Random Thoughts Part 5: Time to Split Again

[Sophia]

Seems so odd life would present such a thorough and plausible explanation of why I had something in my shoe, but then it turns out to have nothing to do with what was in my shoe.

That's why we have science to (dis)prove everything using FACTS!

 

[Sophia]

Random thought inspired by Raghav Gupta's thread.
Are there really so many words in the English language that native speakers must learn lists of words with their definitions? I saw it in some films where they mentioned Spelling Bee and other times I saw that High School students are tested from understanding of certain difficult words. Is that common thing to learn as a native English speaking child?
It seems strange to me, to learn one's native language that way. Do people really use so many terms that learning the words in natural way is not enough? Or is a vast passive vocabulary perceived as something that improves your social status?

 

[WWGD]

Random thought inspired by Raghav Gupta's thread.
Are there really so many words in the English language that native speakers must learn lists of words with their definitions? I saw it in some films where they mentioned Spelling Bee and other times I saw that High School students are tested from understanding of certain difficult words. Is that common thing to learn as a native English speaking child?
It seems strange to me, to learn one's native language that way. Do people really use so many terms that learning the words in natural way is not enough? Or is a vast passive vocabulary perceived as something that improves your social status?

Yes, I don't see much point in spelling bees either. I think the issue is that English is a particularly non-phonetic language, i.e., it is often difficult for many to determine the correct spelling by just hearing the word.

 

[Sophia]

Yes, I don't see much point in spelling bees either. I think the issue is that English is a particularly non-phonetic language, i.e., it is often difficult for many to determine the correct spelling by just hearing the word.

I guess it must be very confusing for children who know the phonetic form of the word and then see it written in a different way.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Are there really so many words in the English language that native speakers must learn lists of words with their definitions? I saw it in some films where they mentioned Spelling Bee and other times I saw that High School students are tested from understanding of certain difficult words. Is that common thing to learn as a native English speaking child?
It seems strange to me, to learn one's native language that way. Do people really use so many terms that learning the words in natural way is not enough? Or is a vast passive vocabulary perceived as something that improves your social status?

Grammar school English classes do, indeed, put a lot of focus on "vocabulary building." After the children are taught the rudiments of reading, they're given paragraphs and even larger stories to read which employ progressively more words. Those words are highlighted in the text and defined below it, and the kids have to learn what they mean in order to understand the story.

Eventually, in higher grades, they are taught about the dictionary and, instead of being given reading material where potential unknown words are highlighted and defined for them, they are instructed to identify unknown words for themselves and to look them up in the separate dictionary.

I don't think it's very common for kids to be given random lists of words and their definitions disembodied from any context to memorize. At least, that never happened to me.

Spelling is a different matter. In preparation for spelling bees, a student might well be given a list of difficult-to-spell words and their definitions to outright memorize. The focus is on the spelling in this case and not on the definition. In other words, spelling bees are not "vocabulary building." They're all about spelling, which is extremely complicated in English compared to other languages, and needs special attention, even for native speakers.

 

[Ibix]

But nowadays we have spell checkers to make spelling easy: http://www.latech.edu/tech/liberal-arts/geography/courses/spellchecker.htm

 

[collinsmark]

I don't think it's very common for kids to be given random lists of words and their definitions disembodied from any context to memorize. At least, that never happened to me.

I had a at least one teacher who taught like that. Every Monday in the 9th grade we were given a new list of "vocabulary" words that we needed to memorize along with their definitions. On Friday we were quizzed on them, in the form of a "matching" test: All the words were given and all the definitions were given on a piece of paper, but not in order, and we had to match the words to their appropriate definitions.

Also I distinctly recall a particular section of a standardized test* in the verbal section were we were given seemingly random words, and had to guess their antonyms from a list. It could be pretty tough if both the words and the list of antonyms were obscure.

*(Was it in a college entrance exam test like the ACT or SAT? I can't recall for sure).

 

[zoobyshoe]

I had a at least one teacher who taught like that. Every Monday in the 9th grade we were given a new list of "vocabulary" words that we needed to memorize along with their definitions. On Friday we were quizzed on them, in the form of a "matching" test: All the words were given and all the definitions were given on a piece of paper, but not in order, and we had to match the words to their appropriate definitions.

I guess all I can say is I think it's unfortunate when a teacher does this sort of thing, and I hope it's not wide spread. I don't recall it ever happening to me in grammar or high school.

 

[Psinter]

@Psinter You should start a thread dedicated to that kind of problem.
It could prove an invaluable resource for students and people that aren't very knowledgeable about physics.

I would see it as a motivation for demotivated students as well, the kind that asks "what's the use of all this".

I just put it here thinking that since it was something I randomly came up with while browsing images for the sake of fun it was the best place.

Maybe next time, I will create a new thread.

