understanding: Using Bloom’s Taxonomy to Explore Literature_ does a masterful job of working the kids through all levels of Bloom’s thinking skills hierarchy. And it doesn’t just throw around terms like “analyze” and then really ask the kids to only comprehend. You should check it out.

End of shameless promotion, we now return to our regularly-scheduled blog post.

So the first thing you have to do is change the kinds of questions you ask. Why must the majority of every unit plan, every study guide, every … whatever … simply be a “march-through-the-chapter”? Unless I’m in the Cash Cab or playing Team Trivia at a local restaurant, it doesn’t matter whether I remember silver, gold, iron … or whatever. In a poem like this, indeed in most literature (including nonfiction), there are more important things than checking to makes sure the kids know Hester’s hair color and whether the hump is on Chillingworth’s left or right side.

Comprehension is indeed on Bloom’s taxonomy, and it is true that you can’t really analyze the finer points of an argument if you don’t understand the argument … but that does not open up every single trivial detail to scrutiny. In fact, I’d go so far as to say …

... There are only two suitable reasons for asking a comprehension question:

1. Is it a hard, complex, or complicated fact (something the kid might actually misunderstand)?

Let’s face it; the kid’s not likely to mistake an iron bell for a platinum one. He’s not likely to confuse a wedding with a funeral.

Some facts, however, _are_ potentially confusing:

Linton (first name) is the son of Heathcliff (no last name) and Isabella Linton (last name). He is the nephew and heir of Edgar Linton (last name), Isabella’s brother. Catherine Linton is the daughter of Edgar Linton and Catherine Earnshaw. She is, therefore, Linton (first name)’s cousin.

In order to understand how Heathcliff ends up owning both Thrushcross Grange and Wuthering Heights, these family relationships are pretty essential, but since the names are so similar (i.e., identical), even a good and careful reader needs to pause and make sure he’s/she’s understanding the basic facts of the story.

But to waste the kid’s time and mental energy reciting the names of the two houses, or how Heathcliff came to live at Wuthering Heights, etc., is … uh … a waste of time and mental energy. Some comprehension simply needs to be assumed, or we’ll never get any further up the scale.

But there is another reasonable justification to work with the kid on the comprehension level:

2. Is it important? Must the kid be especially aware of this fact in order to understand something deeper or something important that will happen later?

This is what I call—feel free to use it, but do give me credit—“the gun in the desk drawer.” In the final pages of the book-story-play, the protagonist is trapped in the study with no hope of escape. The antagonist breaks in the door and rushes toward the pro, who takes cover behind the desk. _If the pro is going to reach into a desk drawer and pull out a gun with which to shoot the ant, that gun needs to be placed in that drawer in Chapter 2._ (or Act I or some time earlier in the story.) Because you want the kid to be able to anticipate pro’s using the gun, because you want pro’s finding the gun to _not_ be a _deus ex machina_, when your student reads the chapter or act or whatever in which the author establishes the presence of the gun, it _is_ worth the time and mental energy to pause and point it out. Just to make sure.

The flip side of this is, if the gun is in the drawer because the anti-gun pro took it from his/her son because the son was being careless, and if pro’s using the gun to shoot ant establishes the author’s pro-gun theme, it’s probably worth a minute to make sure the kid does note the gun in the drawer, even if it’s not an obscure or complicated story fact.

And that’s it. Why else would you want to dwell on the surface … What did she do? What did he say? What color was the red jacket? and so on …

Comprehension is not all that hard. It’s ¬_certainly_ not hard to peruse “The Bells” and find “silver = sleigh ride = merriment,” “gold = wedding = happiness,” “brass = alarm = fright,” and so on. Is that _really_ what we want the kid to get out of this poem?

So get rid of the comprehension questions already! If you want to “do rigor,” then when the kid reports to class, you have to hit the ground running … how do the synesthesic adjectives contribute to the overall feeling of the poem (crystalline delight)? What’s happens to the established rhythm pattern as we proceed through sections III and IV?

How do tone and mood mimic meaning?

That’s the good stuff.

That’s rigor.

It also helps if you’re honest with your kids about what you’re asking them to do. One of my big gripes with the anthology (and it is a real, honest-to-goodness anthology used in many a high school classroom) is that it misidentifies a comprehension question as “analysis,” and it calls something “evaluation” which is not the least bit evaluative. It happens a lot in this particular book.

It’s pretty much the opposite of rigor.

Want to read more? Check out Part I and Part III of this article.

Celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month

2011-09-15T09:05:00.000-02:30

Join Prestwick House in celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month, which begins each year on September 15 — the anniversary of independence for the Latin countries of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua.

Share with your students the rich culture of a variety of Hispanic nations by sharing new stories and authors. Check out sites like GetCaughtReading.org for a list of influential Hispanic authors, the Educator Page at Thinkfinity.com, and a wide variety of multicultural books and teaching materials available at PrestwickHouse.com.

When I Was Puerto Rican
Esmeralda Santiago

A universal coming-of-age story, this autobiographical memoir tells of Santiago's childhood in Puerto Rico and subsequent move to America. Her process of acclimating to a new culture and language — all while undergoing adolescence — is an experience your students will find both compelling and resonant.

Paperback |
Teaching Unit | PDF | Class Set Package

Esperanza Rising
Pam Munoz Ryan

Believable, insightful, and sincere, the emotional quality of this “riches to rags” story will captivate you and your students. When tragedy strikes Esperanza’s wealthy and respected family, they must start anew, working hard and struggling to make a living. Winner of the Pura Belpre Award and Publisher’s Weekly’s Best Book of the Year.

Paperback | Spanish Version
PowerPack | PDF

How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents
Julia Alvarez

Yolanda's father is a wealthy man who provides his family with a comfortable lifestyle until the political situation in the Dominican Republic forces them to flee to the safety of New York City. Yolanda and her three sisters must adjust to a new culture and a reduction in their lifestyle. The sisters, torn between two cultures, struggle to establish their self-identities in their new home.

Paperback
Teaching Unit | PDF | Class Set Package

The House on Mango Street
Sandra Cisneros

This modern classic, rich in Latino heritage, tells the story of Esperanza, a young Hispanic girl living in the Latino section of Chicago. Using poems and stories that lend themselves to classroom use, Esperanza gives insight into the modern Hispanic-American experience.

Paperback | Complete Teacher's Kit
Teaching Unit | PDF | Class Set Package
Activity Pack | PDF | Class Set Package
Response Journal | PDF | Class Set Package
Multiple Perspectives | PDF | Class Set Package

Bless Me, Ultima
Rudolfo Anaya

For those seeking ethnic diversity in their literature curriculum, Rudolfo Anaya's Bless Me, Ultima, a classic of Chicano literature, is a superior choice. While Anaya's novel explores many universal themes, including the struggle of good over evil, it is, essentially, a tale of the loss of innocence.

Paperback | Hardcover | Complete Teacher's Kit
Teaching Unit | PDF | Class Set Package
Activity Pack | PDF | Class Set Package
Response Journal | PDF | Class Set Package

Other Great Multicultural Reads Available at PrestwickHouse.com:

Before We Were Free
Cool Salsa
One Hundred Years of Solitude

Tuesday Trivia

2011-09-13T08:51:00.000-02:30

This little book was the first and most famous of a series of five that included The Chimes (1844), The Cricket on the Hearth (1845), The Battle of Life (1846), and The Haunted Man (1848).
What book was the best-seller of the year in America in 1794?
Which author entered the University of Montpellier to study for a doctorate in medicine, but was expelled because he had previously been an apothecary?
Who was the inspiration for the popular sixteenth-century nursery rhyme Little Miss Muffet?
Which author stood trial in Mexico in 1951 for shooting his wife?

Last Week's Answers

What famous opening line of one of America’s most famous poems was actually intended to parody the clichéd opening of a fairy tale?

“Once upon a midnight dreary …” Edgar Allan Poe’s The Raven

Which nineteenth-century British novelist’s pet was quite possibly the inspiration for the eponymous fowl in a nineteenth-century American poet’s most famous work?

Charles Dickens’s pet raven, Grip, may have been the inspiration for Poe’s The Raven.

Which British Poet Laureate is credited with coining the term “autobiography” in an 1809 article for the _Quarterly Review_?

Robert Southey

To whom did Charles Dickens offer to reveal the ending of his (unfinished final) novel, _The Mystery of Edwin Drood_? (Hint: she said “No, thank you,” and Dickens died, so no one knows how the novel was supposed to end!)

Queen Victoria.

What are Teacher Reviewers Saying About Vocabulary Power Plus for the ACT?

2011-09-12T12:01:00.000-02:30

Recently, we received feedback on our new Vocabulary Power Plus for the ACT series from teachers on the Prestwick House National Curriculum Advisory Board. Read quotations from teachers below

The words are defined, organized, used in context with multiple practices, and even gives the opportunity to practice new roots and prefixes. I also find the practice English sentences to be incredibly useful.
All students, whether taking the ACT or not, need to improve vocabulary skills. They also need to be able to read for errors. Learning root words and prefixes is an easy and organized way of improving vocabulary skills as well. This product does meet a demand!

Leticia C. Geldart

There is an increased emphasis on vocabulary in state and national standards. This guide will not only prepare students for the ACT, but will also increase their comprehension in all disciplines.

Sara Zeek

Perhaps one of the hardest things to help students with is giving them a depth of vocabulary that will aid them not only on the ACT but also in college. This is a helpful approach with extremely accessible exericses.

Janice Mullan

A well-educated student must have an extensive vocabulary that is often not well-developed without formal vocabulary study. The ability to read and comprehend what is read is important both to success in the classroom and success in life.The variety of exercises included ensure that students do not simply memorize a word for a test and then forget it. They get a sense of when and how to use the word which makes it more likely that they will remember and use newly acquired vocabulary.

I am impressed with the variety of exercises for each lesson and the use of review lessons to aid retention. These review lessons introduce additional exercises such as crosswords. While primarily designed for the ACT, the vocabulary and exercises reflect the vocabulary and skills required to be successful on other standardized tests.

Cynthia Byers

The materials covered in the book will not only improve the student's vocabulary, but also in Revising and Editing. This will undoubtedly serve them well when writing essays/preparing for higher level courses.

Luis Garza

Good organization; well-aligned with what the ACT expects students to know and be able to do (writing and critical reading especially, as there are fewer materials available that focus on these along with vocabulary instruction); periodic reviews after each set of seven chapters; rubrics for evaluating writing; state standards listed (an excellent item to include!)

Sharon King-Hanley

The format is easy for students to access and use. I like the presentation - word, definition, part of speech, use in a sentence, synonyms, antonyms, words in context. All material students need to know when learning a new word. I like the periodic review of words with sentence completions and a puzzle. Different formats for learning.

Cherylin J Roeser

How to “Do” Rigor Part I: How many teachers does it take to screw in a light bulb (or introduce a literary concept)?

2011-09-08T08:09:00.001-02:30

by Douglas Grudzina

A few weeks ago, Prestwick House had the privilege of hosting an “externship” in cooperation with the Delaware Business and Industry Education Alliance. On the final day, one of the points our teacher-extern made was that, for the past two decades, everyone has been clamoring about (re)introducing “rigor” to the curriculum and to routine teaching and testing practices. Both an experienced Advanced Placement and a relatively new International Baccalaureate teacher, our intern observed that many teachers simply do not know how to “do rigor.” The models of rigorous instruction are few and far between, and often what is labeled “rigorous” is actually the same, old stuff repackaged with a DVD instead of a filmstrip.

