Learning Strategies

Recent Posts - page 52

• “Untranslatable” words (redux)

  By ljd42 on December 18, 2019

  Six months ago I wrote an essay in my blog about “untranslatable” words. If you haven’t read it, you may want to do so now. The bottom line was that when someone claims that a word in some language is… Read More ›

• There’s no such thing as too many books.

  By ljd42 on December 16, 2019

  

  More shelf space may not be an option. More shelf space requires more shelving, which in turn requires more bookcases, which in turn require more room. Sigh. I gave a few hundred away just over a year ago, but that… Read More ›

• It’s 50 years later; would I still be able to write something like my master’s thesis?

  By ljd42 on December 14, 2019

  

  I can still teach linguistics — but could I still write a linguistics thesis? On April 10, 1969, I submitted my master’s thesis, The Development of Embeddings in the Speech of Young Children. Just now, for a somewhat complicated set of… Read More ›

• Russian Script Hacking for Beginners

  By ljd42 on December 12, 2019

  

  Is it Korsunsky or Korsunskiy or Korsunski or perhaps even Korsunskyi? Would it help to see it written out in Cyrillic rather than in our Roman alphabet? Related question: what’s the capital of Ukraine — Kiev or Kyiv? Actually, it’s… Read More ›

• Every vote counts!

  By ljd42 on December 11, 2019

  

  How do elections work? Does your vote really count? Could your single vote really make a difference? See below. But first… Regular readers of this blog know that I teach a course every summer to rising tenth-graders where one unit is… Read More ›

• A negative decrease?

  By ljd42 on December 9, 2019

  

  Hmm… so I guess that means that my score increased?  

• Coffee shops with books: A personal connection

  By ljd42 on December 8, 2019

  

  As you know, many coffee shops and small restaurants want their customers to feel at home, so they have comfortable chairs and shelves with random books on them. The intent, I suppose, is to create an ambiance like a living… Read More ›

• Semicolon

  By ljd42 on December 6, 2019

  

  “What!? An entire book about semicolons??? You’ve got to be kidding!” “And an audiobook of all things???? How can you listen to a semicolon?” Yes, I have to admit: I really did listen to an audiobook about a punctuation mark…. Read More ›

• Language Unlimited: “Syntax is where the magic happens.”

  By ljd42 on December 4, 2019

  

  “Syntax is where the magic happens. It takes the words we use to slice up our reality, and puts them together in infinitely varied ways.” — from Language Unlimited, by David Adger. If I had to pick one paragraph as the thesis statement… Read More ›

• The apostrophe? Its no longer needed.

  By ljd42 on December 3, 2019

  

  Ive written earlier about apostrophes, but now we have the definitive essay on the subject for all the peevers and prescriptivists out there: “Thats all Folks: The Apostrophe Protection Society Gone for Good” by the distinguished Dennis Baron. Read it… Read More ›

• Murder on the Toy Town Express

  By ljd42 on December 2, 2019

  

  Toy Town is East Aurora, NY. Although you probably already knew that, I didn’t know it until I read Barbara Early’s Murder on the Toy Town Express. Don’t confuse this novel with the famous murder on that other express. You can tell… Read More ›

• “40 Ambitious Ideas to Save Transportation in Boston” plus an MBTA view from 1947

  By ljd42 on November 30, 2019

  

  OK. We know that Boston traffic is a mess. We also know that large swaths of people are unwilling to take the T for a variety of reasons, many of which reflect legitimate frustrations. So here we have a number… Read More ›

• Mollie, Vincent, and… William

  By ljd42 on November 29, 2019

  

  Mollie loves her black-and-white brother Vincent. She’s not so sure about her orange brother William:

• Election Math: A British approach from Plus Magazine

  By ljd42 on November 28, 2019

  

  As you know, Hillary Clinton received more votes than Donald Trump in 2016, which is why she is president today. What? You say that isn’t true? But she really did get more votes — and we live in a democracy,… Read More ›

• To Say Nothing of the Dog and Three Men in a Boat (to say nothing of the dog)

  By ljd42 on November 26, 2019

  

  Two books — each called (in part) To Say Nothing of the Dog. Is this a coincidence? Actually, no. Let’s look at each title in turn: The first of these, which has the full title of To Say Nothing of the Dog: Or… Read More ›

• Greenberg Model Railroad Show

  By ljd42 on November 24, 2019

  

  There were some interesting items at this weekend’s Greenberg Model Railroad Show in Wilmington… But ultimately it was disappointing. The big problem was the ratio of layouts to vendors: it was much too small, maybe 20% layouts and some of… Read More ›

• State University of Murder

  By ljd42 on November 23, 2019

  

  State University of Michigan? Hmm… SUM? Is this perhaps a heavily disguised Michigan State University (MSU)? Or would that be too subtle? Anyway, you should read State University of Murder, Lev Raphael’s latest novel. This academic satire is the latest… Read More ›

• Are teachers entitled to get Social Security benefits?

  By ljd42 on November 21, 2019

  

  “All the money you’ve put into Social Security goes down the drain,” a certain Weston teacher explained to me in 1998. We had been talking about our work histories and future plans. You need to know three facts: Massachusetts public-school teachers… Read More ›

• Shady Characters

  By ljd42 on November 19, 2019

  

  You don’t have to be a typography nerd to enjoy this book, as long as you read it slowly and carefully. Keith Houston (who is not a professional typographer) has written a surprisingly lively book with the title Shady Characters: The… Read More ›

• “The biggest problem teachers have with parents”

  By ljd42 on November 18, 2019

  

  The Math Curmudgeon writes: The biggest problem teachers have with parents is getting them to let go the reins, stop the constant hovering, … essentially to back off and let their children learn in peace. … HS is the time… Read More ›

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