Part I: How many teachers does it take to screw in a light bulb (or introduce a literary concept)?

Admit it. How many times have you had a kid ask you, “When am I ever going to use this stuff?” Tell the truth. You know the question comes up just about every time you get into grammatical, rhetorical, linguistic, or literary terminology. You introduce the term, provide a definition and several superb examples, and the wise guy with the sideways baseball cap in the back of the room shouts out, _When am I ever going to use this stuff?_

Sadly, in far, far, far too many English language arts classrooms, the true answer is, “Never…because it’s going to be introduced to you every year from now until you graduate from high school.”

It’s no longer a new and controversial idea that children (and adults, for that matter) learn new words, not from word-of-the-day calendars or weekly vocabulary lists, but by listening and reading and then speaking and writing. We hear a new word. We guess at its meaning from the context. We might ask for clarification, and we might actually consult a dictionary (or similar source). But the vast, vast, vast majority of the time, we first encounter the word in use.

And … if we never ever hear the word again, or see it in print, or use it in our own speaking and writing, we will probably never “learn” it. It will not be a word we readily understand if and when we do encounter it.

But words we do use a lot—even “hard” words—we remember.

So, depending on what grade(s) you teach, how many times are we going to give our kids the same list of requisite terms brimming with definitions and examples? How many years in a row can we ask a kid to look at the same goofy poster that defines a literary term and offers a caricatured illustration of something? As if he’d never heard the word before!

If, once it’s introduced, all we do with a term like antithesis or metaphor or synecdoche—or, more importantly, if all we do with the concept—is point out that such-and-such a paragraph contains one, then we’re essentially telling the kid who asks _When am I ever going to use this?_ that he isn’t.

Consider the following question. (It’s a made-up question and does not refer to anything in this post, so don’t really try to answer it; you’ll only get frustrated.)

The third paragraph uses all of the following literary devices EXCEPT

A. metaphor.

B. simile.

C. onomatopoeia.

D. alliteration.

E. hyperbole.

On the surface, this seems like a perfectly legitimate question—questions like it often appear on large-scale assessments like AP, SAT, ACT, GRE, etc., etc. (actually, these specific terms are pretty basic for AP) … But there are actually very few and very narrow windows of instruction during which questions like this are valid.

The first is during large-scale assessment, the kind of test that the kid is (theoretically) going to take only once and that’s designed to assess the quality of his entire k – 12 education. Kids who get questions like this wrong are saying something very important about what they learned (or _didn’t_ learn) in school.

The second is within a week or two of the teacher’s introducing the newest of the five terms to the students. That’s a matter of curriculum. If your curriculum assigns these terms to, say, seventh grade, then this is a valid seventh-grade question. But if your curriculum assigns these terms to fifth and sixth grades, then the seventh- (or eighth- or ninth- or tenth-) grade teacher has no business asking such a question … _ever_. (Well, not with those terms.)

What the seventh- and eighth- and ninth- (etc., etc.) teacher _can and should_ do is _actually use_ the terms in regular classroom discourse.

_Don’t you think the onomatopoeia in Poe’s “The Bells” absolutely makes the poem?_

_How does the consonance in the first sentence of “The Fall of the House of Usher” contribute to the tone and mood of the story’s opening?_

_Compare Poe’s frequent use of the trochaic foot with Dr. Seuss’s use of the anapest. How is the poet’s choice of metric pattern appropriate (or inappropriate) for the subject matter of the poem?_

Yes … I am assuming the kid knows what a trochaic foot and an anapest are. I am assuming she’s been introduced to onomatopoeia and consonance. But even if my curriculum has reserved the introduction of those terms and concepts for the specific grade I teach, once I’ve introduced the terms, if I really want my kids talking and writing intelligently about language and literature, _I’ll find ways to make my kids use the terms_!

By the way, the Common Core State Standards developed by the National Governors Association and the Council of Chief State School Officers have this: “Describe how words and phrases (e.g., regular beats, alliteration, rhymes, repeated lines) supply rhythm and meaning in a story, poem, or song” as a Reading/Literature standard for grade -_Two_.

Which question is more fun to discuss:

_What is the metrical patter of Poe’s “Annabel Lee”?_
(irregular anapestic tetrameter/trimeter)

or

_Why is the metrical pattern of Poe’s “Annabel Lee” ironic?_
(because the anapestic foot suggests a lighthearted, musical effect, and the poem is about a necrophiliac)

So … one way to “do rigor” in your English class is to break out of the rut of constant introduction, definition, and identification. Even if the kid doesn’t (or pretends not to) know a term that was supposed to have been introduced earlier in the curriculum (like second grade!), you don’t need to reteach it. Most of the evidence suggests he’ll pick up the term just fine by hearing it, seeing it, and being … uh … _encouraged_ to use it in normal discourse.

Even if it is _your job_ to introduce your kid to the term, after you’ve introduced it, _use it_. Are you _really_ going to admit that your kids aren’t ever going to use these terms? (Well, they might come up on an SAT question …)

Another, related, way to “do rigor” is to keep clear for yourself the difference between the term and the concept. This post has been about introducing and using _terminology_ in your classroom. Kids develop an understanding of the _concepts_ much, much earlier—often even before they begin school.

Onomatopoeia might be a new word (and very challenging to spell) to a fifth-grader. But toddlers understand the idea of _clap, clap, tick, tock, bang, crash,_ and _sizzle_.

Synecdoche and metonymy sound like a million-dollar words, but even little kids enjoy the non-literalness of lending a hand, holding one’s tongue, and having busy fingers. (Well, some research—Panther, Klaus-Uwe and Günter Radden. _ Metonymy in Language and Thought_. Philadelphia: John Benjamins North America, 1999.—suggests that kids don’t really develop a strong sense of metonymy until four or five years of age—but that’s still way before high school when we typically “introduce” it.

When you introduce these terms, you are not opening new worlds of ideas for the kid, you are merely giving him a name for something he already knows. If you teach it like that, he’s much more likely to remember (and use) the terms, and you’ll be much less likely to keep the kid at the level of identifying things that he’s been playing around with since before kindergarten.

So “rigor” isn’t really all that hard to achieve. It doesn’t require a huge overhaul of your curriculum or a mass dumping of all of your previous lesson plans. It does, however, require a slight shift in paradigm, an admission that you are not solely responsible for every bit of knowledge the kid will ever acquire, and a suspicion that your kids really do know more than they’re letting on.

So, it’s really like that old self-fulfilling prophesy (actually, it _is_ the old, self-fulfilling prophesy): our kids will be as dumb as we let them or as smart as we require them.

Why let them off too easy?

--

Want to read more? Check out Part II and Part III of this article.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-09-06T12:39:00.000-02:30

What famous opening line of one of America’s most famous poems was actually intended to parody the clichéd opening of a fairy tale?
Which nineteenth-century British novelist’s pet was quite possibly the inspiration for the eponymous fowl in a nineteenth-century American poet’s most famous work?
Which British Poet Laureate is credited with coining the term “autobiography” in an 1809 article for the _Quarterly Review_?
To whom did Charles Dickens offer to reveal the ending of his (unfinished final) novel, _The Mystery of Edwin Drood_? (Hint: she said “No, thank you,” and Dickens died, so no one knows how the novel was supposed to end!)

Last Week's Answers

Nineteenth-century Shakespearian actor Edmund Keen collapsed onstage while performing the eponymous role in this Shakespearean tragedy. He died three months later, some say of having expended so much in his performance. (Hint: He collapsed during Act III, scene iii.)

Othello

Nineteenth-century British actress Ellen Ternan may or may not have had an affair with this famous Victorian novelist, though he most certainly separated from his wife for her and provided her with a £1,000 bequest and a trust fund sufficient to guarantee that she would never have to work again.

Charles Dickens

While most of this writer’s obituaries dismissed him as a writer of pornography who had “wasted his considerable talents,” colleague E. M. Forster praised him as “the greatest imaginative novelist of our generation.”

D. H. Lawrence

In which Thomas Hardy novel does an adolescent murder his siblings and then commit suicide, leaving a note that says, “Done because we are too menny”?

Jude the Obscure

Prestwick House Develops New ACT Prep Program Based on Best-Selling Vocabulary Power Plus for the New SAT Series

2011-09-02T07:17:00.000-02:30

September 1, 2011, Smyrna, DE — This week, Prestwick House will introduce its first vocabulary series tailored to the needs of ACT students, Vocabulary Power Plus for the ACT.

Based on the same techniques used in Prestwick House’s best-selling Vocabulary Power Plus for the New SAT vocabulary series with over 700,000 copies sold since 2004, Vocabulary Power Plus for the ACT is now available for students in grades 9-12.

“This series is based on both NCTE/IRA scientific research and the ACT itself,” says author, Daniel Reed. “Because of this, teachers will be able to give their students quality ACT test prep while simultaneously adhering to best practices in teaching vocabulary.”

“With the number of vocabulary words students are expected to learn, and the limited amount of time available to teachers in the classroom, it makes sense to create a program that can maximize both student ACT scores and word retention.”

While the ACT exam has been taken by students across all fifty states since 1960, ACT.org reports that the number of students taking the test has grown significantly in the past ten years. In 2010, 27 states reported over 50% of the student population as test-takers.

“With the increased number of students preparing for the ACT test and a lack of ACT-specific vocabulary products on the market, we wanted to make sure that teachers had what they need to help their students excel,” says Prestwick House Brand Manager, Jerry Clark.

“Vocabulary Power Plus for the ACT covers not only vocabulary, but also reading, writing, and grammar in a logically structured format. While skills learned through Vocabulary Power Plus for the ACT are universally useful, the series is specifically tailored for use as preparation for the ACT — something that we think teachers of ACT test-takers will find extremely useful.”

In addition to teaching vocabulary, this series provide students with practice on ACT-style questions and provides effective writing strategies that will prepare them for the ACT writing component.

“We provide ACT-style questions so that exam takers will be familiar with the structure of the language portion of the ACT on the morning they take it. The series helps test takers develop the cautious aggression necessary to succeed on any assessment test, whether ACT or SAT,” explains Reed.
“The ACT writing test is about getting your idea on paper in a short amount of time—not editing or proofreading or rewriting, because there’s very little time (30 minutes) for revision. Developing a rapid writing strategy for use with any topic is essential.”

Along with student workbooks, a teacher’s edition, and multiple versions of test packages, the Vocabulary Power Plus for the New ACT series contains helpful Introduction Presentations and Practice Presentations. Introduction Presentations familiarize students with words at the beginning of each unit and help them grasp shades of meaning by using words in an authentic context. Practice Presentations ensure that students have a firm understanding of new words provides the practice they need to retain them.

Currently, Prestwick House is looking for school partners to test the effectiveness of Vocabulary Power Plus for the ACT on students’ ACT scores. If you are interested in partnering with Prestwick House to try out this new program in exchange for free vocabulary materials, please contact Keith Bergstrom at keith@prestwickhouse.com or (302)-659-2070 x131.

To learn more about Vocabulary Power Plus for the ACT, call (800)-932-4593 or visit www.PrestwickHouse.com.

I Me Mine: The Beatles and Their Pronouns

2011-08-31T10:33:00.000-02:30

According to Bill Zimmer of the New York Times:

James W. Pennebaker’s new book “The Secret Life of Pronouns,” which I reviewed in The Times Book Review on Sunday, makes it hard to stop thinking about pronouns and the other little “function words” that Mr. Pennebaker, a social psychologist at the University of Texas at Austin, sees as “the keys to the soul.” Mr. Pennebaker is admirably omnivorous when it comes to looking for material that will show how these stealthy words — which include articles, prepositions, conjunctions and auxiliary verbs — reflect our social psyche. One of his more unexpected sources is the lyrical canon of the Beatles.

Mr. Pennebaker crunches the numbers on Beatles songs using text analysis programs and arrives at some fascinating conclusions. As the band aged their lyrics grew “more complex, more psychologically distant and far less positive.” The increasing complexity of the lyrics is manifested in “bigger words and more prepositions, articles and conjunctions.” There was also a big drop in the use of first-person singular pronouns, from 14 percent in the group’s early years to 7 percent in the final years. Self-absorption, it seems, gave way to more socially involved perspectives.

As it happens, I’d been thinking about the Beatles and their pronouns because my 5-year-old son is currently working through a serious obsession with all things Fab Four. That includes repeated viewings of not just their films but also the “Anthology” DVD series about the group. At one point in the documentary Paul McCartney recalls collaborating with John Lennon on the song “She Loves You” in the summer of 1963. “All our early songs,” Mr. McCartney said, “had always had this very personal thing,” pointing to “Please Please Me,” “From Me to You,” “P.S. I Love You,” and “Thank You Girl.” Then he said, “we hit on the idea of doing a kind of a reported conversation: ‘I saw her yesterday, she told me what to say, she said she loves you.’ It just gave us another little dimension really.”

Mr. McCartney was clearly attuned to how pronouns could provide different perspectives in songwriting (even if he goofed when he told the biographer Barry Miles that “She Loves You” was a “personal preposition song”). But Lennon was no slouch in the pronoun department. He could take a third-person song like “Nowhere Man” and use pronouns to forge a sense of identification: “Isn’t he a lot like you and me?”

Lennon’s play with pronouns reached absurd heights, of course, in the first line of “I Am the Walrus”: “I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together.” And let’s not forget about George Harrison. Even if the Beatles’ use of I-words declined over the years, Harrison penned the ultimate ode to first-person singular pronouns as badges of egocentrism in “I Me Mine,” the last song the Beatles recorded together.

Mr. Pennebaker also explores the songwriting partnership of Lennon and McCartney, comparing the songs they wrote mostly on their own to their true collaborations written “eyeball to eyeball,” as Lennon once put it. The songs on which they collaborated closely produced linguistic patterns strikingly different from those of either songwriter individually. The 15 songs that were true John-Paul partnerships, Mr. Pennebaker says, were “much more positive” in emotional tone and used “more I-words, fewer we-words and much shorter words than either artist normally used on his own.”

Mr. Pennebaker discerns that same synergy at work in a very different collection of texts: The Federalist Papers, three of which were written jointly by Alexander Hamilton and James Madison. John and Paul and Alexander and James: now that would be a supergroup.

(For more, see Pennebaker’s 2008 article in the journal Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, “Things We Said Today: A Linguistic Analysis of the Beatles,” authored with Keith J. Petrie and Borge Sivertsen.)

Tuesday Trivia

2011-08-30T12:33:00.004-02:30

Nineteenth-century Shakespearian actor Edmund Keen collapsed onstage while performing the eponymous role in this Shakespearean tragedy. He died three months later, some say of having expended so much in his performance. (Hint: He collapsed during Act III, scene iii.)
Nineteenth-century British actress Ellen Ternan may or may not have had an affair with this famous Victorian novelist, though he most certainly separated from his wife for her and provided her with a £1,000 bequest and a trust fund sufficient to guarantee that she would never have to work again.
While most of this writer’s obituaries dismissed him as a writer of pornography who had “wasted his considerable talents,” colleague E. M. Forster praised him as “the greatest imaginative novelist of our generation.”
In which Thomas Hardy novel does an adolescent murder his siblings and then commit suicide, leaving a note that says, “Done because we are too menny”?

Last Week's Answers

Which is the longest running play in history?

"The Mouse Trap," by Agatha Christie.

How many weeks was Barbara Bush's book about her English Springer Spaniel, Millie's book, on the bestseller list?

29 weeks

Which literary character was born on September 22 1290?

Bilbo Baggins

What was Cinderella’s glass slipper originially made out of?

Cinderella's slippers were originally made out of fur, but the story was changed in the 1600s by a translator.

Who introduced mystery fiction's first fictional detective?

Edgar Allan Poe introduced Auguste C. Dupin, in his 1841 story, "The Murders in the Rue Morgue."

Which was the first American novel to sell more than one million copies?

Harriet Beecher Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin"

Woot! New additions to dictionary reflect today's culture

2011-08-29T11:53:00.000-02:30

According to CNN.com:

Don't be a denialist. Instead put on your jeggings (breathe in) or mankini (be careful) and retweet this article.

After all, it's hip to be in the know on the 400 new words and phrases in the 12th edition of Concise Oxford English Dictionary, the abridged version of the Oxford English Dictionary. The smaller dictionary is meant to "cover the language of its own time."

Beware: Not all words are built to last, wrote dictionary editor Angus Stevenson in a blog posting last week.

"Sadly, the new edition has no room for tremendous words like brabble 'paltry noisy quarrel' and growlery 'place to growl in, private room, den' -- what we might call a man cave these days," Stevenson wrote on a blog.

Some of the new words:

cyberbullying: n. the use of electronic communication to bully a person, typically by sending messages of an intimidating or threatening nature.
denialist: n. a person who refuses to admit the truth of a concept or proposition that is supported by the majority of scientific or historical evidence.
jeggings: pl. n. tight-fitting stretch trousers for women, styled to resemble a pair of denim jeans.
mankini: n. (pl. mankinis) a brief one-piece bathing garment for men, with a T-back.
retweet: v. (on the social networking service Twitter) repost or forward (a message posted by another user). n. a reposted or forwarded message on Twitter.
sexting: n. informal the sending of sexually explicit photographs or messages via mobile phone.
woot: exclam. informal (especially in electronic communication) used to express elation, enthusiasm, or triumph.

The dictionary also adds new definitions of familiar words.

Thought a cougar was just an ornery old cat you might encounter in the American West? By now you know a cougar also is "an older woman seeking a sexual relationship with a younger man."

Literature Brings the Physical Past to Life

2011-08-25T11:48:00.004-02:30

According to Scott Herring at Chronicle.com:

Recently, literary theorists have been making another of their occasional efforts to restore a trace of earthly reality to criticism. This time those efforts have taken the form of Darwinian literary studies, which attempt to relate the universal impulse to tell stories to human nature, as shaped by evolution.

My guess is that those theorists are motivated partly by a desperate realization that, in the process of deconstructing the profession, we in the literature business have shot ourselves not in the foot, but in the head. At a time of contracting education budgets, the public is no longer willing to pay for courses titled "Bat[woman] and Cat[man]: Queering the Canonical Comix."

If nothing else, people may appreciate the application of scientific thinking to a field that has known little of it. Americans admire practicality, and our profession has become esoteric and politicized. Today's literary scholarship too often serves as a vehicle for politics, and even professors who care little for public opinion are eager to indoctrinate students in their views. We seem to have given up on the notion that literature itself can be useful. But in doing so, we are forgetting a crucial function of the books we study.

History gives us the facts, sort of, but from literary works we can learn what the past smelled like, sounded like, and felt like, the forgotten gritty details of a lost era. Literature brings us as close as we can come to reinhabiting the past. By reclaiming this use of literature in the classroom, perhaps we can move away from the political agitation that has been our bread and butter—or porridge and hardtack—for the last 30 years.

Besides literary Darwinism, I suggest another way that scholars can ground their studies in reality: Start with a piece of the physical world. I, for example, recently had a major breakthrough that arose from a bit of junk engine iron.

In the autumn of 2009, I was kicking around the high sagebrush desert just inside the northern edge of Yellowstone National Park, in Montana, looking over the remains of a ghost town. In the process, I found an old dump. From the condition of the glass and the type of rifle and revolver cartridges lying around, I could tell that it dated back well into the 20th century. In one corner, I found the remains of a day—in about 1945, it seemed—when someone had finally gotten around to cleaning out the garage. Scattered around were a clutch pedal, a differential gear, an axle, a piece of tire, and so forth. The parts must have been old even in the mid-1940s, and should have gone for scrap during the war. Perhaps they had still been in use, driven to death by the car's owner.

One piece was evocative somehow: an engine head, the long, heavy piece of steel that sits on top of the cylinders on the engine block and contains the explosions of volatilized gasoline that drive the pistons up and down. I know a little about cars because before I went to graduate school, I spent some years running a service station and repair shop in Yellowstone, where I'd gotten hooked on the scenery. I took photographs of the engine head. It seemed familiar somehow.

Two days later, I was called home to California. My grandfather, who had just turned 85, was sick. When I visited him at home in the Sierra foothills, he was bedridden but otherwise still himself. We talked about my trip to Yellowstone, and I opened up my laptop to show him the photographs. When I got to the engine head, I asked if he knew what it was.

He squinted at the screen. "That's a head from a 1934 Ford Model B."

OK—more specific an answer than I'd expected. Then he surprised me again: "That's a head from the same kind of car I had during the war. That'd fit any model from a '32 to a '34. Mine was a '34."

I knew the car from family photos. Maybe that is why the head, lying out there in the desert, sparked my memory; it went with much of the other junk, which had come from a Model B. (That model wound up becoming famous. By the 1950s, the cars could be bought for a pittance, and kids began customizing them beyond recognition. They became the little deuce coupe the Beach Boys sang about in 1963—the "deuce" being the "2" in the year the car made its debut: 1932.)

Seeing that piece of the past turned loose a flood of memories in my grandfather. "I left Camp Carson in Colorado Springs—I got transferred to another unit, in Los Angeles," he continued in his Ozark accent. He was speaking, I think, of early 1945, when he drove his Model B with my grandmother and my mother, then a baby, across Tijeras Pass on Route 66. ("Tiger-Ass Pass," my grandfather would forever call it.) It was snowing. One would think the snow would keep the engine cool, but a head gasket blew, and the water supply of the engine spewed out onto the hissing block.

My grandfather hitchhiked and walked into Albuquerque, where he found a junkyard. "The owner had three sons in the service," he explained. "He saw my uniform. He let me have some tools, and I went out and got what I needed. When I tried to pay him, he said, 'You don't owe me anything.'"

The snow continued. He now had to get back to the car on Tijeras Pass, where my grandmother and the baby were stuck. He found a cabdriver who finally agreed to take him back to the Ford, he repaired the engine, and the family limped on toward California.

Then he told me something I'd never heard before. Years before the breakdown on Route 66, his family had been part of the great Okie/Arkie flight to California. They had left Little Rock in 1939, driving a 1937 Oldsmobile, "pretty much a brand-new car, in those days. But the trip destroyed it by the time we made it to Santa Monica. It never ran right again. The heat killed it." They had crossed the Mojave Desert in the usual way, which was to pull up near the California border, wait until nightfall, and make a kamikaze run to the other side. Desert temperatures usually drop after dark, but the Mojave can stay hot even at night.

"Why did the heat do that much damage?" I asked.

"Cars were different then," he explained. "On that Model B, the radiator was never big enough, and the water pumps were never big enough. The head cracked when they got hot. Mine got hot." The Oldsmobile had suffered similarly. As engines heated, every moving part—camshaft, crankshaft, rods, bearings, rings, and all the rest—was stressed and finally warped in ways that spoiled the fine tolerances any engine requires.

At the time, as he spoke, it seemed a minor point. We talked until he was too tired to go on. The disease—leukemia—had done more damage than I thought. He passed away the next day.

While I grieved for my grandfather, my mind kept returning to the way I had touched history that afternoon. I thought, for instance, about the great migration to California that Americans undertook every day during my grandfather's youth. I thought about the most famous document of that migration, John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath.

Steinbeck, we know, had a habit of exaggerating. He made the flight from Oklahoma sound like it involved tens of millions, when in fact the numbers were closer to tens of thousands. Still, scenes in the book came back to me with a vividness they had never possessed before—especially the Mojave Desert, between the town of Needles and the Sierra Nevada, which the Joads had to cross to reach California's Central Valley:

"The truck took the road and moved up the long hill, through the broken, rotten rock. The engine boiled very soon and Tom slowed down and took it easy. Up the long slope, winding and twisting through dead country, burned white and gray, and no hint of life in it. Once Tom stopped for a few moments to let the engine cool, and then he traveled on. They topped the pass while the sun was still up, and looked down on the desert—black cinder mountains in the distance, and the yellow sun reflected on the gray desert. The little starved bushes, sage and grease-wood, threw bold shadows on the sand and bits of rock. The glaring sun was straight ahead. Tom held his hand before his eyes to see at all. They passed the crest and coasted down to cool the engine. They coasted down the long sweep to the floor of the desert, and the fan turned over to cool the water in the radiator."

Generations of high-school and college students have been told that these descriptions are (pause to write on the whiteboard) a literary allusion. The Joads are wandering through the desert of Sinai in search of the promised land. They are like the Israelites in the Book of Exodus, which is in another, bigger book called the Bible.

That analysis is good enough, as far as it goes. But it leaves out an important element: engine coolant.

Drivers during the Great Depression had coolant and antifreeze, but it was primitive stuff compared to the brews available today. Modern coolant, the green fluid that mixes with water in radiators, is part of the armory of sophisticated engineering that has eliminated heat as a threat to automotive engines. Today millions make the drive between Los Angeles and Las Vegas in 120-degree heat with the air conditioner on high, driving way over the speed limit and never giving the heat a thought unless they have to get out and buy gas.

On that last afternoon with my grandfather, he took me to an alternate reality—alternate, but not made up. It was a reality of hardship, suffering, and endurance that we seem to have lost. When his family reached the far edge of the desert in the '37 Olds, my grandfather was so desperately hot that he tried swimming in the Salton Sea. The result made me think of another literary allusion, to Lot's wife. "I come outta there white with salt, head to toe," my grandfather said. "I never suffered like that." He kept suffering until he reached a bathtub in Santa Monica, days later.

That kind of information is in The Grapes of Wrath, but we have a hard time recognizing it. When we read about the Joads' crossing, we assume that the problem is simply that their car is old and overloaded. The truth is that the sum of society's technology was not up to the challenge of moving a family across one of the world's most fearsome deserts.

The past is not another country; it is another life. The texture of daily living is different now than in the past, more different the further back we look, until we find people whose experiences created a psychology we might find baffling or rude. Many details that once made up the daily round are lost to us because people considered them too trivial to write down.

Knowing the past means knowing what people carried in their pockets, what they did with their sewage, where their dogs slept. Those details may seem unimportant, but what they convey is not. My bit of junk from the Montana sage taught me why millions of otherwise-modern people in 20th-century America feared the desert as much as the ox-drawn pioneers had.

Let the dead French theorists lie. Instead, literary scholars can become guides to the physical reality of the past. If you think about it, that's what we've been doing in class for the last hundred years: explaining how to pronounce "Doth not Brutus bootless kneel?" in Early Modern English, for instance, or describing a Boeing B-17 to help students understand Randall Jarrell's poem "The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner." Once ordinary people note that we're doing something useful again, they might stop looking at us like we're nuts. And maybe we'll even get some jobs back.

Prestwick House Helps Its Employees Find Balance

2011-08-16T12:37:00.003-02:30

This week, Prestwick House was featured in the Wilmington News Journal's feature on the Best Places to work in Delaware. Check out the full story written by Dan Shortridge here, or read more below.

Prestwick House CEO Jason Scott stands in the Smyrna warehouse where there are over 200,000 books ready to ship to schools throughout the United States.

A visitor walking into the offices of Prestwick House might be forgiven for thinking they've entered through the wrong door.

Instead of a reception desk, etched-glass logo or waiting area with magazines, you're greeted by what appears to be the interior of a comfortable coffeehouse, with wooden tables and tall chairs ready for people to lounge, lunch, brainstorm or banter.

Even the "work" areas are different. Cubicles are colored maroon instead of an antiseptic gray or green, and posters and fully loaded bookshelves abound.

The relaxed, comfortable atmosphere is all intentional, said CEO Jason Scott, as are the flexible work schedules and self-managed projects. .

"Sometimes people aren't sure what kind of business this is," Scott says with a chuckle.

Prestwick House, which employs about 30 workers at its Smyrna-area offices, publishes books, resource materials and teachers' guides in English and the language arts, targeted at 7th- to 12th-grade classes. Its team of writers, editors, artists, designers, marketers and distributors produces about 130 new products a year, in both printed and digital formats.

One of the best things about working for the company, employees say, is the flexible work system that's in place. Some employees can work -- within reason -- whatever hours they want. If a writer wants to start the day at 7 a.m., or an editor at 10 a.m., that's fine.

Even those who have specific tasks to do during specific hours praise the work-life balance the company allows them.

That moved Prestwick House into the top ranking this year for the workplace providing the best work/life flexibility in the News Journal's annual Top Workplaces survey, conducted with Workplace Dynamics.

Mandee Watts, 23, of Smyrna, has worked at Prestwick for eight years, starting as a temporary teenage warehouse worker for the summer shipping rush. If she needs to take off early to be with her daughter, she says, it's fine.

"As long as your job's done, it's no problem at all," Watts said. "It's the best place in the world."

Some employees on the creative side have the flexibility to work from home two days a week, if they're disciplined, Scott said.

"Our writers and editors have found that to be a very productive time for them," he said.

Employees also are responsible for setting their own annual and monthly goals, and many of the company's project ideas come from within -- at times from the bottom at one of the many meetings held in the main entrance area, with tables pushed together and everyone having a voice.

"If you propose a project, there's a good chance you're going to be heading it up," said general manager Keith Bergstrom, who worked his way up after being hired out of the University of Delaware in 2001 for a customer service job.

Other benefits include:

» A common "time off" pool, instead of divisions between sick time and vacation time. "If you need to take off, you can take off," Scott explains. "You don't have to call in" -- pretending to cough -- " 'I'm sick.' "

» A company-paid graduate education program, which has helped three employees so far earn their MBAs.

» A Christmas break when the entire company is closed down for a long holiday period, mirroring the shutdowns of most of the schools they serve.

The company still feels like the family-owned business it is, though it has grown substantially from its early days in the Scott family garage on Prestwick Court in Dover.

These days, the family includes all 30 employees, whose faces adorn goofy "class photos" in the main area, mimicking the Sgt. Pepper album cover one year, or dressed up as pirates to mark an edition of "Treasure Island" being put out.

"There are a lot of good people here," he said. "We have a good time together."

Tuesday Trivia

2011-08-16T08:34:00.001-02:30

Which is the longest running play in history?
How many weeks was Barbara Bush's book about her English Springer Spaniel, Millie's book, on the bestseller list?
Which literary character was born on September 22 1290?
What was Cinderella’s glass slipper originially made out of?
Who introduced mystery fiction's first fictional detective?
Which was the first American novel to sell more than one million copies?

Last Week's Answers
Which author is sports a black eye in the dust jacket photo of his 1967 novel?

Norman Mailer appears on the inside cover of his novel Why Are We in Vietnam? with a spectacular shiner. Also odd is the fact that in the book, the word "Vietnam" occurs only one time — the last page.

Poet named Ernest Dowson wrote “To Cynara,” a work that contains a line which was used as the title of which world famous novel?

Gone With The Wind. The line is, 'I have forgot much, Cynara, gone with the wind, flung roses riotously to the throng,'

Which famous author held the position of Governor General of Canada in 1935?

Thirty-Nine Steps author John Buchan. He was also a barrister, a Member of Parliament, soldier, and publisher.

The epitaph 'Blest be the man that spares these stones, and curst be he that moves my bones,' was written by whom?

Shakespeare
Which English Romantic poet was born with a clubfoot?

Lord Byron

Tuesday Trivia

2011-08-09T15:31:00.001-02:30

Which author is sports a black eye in the dust jacket photo of his 1967 novel?
Poet named Ernest Dowson wrote “To Cynara,” a work that contains a line which was used as the title of which world famous novel?
Which famous author held the position of Governor General of Canada in 1935?
The epitaph 'Blest be the man that spares these stones, and curst be he that moves my bones,' was written by whom?
Which English Romantic poet was born with a clubfoot?

Last Week's Answers

Which was the first novel ever sold through a vending machine?

Murder on the Orient Express was sold from a vending machine for the first time in 1989 at the Paris Metro. Interestingly enough, the first vending machine was invented in Alexandria, Egypt around 215 BC. When a coin was dropped into a slot, its weight would pull a cork out of a spigot and the machine would dispense a trickle of water.

The oldest surviving daily newspaper is the Wiener Zeitung of Austria. When was it first printed?

It was first printed in 1703.

Where does the “Hey Diddle Diddle” nursery rhyme come from?

This Nursery Rhyme originated in the court of Queen Elizabeth I. The queen is said to have teased her courtiers (not unlike a cat teases mice) and was very fond of dancing to fiddle music. One of her courtiers was called "Moon" and another "Dog," and there was also a gentleman of the court called "Dish" who eloped with Mistress “Spoon.”

And thus the rhyme was born: “Hey diddle, diddle, The cat and the fiddle, The cow jumped over the moon, The little dog laughed to see such sport, And the dish ran away with the spoon.”

There are 10 million books in the Russian Public Library in Leningrad — enough to supply every person in the city with two books. If the books housed in the United States Library of Congress were doled out to those living in the city of Washington, D.C., how many books would each person receive?

If the 72,466,926 books housed in the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. were doled out to the 591,833 people living in the city, there would be approximately 122 volumes for each person.

Why was part of Lewis Carroll's classic, "Through the Looking Glass," featuring a giant wasp wearing a wig omitted from the original publication and only made known to the general public 107 years later?

The section, which featured a giant wasp wearing a wig, was left out because Carroll's illustrator, John Tenniel, refused to illustrate it. "A wasp in a wig," said Tenniel, "is altogether beyond the appliances of art."

Tuesday Trivia

2011-08-02T15:27:00.000-02:30

Which was the first novel ever sold through a vending machine?
The oldest surviving daily newspaper is the Wiener Zeitung of Austria. When was it first printed?
Where does the “Hey Diddle Diddle” nursery rhyme come from?
There are 10 million books in the Russian Public Library in Leningrad — enough to supply every person in the city with two books. If the books housed in the United States Library of Congress were doled out to those living in the city of Washington, D.C., how many books would each person receive?
Why was part of Lewis Carroll's classic, "Through the Looking Glass," featuring a giant wasp wearing a wig omitted from the original publication and only made known to the general public 107 years later?

Last Week's Answers
Author Eric Blair wrote under what pen name?

Eric Blair, author of Animal Farm and 1984, wrote under the pseudonym George Orwell. Blair considered several names including P. S. Burton, Kenneth Miles, and H. Lewis Allways. He finally adopted the nom de plume George Orwell because, as he told Eleanor Jacques, "It is a good round English name."

Which Aldous Huxley work was the inspiration behind Jim Morrison naming his band The Doors?

The book The Doors of Perception, by Aldous Huxley, was the inspiration behind Jim Morrison naming his band The Doors. The book extols the use of hallucinogenic drugs.

Which classic novel was written based on a bet between several authors vacationing together in 1818?

Mary Shelley and her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, were visiting their friend Lord Byron when she got the idea for Frankenstein. The three friends agreed to see who could come up with the best ghost story to scare the other two.

Which piece of American literature containing over 50,000 words does not once use the letter “e”?

American author, Ernest Vincent Wright wrote Gadsby: A Champion of Youth, which, except for the introduction and a note at the end, does not use the letter “e.” Every word is properly spelled and all narration is grammatically correct. He actually taped down the letter “e” on his typewriter to avoid accidentally using it.

Which word in the English language has the most definitions?

Of all the words in the English language, the word ’set’ has the most definitions.

Matt Damon explains non-financial motivations and the education sector

2011-08-02T12:31:00.003-02:30

Although his language is a little harsh during this video, actor Matt Damon gets his point across about the vocational nature of being an educator — or an actor.

At BoingBoing.net, Cory Doctorow explains, "In this brief video, Matt Damon is quizzed by a reporter who claims that he’s a good actor because he knows he’d be fired if he did a bad job, while teachers, with job security, have no such incentive. He persuasively lambastes the reporter, arguing that the reasons people do things — especially jobs like teaching (but also arts careers, which have a very low chance of succeeding) — are much more nuanced than a mere job-security-incentive 'MBA' model would suggest."

"It’s a very illuminating example of a clash of ideologies. Damon, after all, had no 'rational' business becoming an actor, since he was almost entirely certain to fail. Now that he is a multi-millionaire, he has no 'rational' reason to continue acting, because he’s assured of financial security forever. Clearly, Damon is someone whose lifelong incentives are not about 'job security.' Rather, his motivations are vocational — he does this because it fulfills him."

"And that’s the case with most of the teachers I know. The important thing about a vocational model of incentives is that it can be undermined by the 'rational' model preached by those who accuse teachers of sloth created by their “job security.” That is, when you go around calling teachers featherbedding losers who only do the job because it’s so cushy, you scare away all those people for whom the dignity of the vocation provides the low-cost workforce upon which the educational sector depends."

Shakespeare Act V of Hamet Performed by Murderers and Convicts

2011-07-29T16:04:00.010-02:30

According to ThisAmericanLife.org, "Shakespeare may seem like an odd match for a group of hardened criminals, but Jack found that they understand the Bard on a level that most of us might not. It's a play about murder and its consequences, performed by murderers, living out the consequences."

Tuesday Trivia

2011-07-26T15:25:00.002-02:30

Author Eric Blair wrote under what pen name?
Which Aldous Huxley work was the inspiration behind Jim Morrison naming his band The Doors?
Which classic novel was written based on a bet between several authors vacationing together in 1818?
Which piece of American literature containing over 50,000 words does not once use the letter “e”?
Which word in the English language has the most definitions?

Last Week's Answers

Which British writer and poet had a love child with his half sister?

Lord Byron

During the French Revolution the new French Constitution was bound with what?

The tanned leather skin of a guillotined aristocrat

Which was the very first newspaper to use a perfumed page in 1937?

The Washington Daily News

Which favorite children’s book was originally titled The Sea-Cook?

Treasure Island (Robert Louis Stevenson) - "The Sea-Cook"

Tuesday Trivia

2011-07-19T16:01:00.001-02:30

When was the very first book about plastic surgery written?
Which British writer and poet had a love child with his half sister?
During the French Revolution the new French Constitution was bound with what?
Which was the very first newspaper to use a perfumed page in 1937?
Which favorite children’s book was originally titled The Sea-Cook?

Last Week's Answers

Which eccentric British author was known to touch things three times for good luck?

Charles Dickens

Which author who could not speak English until she was a teenager went on to write The Scarlet Pimpernel?

Baroness Orczy

Which country once banned all of the Sherlock Holmes books because of the detective's belief in spiritualism?

Russia

Which popular book was originally titled They Don’t Build Statues to Businessmen?

Valley Of The Dolls by Jacqueline Susann

FREE Vocabulary Apps!

2011-07-12T16:55:00.004-02:30

Today AppShopper is featuring a FREE vocabulary building game on their website. Visit AppShopper.com for more details.

And if you're looking for a vocabulary application to go with your Vocabulary Power Plus for the New SAT curriculum, don't forget to visit the iTunes store to pick up the FREE version of the Vocabulary Power Plus application!

Tuesday Trivia

2011-07-12T15:57:00.001-02:30

Which eccentric British author was known to touch things three times for good luck?
Which author who could not speak English until she was a teenager went on to write The Scarlet Pimpernel?
Which country once banned all of the Sherlock Holmes books because of the detective's belief in spiritualism?
Which popular book was originally titled They Don’t Build Statues to Businessmen?

Last Week's Answers

What percentage of publications sold in Japan are comic books?

20 percent

At age 18, which British writer worked as a deck chair attendant at the famous Weston Super Mare seaside resort?

Lord Archer

In 1975 Indian poet Sri Chinmoy set a world record by writing how many poems in a single day?

843

What was the original title of Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice?

Bar-B-Q

Tuesday Trivia

2011-07-05T15:53:00.003-02:30

What percentage of publications sold in Japan are comic books?
At age 18, which British writer worked as a deck chair attendant at the famous Weston Super Mare seaside resort?
In 1975 Indian poet Sri Chinmoy set a world record by writing how many poems in a single day?
What was the original title of Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice?

Last Week's Answers

Which author’s secret followers wear a green carnation to identify themselves?

Oscar Wilde

Which English author always touched things three times for luck?

Charles Dickens

What was Jane Austen's book Northanger Abbey originally called?

Susan

Which English diarist loved to play the recorder?

Samuel Pepys

What do Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Moby Dick, The Good Earth, Catch 22, and Lord of the Flies have in common?

They were all rejected by publishers before becoming bestsellers.

Going, Going, And Gone?: No, The Oxford Comma Is Safe ... For Now

2011-06-30T16:08:00.003-02:30

From NPR's Monkey See Blog:

I have a confession.

I am only too happy to emphatically defend split infinitives against the accusation that they are offensive in any language except Latin. I believe perfectly marvelous sentences can end with prepositions or begin with "and."

I make up words, I write in fragments, I am absolutely not a flawless user of any kind of punctuation, I make noises in the middle of my own writing (like "AAAAARGH!"), and I often like the rhythms of sentences more than their technicalities. Run-on sentences amuse me. I frequently give the impression that the American Parentheticals Council has me on retainer, or that I am encouraging a bidding war between Big Ellipses and Big Dashes to see which will become my official sponsor. ("Dashes: The Official 'And Another Thing' Punctuator Of Monkey See.") I write "email" without a hyphen, I am a big fan of the word "crazypants," and my plan is to master "who"/"whom" only on my deathbed, as my ironic dying gift to absolutely no one, since there will be no one left to hear me.

And yet, even the rumbling of a distant threat to the Oxford comma (or "serial comma") turns me instantly into an NFL referee, blowing my whistle and improvising some sort of signal — perhaps my hands clasped to my own head as if in pain — to indicate that the loss of the serial comma would sadden me beyond words.

This blew up yesterday when there was a rumbling that the University of Oxford was dumping its own comma. As it turned out, this wasn't the case. They haven't changed their authoritative style guide, but they've changed their internal PR department procedures that they use for press releases. The PR department and the editorial department are two different things, so this doesn't necessarily mean much of anything, except that it's maybe a little embarrassing to have your own PR department abandoning your style guide.

For those of you who enjoy the outdoors and would no more sort commas into classes than you would organize peanut butter jars in order of viscosity, the serial comma — or "Oxford comma" — is the final comma that comes in a sentence like this: "I met a realtor, a DJ, a surfer, and a pharmaceutical salesperson." (In this sentence, I am on The Bachelorette.) I don't typically use the serial comma here on the blog, because NPR uses AP style, which is standard for most news organizations. AP style leaves out the serial comma unless it's particularly necessary. It would dictate writing that sentence as: "I met a realtor, a DJ, a surfer and a pharmaceutical salesperson." That's what I do at work. At home, though? In correspondence, in notes to myself, in writing on cakes with icing? Serial commas. Forever.

Whether the serial comma is used is usually not a big deal — you see lists every day both with it and without it, and it won't hang you up either way. "Please buy bread, cheese, butter and milk." "Please buy bread, cheese, butter, and milk." Either is fine.

But when it matters, it really matters.

Suppose that instead of the list of men our bachelorette met above, things went differently. Without the serial comma, she might say: "The best available men are the two tall guys, George and Pete." There, you really don't know whether George and Pete are the tall guys, or whether there are two tall guys in addition to George and Pete. You literally don't know how many men you're talking about, and while that level of confusion as to elementary facts seems like something that might actually happen on The Bachelorette, it is unfortunate in other settings. If, on the other hand, you use the serial comma, then you would write that sentence only if you meant that George and Pete were the tall guys, and if you didn't, you'd say, "I met two tall guys, George, and Pete."

Two men have just been created by that comma out of whole cloth. Boom! We've created life! Don't you feel like Dr. Frankenstein?

It's perhaps not surprising that a comma that can singlehandedly create human beings can also get people pretty wound up. Twitter went bazoo over the entire Oxford business yesterday, particularly before the clarification was made that it was just the PR department. People — people like me — love the serial comma. They rely on it. They feel like society's abandonment of it is a sign that all has gone haywire. They feel about it the way other people feel about newspapers, green spaces, or virtue.

The balancing act between how much rule-making you like in language and how much you like language to evolve naturally isn't necessarily the point of the serial comma debate (to me, the reasons to keep it have absolutely nothing to do with tradition and everything to do with actual utility), but that's where almost any discussion of almost any arcane point invariably winds up. Language is alive, you see, and it changes, and its beauty lies in its ability to be shaped by an entire society that calls upon its collective wisdom and experience to create a means of communication that accomplishes what it needs to AND NO THAT DOESN'T MAKE "IRREGARDLESS" OKAY AND STOP USING "LITERALLY" TO MEAN "FIGURATIVELY" I AM BEGGING YOU.

Uh-oh.

I firmly believe all of that good stuff about our living language, and yet I accidentally hit my own nerve. Love of language, it turns out, is a complicated minefield of things you care about and things you don't, and one person's explosive issues are obviously no more valid than anyone else's. Some people hate Capitalization For Cutesy Point-Making in exactly the same way I hate "irregardless," but I use it happily. Not as much as I once did, but I do. (Don't email me about "irregardless" or "literally," by the way. I glare at your spineless, weak-kneed dictionary with a judgmental, squinty eye. I do! I glare at it!)

For now, the Oxford comma lives on at Oxford. And it lives on in my heart. Life is nasty, brutish, and short (or, to introduce unnecessary ambiguity, "life is nasty, brutish and short"), and the least I can do for myself is to hold tight to the linguistic niceties about which I, for whatever reason, care. It's comforting. It's calming. And when it comes to taking a firm position about mostly unimportant debates, that's about all I can hope for.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-06-28T10:25:00.003-02:30

Which author’s secret followers wear a green carnation to identify themselves?
Which English author always touched things three times for luck?
What was Jane Austen's book Northanger Abbey originally titled?
Which English diarist loved to play the recorder?
What do Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Moby Dick, The Good Earth, Catch 22, and Lord of the Flies have in common?

Last Week's Answers

In North Carolina, USA, in 1980 a library forbade children to read which book without parental consent?

The bible

Which English pamphleteer had his ears cut off because of his inflammatory publications?

William Prynne

What did Russian author Dostoyevsky and F. Scott Fitzgerald have in common?

They were both foot fetishists.

How many titles did Margaret Mitchell, author of Gone With The Wind, write in her lifetime?

Just the one.

In England in 1272 AD what was the cost of a handwritten Holy Bible in nine volumes?

About £33.00.

Don’t Miss It!

2011-06-20T12:08:00.001-02:30

I always think about Daisy Buchanan this time of year. You know how she makes that vapid observation the first evening Nick comes over to her house for dinner in Chapter 1:

“Do you always watch for the longest day of the year and then miss it? I always watch for the longest day in the year and then miss it.”

Well, tomorrow is the longest day of the year (at least in the Northern Hemisphere).

Don’t miss it!

I am an English Teacher; You do the Math

2011-06-17T08:23:00.000-02:30

by Douglas Grudzina

All right, I confess that that is not a Douglas Grudzina Original Quip, but it is by and large a Prestwick House Original, so as long as I’m writing for Prestwick House, I think I can legally use it.

I’ve been reviewing statistics—test data—Delaware student test data …

… DELAWARE STUDENT FOURTH GRADE MATHEMATICS TEST DATA …

(Don’t ask me why.)

But in reviewing this data, I got to thinking about how mathematics kind of _is_ a language (my future son-in-law is a high school mathematics and physics teacher, so he’d be happy to hear me admit that), and perhaps mathematics teachers experience some of the same frustrations—often for some of the same reasons—as other language teachers. And maybe the solution is the same as well.

Here’s the backstory, the exposition, whatever you want to call it:

While reviewing this data, I encountered a young woman (fourth grade). She was tested once in the fall of 2010 and once in the winter of 2011. She was probably also tested in the spring of 2011, but I don’t have that data. Her scores in three categories were reported: _Numeric Reasoning_, _Algebraic Reasoning_, and _Geometric Reasoning_.

Now, keep in mind that this is fourth grade, and when I was in fourth grade, I was memorizing multiplication tables and trying to transition from long to short division. (Maybe that was fifth grade, and I never did successfully make the transition.)

I have no idea what “Algebraic Reasoning” or “Geometric Reasoning” might look like in the fourth grade.

But that’s not the point.

This young woman scored “Well Below” the performance standard in the fall (with an overall score of 642) and “Below” the performance standard in the winter (with an overall score of 696). 700 is the cut score for “Meets the Standard,” so she is almost there.

In both tests, her Numeric Reasoning score was the highest; Algebraic Reasoning was the lowest. Geometric Reasoning was very close to the Numeric Reasoning and showed the biggest gain from the fall to winter tests.

Now here’s the point…(and thank you for your kind indulgence).

Geometry is a readily-applied math. It’s gallons of paint, square feet of floor tile, yards of fabric. Algebra…not so much. Algebra is merely a set of _tools_ by which we calculate gallons of paint, square feet of floor tile, yards of fabric.

Yet, I think, math teachers teach algebra in much the same way they teach geometry. Here are some “rules.” Here are some equations. Here’s what parentheses mean in an equation, and here’s what you do if you encounter parentheses in an equation.

M-D-A-S.

You give me any equation, tell me to solve for X, and I’m on it!

But…so what? When I order floor tile or paint, unless I’ve had someone else come in a measure for me, I invariably order too much (excess not refundable) or too little (sorry, that was the end of the lot run, so your next order will not match).

But I _can_ solve for X.

OKAY, now here’s (_really_) my point … (And _really_, thank you for your extreme patience.)

The English language has all sorts of tools—like algebraic equations—all of which _help us_ formulate thoughts, communicate those thoughts to others, and understand the thoughts that others have communicated to us. I’m thinking things like verb tenses, pronoun-antecedent agreement, subordinate clauses.

These tools, however, are pretty pointless on their own.

Imagine practicing “hammer.” Next week we’ll get to “nails.”

Solve for X.

But why do I care about X unless I need to know how many cubic yards of non-refundable decorative gravel I need to order for my driveway?

If we give a kid a list of 20 sentences, some with the subordinate clause at the beginning and some with the subordinate clause at the end, and we tell him to draw in the commas where they are needed, what have we taught him? Will he now never again write an unintentional sentence fragment? Will he never again subordinate the wrong bit of information and create an illogical sentence?

_Because he kindly stopped for me, I could not stop for death._

I learned a little bit of sentence diagramming in the fourth grade (when we weren’t trying to transition to short division). To this day, some 45 years later, I still hear the occasional lament that “they” stopped teaching sentence diagramming.

But what I remember about diagramming sentences was being tested on whether or not the line was straight or diagonal, whether it went all the way through the horizontal line or not, whether it was solid or dashed. On these tests, we would lose points if we did not put a word in parentheses that was supposed to be in parentheses.

We were tested on our knowledge of sentence-diagramming techniques.

But I do not remember _ever_ having a teacher (or professor or editor) sit down with me and diagram one of my own sentences to diagnose structural problems. That _is_ the proper use of the tool, isn’t it?

I can’t help but think that that poor little fourth-grade girl, who is _so close_ to meeting her fourth-grade standard in mathematics might do so much better in “algebraic reasoning” if someone would help her to realize that “algebra” is nothing more than realizing what piece of information she doesn’t have and finding a way to figure it out.

You know length and width; solve for area.

You know area and desired depth of stones in your driveway; solve for volume or number of cubic yards you need to order.

And I am even more certain that our most reluctant writers and readers might do so much better in the “grammar and mechanics” aspects of their language use if those aspects were made the _means to the end_ and not the ends in itself.

Solve for X.

Diagram the following sentences.

Decline the following irregular verbs.

Is it any wonder so many of our kids zone out before they ever get to the payoff of actual communication?

The Cranky Language Lady: Wednesday Grammar Quiz for Grownups

2011-06-15T14:20:00.002-02:30

The Cranky Language Lady: Wednesday Grammar Quiz for Grownups comes from CrankyLanguageLady.com. To find out more about the Cranky Language Lady, view sample pages from her new book, peruse her blog, or visit the website.

Grammar Quiz #30: Spellcheck Isn't Perfect

Spell check improves all the time, but it’s not perfect. It may highlight words that really are words but that are used incorrectly—or it may not. For example, it won’t pick up all the errors in the following passage. Can you?

“Ewe our the apple of my I,” said Clarence. “Its plane to sea that I am looking at the most beautiful woman on the planet, and I love you.” He continued to stair at her over there read whine.
“Okay,” said Doreen with out mush enthusiasm. She wanted to reed the menu and decide between stake and lobster. “I think thistle bee good,” she said, pointing too the lobster.

Clarence got down on won knee and held out a wring. “Wheel ewe merry me?” he asked.
“Know, I don’t think sew,” Doreen replied. “I’m knot interested, butt aisle let ewe by me diner.”

View answer.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-06-14T08:39:00.000-02:30

In North Carolina, USA, in 1980 a library forbade children to read which book without parental consent?
Which English pamphleteer had his ears cut off because of his inflammatory publications?
What did Russian author Dostoyevsky and F. Scott Fitzgerald have in common?
How many titles did Margaret Mitchell, author of Gone With The Wind, write in her lifetime?
In England in 1272 AD what was the cost of a handwritten Holy Bible in nine volumes?

Last Week's Answers

Which author always slept facing the North because he thought that it would improve his writing?

Charles Dickens

Which country publishes more books than any other country in the world?

Iceland

Which world-renowned daily newspaper published an apology to a professor 49 years after printing that his theories about traveling into space, which they had scoffed at, were proved to be correct?

The New York Times

How many pseudonyms did Russian writer Konstantin Mikhailov have?

325

Which author once ate an apple under the Arch de Triomphe to try to overcome his insomnia?

Alexander Dumas

The Cranky Language Lady: Wednesday Grammar Quiz for Grownups

2011-06-08T12:48:00.000-02:30

Grammar Quiz #29: Common Errors

When others discount or dismiss your writing, it’s often because you have misused some common words. Many people view the correct use of these words as a sign that you know what you’re doing. Unfortunately, anyone can slip up, even an excellent writer, so it pays to be careful. Can you find the eight errors in the passage below?

Its a happy day for teachers when a school opens its doors and lets the kids out for the summer. Its a happy day for the kids, too. They kick up there heels and rejoice that there going to have a couple of months of freedom. Its not such a happy day for there parents, however. They brace theirselves for a lot of “There is nothing to do!” comments, along with questions like, “Can you take me to the mall?” and, “Can you take me to Ashley’s house?” There is no summertime peace for parents, only for teachers—unless, of course, the teachers have there own kids.

View correction.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-06-07T09:08:00.001-02:30

Which author always slept facing the North because he thought that it would improve his writing?
Which country publishes more books than any other country in the world?
Which world-renowned daily newspaper published an apology to a professor 49 years after printing that his theories about travelling into space, which they had scoffed at, were proved to be correct?
How many pseudonyms did Russian writer Konstantin Mikhailov have?
Which author once ate an apple under the Arch de Triomphe to try to overcome his insomnia?

Last Week's Answers

Which author played cricket for the MCC and once bowled the legendary W.C. Grace?

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Which French writer had a pet swordfish?

Marcel Proust

How many fireflies does it take to give off enough like to read a book by?

Six firefly insects provide enough light to read a book.

Which English author would work himself up so much when he performed his own works on stage that he sometimes fainted?

Charles Dickens

How old was Sir Winston Churchill when he wrote his book "The History of the English Speaking Peoples"?

82 years old

The Cranky Language Lady: Wednesday Grammar Quiz for Grownups

2011-06-01T12:45:00.001-02:30

Grammar Quiz #28: Agreement

Can you find the five errors in agreement in the following selection?

Each of the twenty-seven cows standing in the middle of the country road were calmly looking around, not at all perturbed by Blake’s Mercedes and all the honking and yelling going on. “This bunch of cows that won’t get out of the road are stupid!” he shouted.

“It’s called a herd,” his girlfriend Alicia commented mildly, “a herd of cattle not a bunch of cows.”
Blake shot her a dirty look. “Okay, each of the cows in the herd of cattle standing there blocking the road should get their act together and move out of our way!"

"Perhaps if you asked them nicely,” Alicia answered. “Neither a person nor a cow like to be yelled at.” With that, she got out of the car and patted a black and white heifer on the rump. “Move along, sweetie,” she said, “and ask your friends to scoot to the side, please.”

To Blake’s astonishment, the road suddenly cleared. “I guess I should call you the Cow Whisperer,” he said, in awe.

“Every woman in the universe has their own special talents,” she smiled.

View answer.

The Case—Please Hear Me Out—Against the Em Dash

2011-05-31T11:04:00.003-02:30

According to an article on Slate.com:

According to the Associated Press Stylebook—Slate's bible for all things punctuation- and grammar-related—there are two main prose uses—the abrupt change and the series within a phrase—for the em dash. The guide does not explicitly say that writers can use the dash in lieu of properly crafting sentences, or instead of a comma or a parenthetical or a colon—and yet in practical usage, we do. A lot—or so I have observed lately. America's finest prose—in blogs, magazines, newspapers, or novels—is littered with so many dashes among the dots it's as if the language is signaling distress in Morse code.

What's the matter with an em dash or two, you ask?—or so I like to imagine. What's not to like about a sentence that explores in full all the punctuational options—sometimes a dash, sometimes an ellipsis, sometimes a nice semicolon at just the right moment—in order to seem more complex and syntactically interesting, to reach its full potential? Doesn't a dash—if done right—let the writer maintain an elegant, sinewy flow to her sentences?

Nope—or that's my take, anyway. Now, I'm the first to admit—before you Google and shame me with a thousand examples in the comments—that I'm no saint when it comes to the em dash. I never met a sentence I didn't want to make just a bit longer—and so the dash is my embarrassing best friend. When the New York Times' associate managing editor for standards—Philip B. Corbett, for the record—wrote a blog post scolding Times writers for overusing the dash (as many as five dashes snuck their way into a single 3.5-paragraph story on A1, to his horror), an old friend from my college newspaper emailed it to me. "Reminded me of our battles over long dashes," he wrote—and, to tell the truth, I wasn't on the anti-dash side back then. But as I've read and written more in the ensuing years, my reliance on the dash has come to feel like a pack-a-day cigarette habit—I know it makes me look and sound and feel terrible—and so I'm trying to quit.

The problem with the dash—as you may have noticed!—is that it discourages truly efficient writing. It also—and this might be its worst sin—disrupts the flow of a sentence. Don't you find it annoying—and you can tell me if you do, I won't be hurt—when a writer inserts a thought into the midst of another one that's not yet complete? Strunk and White—who must always be mentioned in articles such as this one—counsel against overusing the dash as well: "Use a dash only when a more common mark of punctuation seems inadequate." Who are we, we modern writers, to pass judgment—and with such shocking frequency—on these more simple forms of punctuation—the workmanlike comma, the stalwart colon, the taken-for-granted period? (One colleague—arguing strenuously that certain occasions call for the dash instead of other punctuation, for purposes of tone—told me he thinks of the parenthesis as a whisper, and the dash as a way of calling attention to a phrase. As for what I think of his observation—well, consider how I have chosen to offset it.)

Perhaps, in some way, the recent rise of the dash—and this "trend" is just anecdotal observation; I admit I haven't found a way to crunch the numbers—is a reaction to our attention-deficit-disordered culture, in which we toggle between tabs and ideas and conversations all day. An explanation is not an excuse, though—as Corbett wrote in another sensible harangue against the dash, "Sometimes a procession of such punctuation is a hint that a sentence is overstuffed or needs rethinking." Why not try for clarity in our writing—if not our lives?

It's unclear—even among the printing community—when the em dash came into common usage. Folklore—if you're willing to trust it—holds that it's been around since the days of Gutenberg but didn't catch on until at least the 1700s because the em dash wasn't used in the Bible, and thus was considered an inferior bit of punctuation. The symbol derives its name from its width—approximately equal to an m—and is easily confused with its close cousin the en dash, used more frequently across the pond, but here meant only to offset sports scores and the like. The em dash isn't easily formed on computers—it requires some special keystrokes on both PCs and Macs—and so I will admit that at least some of my bile comes from, as a copy editor, endlessly changing other writers' sloppy em-dash simulacra (the double dash, the single offset dash) to the real thing.

Perhaps the most famous dash-user in history—though she didn't use the em dash conventionally—was Emily Dickinson. According to the essay "Emily Dickinson's Volcanic Punctuation" from a 1993 edition of The Emily Dickinson Journal—a true general-interest read!—"Dickinson's excessive use of dashes has been interpreted variously as the result of great stress and intense emotion, as the indication of a mental breakdown, and as a mere idiosyncratic, female habit." Can there really be—at the risk of sounding like a troglodyte—something feminine about the use of a dash, some sort of lighthearted gossamer quality? Compare Dickinson's stylistic flitting with the brutally short sentences of male writers—Hemingway, for instance—who, arguably, use their clipped style to evoke taciturn masculinity. Henry Fielding apparently rewrote his sister Sarah's work heavily to edit out some of her idiosyncrasies—chief among them, a devotion to the dash. In Gore Vidal's Burr, the title character complains—in a charming internal monologue—"Why am I using so many dashes? Like a schoolgirl. The dash is the sign of a poor style. Jefferson used to hurl them like javelins across the page." So is the rise of the dash related—as everything seems to be these days—to the End of Men? (I kid—calm down.)

More likely, it's the lack of hard-and-fast usage rules—even the AP's guidelines are more suggestions than anything—that makes the dash so popular in our post-sentence-diagramming era. According to Lynne Truss—the closest thing we've got to a celebrity grammarian, thanks to her best-seller Eats, Shoots and Leaves—people use the em dash because "they know you can't use it wrongly—which for a punctuation mark, is an uncommon virtue."

So, fine, the em dash is easy to turn to—any port will do in a storm. But if you want to make your point—directly, with clarity, and memorably—I have some advice you'd do well to consider. Leave the damn em dash alone.

Shakespeare, Intel Geeks, and a Database of Metaphors

2011-05-26T11:02:00.005-02:30

According to Wired.com:

To navigate the shadowy landscape of intelligence, the government is prying open the Pandora’s box of language. First stop on that long and winding road? Metaphors.

Metaphors are everywhere (there are three in the previous paragraph). Problem is, they can differ from culture to culture, and are often hard to identify. While it’s relatively simple for a computer to sort nouns from verbs, the nuances of language are slightly more challenging.

To solve this problem, Iarpa, the mad science unit of the intelligence community (or Darpa for spies), is asking universities and businesses to help them build a giant database of metaphors. The goal is to “exploit the use of metaphors by different cultures to gain insight into their cultural norms.”

In an unlikely shout out to Aristotle, Iarpa acknowledges the ancient roots of these poetic devices. Much more recently, scientists have uncovered those roots in our biology. Turns out, metaphors are more than just figurative flourishes or explanatory shortcuts; they shape our thoughts, beliefs and actions.

Take the conceptual metaphor, “affection is warmth.” People who hold hot cups of coffee are more likely to judge strangers as friendly than those who get iced coffee. Or, “morality is purity”; more people will request antiseptic wipes when they’ve been asked to think about adultery or cheating than when they’ve pondered good deeds.

So, it makes sense that, given the deep-seated nature of these metaphors, the government would want to use them for better understanding, communicating and — who are we kidding? — winning hearts and minds.

The first step is to identify and collect all those metaphors — from English, Farsi, Spanish and Russian — into a huge database. That means analyzing loads of textual data, identifying all the metaphors (“his life took a left turn”; “you must find your own way”), mapping them onto a conceptual metaphor (“life is a journey”) and then … well, after that, it’s not completely clear.

Social science may offer a clue into what we could possibly do with this gigantic metaphor repository, however. Besides improving communication and interactions in a globalized world, metaphors might help us bridge cross-cultural gaps.

For example, the topic of morality. Americans are likely to think of morality in terms of rights, or things we “possess” or can be “deprived of” — “rights as IOUs.” In China, on the other hand, morality is usually conceived of as bounded space or concentric circles, so you can “overstep boundaries” or “hit the mark.” These two metaphors aren’t really compatible, but if we started talking about a moral right as a “right-of-way” (a path to move along without interference), we might have found a metaphor that carries weight in both cultures.

This isn’t the government’s first foray into the nuances of language. Darpa has embarked on a series of studies looking at how storytelling and narrative can help make sense of complex information or understand the human terrain.

Project Metaphor kicks off in November. We can’t afford to lose another minute. “Time is money,” after all.

The Cranky Language Lady: Wednesday Grammar Quiz for Grownups

2011-05-25T10:57:00.000-02:30

Grammar Quiz #27: Spotting Common Errors

The passage below has five problems. Can you find them and fix them?

“How about these one’s here?” asked the clerk, her nose stud flashing fetchingly under the fluorescent lights as she pointed to a selection of socks. All of the sudden, Byron was smitten.

“Um…,” he said, mentally smacking himself in the head for his inability to form a coherent sentence.

His friend Jake came to the rescue. “He needs to think about it. Me and him will be back later.”
“Definately,” Byron managed to say, gazing at the clerk with starry eyes.

View answer.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-05-24T10:43:00.001-02:30

Which author played cricket for the MCC and once bowled the legendary W.C. Grace?
Which French writer had a pet swordfish?
How many fireflies does it take to give off enough like to read a book by?
Which English author would work himself up so much when he performed his own works on stage that he sometimes fainted?
How old was Sir Winston Churchill when he wrote his book "The History of the English Speaking Peoples"?

Last Week's Answer

How many of Shakespeare’s living descendants remain today?

William Shakespeare has no living descendants.

Which word was accidentally omitted from a 1631 publication of the Bible, therefore encouraging readers to commit adultery?

In 1631, a printer accidentally omitted the word "Not" from the seventh commandment, encouraging readers to commit adultery.

Which author wrote his most famous work standing up?

Lewis Carroll wrote "Alice In Wonderland" (and most of his other works) standing up at a writing desk.

Which author wrote the story “Rasselas” in under a week to earn enough money to pay for his mother’s funeral?

Samuel Johnson

What anachronism appears in Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar?

In Julius Caesar, there is reference to a clock striking despite the fact that chiming clocks were not created until nearly a thousand years after Caesar’s death.

The Cranky Language Lady: Wednesday Grammar Quiz for Grownups

2011-05-18T11:00:00.000-02:30

Grammar Quiz #27: Spotting and Correcting Wrong Words

Can you spot and correct the two problem words in this entry?

Nathan really wanted his white shirts hung on white hangers, his blue shirts hung on blue hangers, and his green shirts hung on green hangers. He could of told his wife that, but he was afraid she might stop doing his laundry. After all, he remembered how she use to make him breakfast every morning, until he suggested that he really preferred the butter on his toast to go completely to the edges of the bread.

View answer.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-05-17T10:05:00.000-02:30

How many of Shakespeare’s living descendants remain today?
Which word was accidentally omitted from a 1631 publication of the Bible, therefore encouraging readers to commit adultery?
Which author wrote his most famous work standing up?
Which author wrote the story “Rasselas” in under a week to earn enough money to pay for his mother’s funeral?
What anachronism appears in Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar?

Last Week's Answers

Which author drew most of his inspiration from nighttime walks around London in an attempt to cure his terrible insomnia?

Charles Dickens would walk up to 20 miles per night.

Which author was so afraid of being burned alive that he insisted on carrying a piece of rope for an easy escape from any burning building?

Hans Christian Anderson

Which poet had his heel bone stolen from Poet’s Corner by the Dean of Westminster when his grave was disturbed in 1849?

Ben Jonson

Which 18th century English playwright was such a compulsive drinker that he would drink eau-de-cologne in a pinch?

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

What is the shortest play ever written and performed?

Samuel Beckett's play "Breath" lasts for only 35 seconds and consists of breaths and cries.

Last Call Deadline Extension: Delaware Teacher of the Year!

2011-05-16T15:51:00.003-02:30

Download an Entry Form Here.

CEO Jason Scott awards Mrs. Kristin Zerbe the Prestwick House 2010 English Teacher of the Year Award at the Delaware Shakespeare Festival.

At Prestwick House, we know firsthand that Delaware has some of the most innovative, exciting, and caring teachers in the country. This year,we would like to recognize the efforts of Delaware’s finest teachers with the second annual Prestwick House Delaware English Teacher of the Year Award — but to accomplish this task, we need your help.

Each English Department chair within the state of Delaware is invited to nominate one 6th - 12th grade English teacher from their faculty who consistently goes above and beyond in his or her dedication to helping students. Nominations will be accepted until May 25th, 2011, and can be e-mailed to keith@prestwickhouse.com.

With your submission, please include a letter of recommendation explaining how the nominated teacher has demonstrated both innovation and effectiveness in the classroom. Keep in mind that candidates should be individuals who demonstrate outstanding leadership, a thorough knowledge of their subject matter, and an understanding of the individual needs of their students.

The winning teacher will receive a new Apple iPad fully loaded with Prestwick House digital teaching materials, in addition to a plaque commemorating the achievement and recognition at a performance of The Winter’s Tale by the Delaware Shakespeare Festival.

Finalists will be announced in early June with the winner announced later in the summer at a Delaware Shakespeare Festival performance. All finalists will be featured on the Prestwick House website, blog, and in the Footnotes monthly email newsletter.

For more information on the Prestwick House Delaware English Teacher of the Year Award, please feel free to contact Prestwick House General Manager, Keith Bergstrom by phone at (800)-932-4593 x131 or e-mail keith@prestwickhouse.com.

Download an Entry Form Here.

Donate Old Watches for a Great Cause!

2011-05-12T11:11:00.000-02:30

Thanks to the efforts of senior editor, Paul Moliken, Prestwick House is partnering with a unique non-profit charity, called Kids Time.

The founder of Kids Time, retired physician Murray Moliken, takes donated wall clocks, old watches, and stickers to local elementary schools, Boys and Girl's Clubs, and Boys and Girl Scout troops. Here, kids are able to help create fun, interesting clocks for donation to less fortunate, hospital-bound children.

Over 3,500 clocks have already been given to ill children, who light up and smile broadly when they realize that the gift came directly from youngsters their own age. Clocks have been distributed to children's hospitals from Florida to California.

Unfortunately, in recent years, wrist watches have become more difficult to come by. Over 40,000 watches have been used so far in the process of creating these clocks, and we need your help to keep the project going!

Almost everyone has broken, old, unwanted, cheap, discarded, unused watches in a drawer somewhere that they’ll never use.

Simply send them to the address listed below to help further a good cause.

Kids Time Donations
c/o Paul Moliken
58 Artisan Drive
Smyrna, DE 19977

Tuesday Trivia

2011-05-10T14:39:00.002-02:30

Which author drew most of his inspiration from nighttime walks around London in an attempt to cure his terrible insomnia?
Which author was so afraid of being burned alive that he insisted on carrying a piece of rope for an easy escape from any burning building?
Which poet had his heel bone stolen from Poet’s Corner by the Dean of Westminster when his grave was disturbed in 1849?
Which 18th century English playwright was such a compulsive drinker that he would drink eau-de-cologne in a pinch?
What is the shortest play ever written and performed?

Last Week's Answers

What is the most shoplifted book in the world?

The bible

Which Scottish poet owned a pet ewe called Poor Mallie who had two poems dedicated to her?

Robert Burns

Which author refused to write on anything besides yellow legal paper?

Truman Capote

What is the average life expectancy of modern books?

The life expectancy of a modern book is about 100 years due to the high concentration of sulphuric acid in the wood pulp paper is made from.

How much was John Milton paid for his classic work, “Paradise Lost”?

Just £10.00

Happy Teacher Appreciation Week! In Search of Teacher Appreciation

2011-05-05T13:16:00.004-02:30

by Douglas Grudzina

See if you can complete the following common sayings:

Those who can do; those who can’t _____ .
If you can read this, thank a _____ .

I was just informed yesterday that this week is “Teacher Appreciation Week,” and the announcement got me to reminiscing about “Teacher Appreciation Weeks” of the past.

To be honest, I don’t remember any—not specific ones anyway, not like the Christmas I got my three-speed English racer bicycle or my wedding day or the births of my daughters.

I do remember that, along about Wednesday of the week (if we were aware of the week at all), the school board would “buy us lunch.” All that really meant was that we wouldn’t be charged for whatever the cafeteria was serving that day.

Of course, our Association officers would insist on paying for their own lunches, but I was never one to look a gift horse in the mouth. I think I also remember the occasional cookies-and-punch reception hosted by the PTA.

I taught in a 9 – 12 school, so we had some very strong booster organizations but not a terribly vibrant PTA. Still, the Sunshine Hydrox were nice, and red Hawaiian Punch is always a welcome treat.

Sincerely, though, the thought was definitely appreciated, and the person I remember hosting the affairs probably bought the refreshments out of her own pocket. However, I do not remember:

morning PA announcements reminding students, secretarial staff, administration, etc., that it was “Teacher Appreciation Week,” and it might be nice for each one to say one nice thing to one member of the instructional staff in the course of the day;
any student, secretary, administrator, etc., stopping by my room to remind me that it was “Teacher Appreciation Week” and saying one nice thing to me that day.

Several states lately have found surprising and creative ways to express their appreciation of teachers. But I don’t want to digress into politics … When I think about a week like “Teacher Appreciation Week,” I have to remind myself that there are more “- - - Week”s than there are weeks in the year!

The second week of March alone is “National School Breakfast Week” and “Severe Weather Week.” I wonder what we’re celebrating—and how—during “Severe Weather Week.”

This week “Teacher Appreciation Week” coincides with “National Physical Education and Sports Week.” Do our Phys Ed colleagues feel cheated that their two big commemorations fall on the same week? For all that, however, do we even have an “English Language Arts Education Week”? If so, does anyone know when it is? Maybe they could make one coincide with “National Friends of Libraries Week” (the third week in October) or “Celebrate Freedom Week” (the second week of September).

April 2 is apparently “International Children’s Book Day,” so maybe “ELA Ed Week” could occur then. Okay, I do want apologize for my apparent cynicism. This is not just a “toss away” week that no one knows anything about. There are tons and tons of “Teacher Appreciation Week” activities and lessons and materials and outlines on the Internet. If you want to make sure TAW gets observed in your classroom, just do a quick Google search. But wouldn’t the teacher’s planning her (his) own classroom’s TAW activities be rather like all the kids inviting themselves over to Mom’s house for Mother’s Day, so she can cook them a big dinner?

To be honest, I rarely felt starved for appreciation during my years in the classroom. Granted, I had those relatively few students (and their parents) who thought (and maybe still do) that I had been born with the express purpose of ruining their (or their child’s) lives, make college entrance impossible, destroy their self-esteem, and condemn them to lives of middle-class drudgery.

But the vast majority of my students (and their parents) knew—and appreciated the fact—that a “C” on a paper was not a condemnation but a challenge to do better; that even if I did pour on the homework the same weekend as the big ski trip, they (or their children) would be hard put to find a career in which they wouldn’t be working long hours or bringing work home—even during a special weekend.

My school had a (short-lived but nice while it lasted) tradition of allowing graduates to choose any high school faculty member they wanted to be the one to present their diploma to them. To be asked—by even one student—was to feel appreciated. To be invited to a student’s graduation party was to feel appreciated. To have the really shy, quiet kid in the back row of the class who never raised his hand or questioned a grade come up to you to give you a graduation announcement and wallet-sized senior photo was to feel appreciated.

And to have a former student appear out of the blue—in a few cases, some 30 years after their high school graduations—and ask to “friend” you on Facebook is to feel appreciated. I’m sure you all know what I’m talking about.

Just as we treasure those exquisite “teachable moments” when the cosmic forces are all in alignment, and we know we’ve gotten through; we treasure those moments when the human spirit inside of our students touches the human spirit inside of us, and that spirit tells us _you are a part of what I have become, and I thank you for that_.

Sort of an academic _Namaste_.

I will be honest: sometimes I miss my interactions with my students. So … for this “Teacher Appreciation Week,” my wish for all of you out there who are classroom teachers is that, in addition to the school board’s free slice of pizza and the PTA’s cookies and punch, you are able to recall the times you know you made a positive difference and especially the times someone let you know.

Think about the times you know you are appreciated … and smile.

Happy “Teacher Appreciation Week.”

(By the way, Sunday is Mother’s Day. You probably still have time to defrost a turkey or something—but don’t make Mom cook it.)

The Cranky Language Lady: Wednesday Grammar Quiz for Grownups

2011-05-04T14:05:00.000-02:30

Grammar Quiz #24: Parenthesis: What's the Right Thing to Do

The world of parentheses can be a difficult one to navigate. Can you determine which two of the following sentences handle parentheses correctly? How would you correct the others? \

The graduation speaker was not observant enough to notice the many signs of boredom throughout the audience (yawning, dozing, playing “Angry Birds.”)
The graduation speaker was putting everyone to sleep. (His topic was Paradigms of the Future in a Global Economy).
The graduation speaker (He was Dr. Arlington Keller) was boring everyone to death with his uninspired topic, Stuff I Think.
Zachary slept (as in snored) through the graduation speech.
The audience burst into enthusiastic applause (were they just happy it was over?) when the graduation speaker finally sat down.

View answer.

Tuesday Trivia

2011-05-03T02:17:00.001-02:30

What is the most shoplifted book in the world?
Which Scottish poet owned a pet ewe called Poor Mallie who had two poems dedicated to her?
Which author refused to write on anything besides yellow legal paper?
Although many ancient books survive to this day, modern books do not have this sort of longevity. What is the average life expectancy of modern books?
How much was John Milton paid for his classic work, “Paradise Lost”?

Last Week's Answers

Which scientific author who caused quite a stir with the church had originally intended to become a priest?

Charles Darwin

Which author had had a pet scorpion which he used to keep on his desk for inspiration?

Henrik Ibsen

Which country has the largest number of libraries and books in the world?

Russia

Which poet had a pony named Fanny that pulled his wife along in a wheelchair?

Alfred Lord Tennyson

Which British author was expelled from school for being caught smoking?

Jackie Collins

Mansion in New York Believe To Have Inspired F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby” Being Demolished

2011-05-02T14:24:00.003-02:30

According to Batangas Today:

The 25-room mansion in New York which some scholars believe inspired “The Great Gatsby” is being demolished for a subdivision, several international news sites reported on Monday.

The demolition was said to have started on Saturday. As reported earlier, the mansion will be replaced by five houses each with a $10 million tag price.

It was reported that David Brodsky, who purchased the property for $17.5 million in 2004 with his father, downplayed the house’s significance in literature. “To be honest with you there isn’t anything really special about it. We did a lot of research on its history and there is really no evidence that [Gatsby author F. Scott] Fitzgerald was even ever there,” Brodsky was quoted saying.

F. Scott Fitzgerald‘s relationship to the mansion has become a local lore regardless of his true connection to it, preservationist Alexandra Wolfe said.

The house featured marble, Palladian windows, parquet floors and hand-painted wallpaper.