But nowadays we have spell checkers to make spelling easy: http://www.latech.edu/tech/liberal-arts/geography/courses/spellchecker.htm

When I have doubts about how a word is pronounced in English I go to an online text-to-speech and put the word there to listen to it. Once I was in a computer lab at uni and it was very silent. A guy took the Google Translator page and put an obscene word there. Turned the computer's volume at max and began to repeatedly click the speaker button. The obscene word was spoken out loud repeatedly by the translator with woman voice while he and a few others laughed. One girl rolled up her eyes and said something like: "How childish. I can't believe these idiots." Only students were there. Is that childish?

 

[Scott C.]

Today, it seems much of this process is politically or administratively driven by departments of education (elected officials or appointees) needing to be seen addressing issues; after all Federal and State standardized test results affect funding (and careers). The net result is that the wheel gets reinvented periodically.

US of A educators appear to be in thrall to two cyclical conflicting language acquisition theories. One favors the phonetic and the other the memorized character driven approach. Back in olden times, when you had to walk uphill (both ways) through hip deep snow to get to school I was taught the phonetic approach while those following me by a little as five years were taught the character approach. To me these folks seem challenged, in that, when confronted by a novel word (perhaps in a lecture, conversation, taking notes...) using a dictionary seems very difficult for them.

 

[WWGD]

This Indian guy who would not grow up was aptly named Childeesh.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Today, it seems much of this process is politically or administratively driven by departments of education (elected officials or appointees) needing to be seen addressing issues; ...

I see school boards getting cited so frequently as examples of bureaucracy gone awry that I've come to feel education in the US is doomed.

 

[JorisL]

I see school boards getting cited so frequently as examples of bureaucracy gone awry that I've come to feel education in the US is doomed.

While a little different it turns out that the latest version of the minimal requirements scrapped friction and its description as a force has been scrapped from those requirements. As a consequence the newest books barely mention friction while it is of the utmost importance when connecting the idealized picture to real life experience. The professor focusing on physics education research over here couldn't grasp what would motivate such a decision.
Especially considering the fact that professional physicists are involved in drafting the new syllabi.

Hopefully teachers keep complaining about this and teach about friction regardless (they are minimal requirements after all). Otherwise high school mechanics becomes a lot more complicated to intuitively grasp (leading to misconceptions that one needs to apply a constant force to retain a constant speed).

 

[Scott C.]

Simplification is the road to higher test scores, therefore more and more content is removed (in all disciplines). I don't believe teachers will complain since they teach their students how to pass the tests, (they are evaluated on the scores their students achieve).

College educators may have reason to complain regarding the level of incoming students, but the political aim to embrace diversity has been apparently achieved. This a tragedy because those same political forces put forward a laudable objective without supplying commensurate commitment of real resources to achieve this within most venues.

 

[zoobyshoe]

Today I got a birthday present for my car, even though it's not my car's birthday: a new muffler

Mufflers for the old air-cooled VW's are hard to find nowadays. Muffler outlets just don't sell them, and you have to order them online. I ordered one of them, and it came this morning by USPS.

Having been shipped from China (which I do not believe is the Latin Ablative Absolute) it had to cross the ocean, and for that reason came painted merely to prevent rust. The retailer warned this paint had to be stripped and replaced with high temperature paint.

A trip to home depot where I bought paint stripper and rubber gloves took from 2:30 to 3:30. By 4:30, the paint was successfully stripped. The paint stripper worked remarkably well. I can't tell you what brand I used because that would be spamming. A trip down to AutoZone got me a can of flat black high temperature paint (1300º to 2000º F). Tomorrow I shall spray this puppy and install it. Installation is a simple matter: it's held on with three bolts, no welding required.

This is not the standard air-cooled VW muffler, incidentally. Some previous owner changed all the pipe work so it takes a different muffler.

"Muffler" reminded me of "muffin," so I had to go get one. When I got to Walmart, I got distracted by cupcakes and brought one of those home instead. Regardless, since the muffler/muffin association did not lead to trying to eat the muffler, I came out of it unscathed.

 

[Sophia]

I had a at least one teacher who taught like that. Every Monday in the 9th grade we were given a new list of "vocabulary" words that we needed to memorize along with their definitions. On Friday we were quizzed on them, in the form of a "matching" test: All the words were given and all the definitions were given on a piece of paper, but not in order, and we had to match the words to their appropriate definitions.

Also I distinctly recall a particular section of a standardized test* in the verbal section were we were given seemingly random words, and had to guess their antonyms from a list. It could be pretty tough if both the words and the list of antonyms were obscure.

*(Was it in a college entrance exam test like the ACT or SAT? I can't recall for sure).

This is what I meant.
But I guess it's understandable because English is so rich with all those derivatives from Latin, French, phrasal verbs and idioms. And also, as was said in the propone thread, it is spoken in many countries that have their own dialect.

I guess all I can say is I think it's unfortunate when a teacher does this sort of thing, and I hope it's not wide spread. I don't recall it ever happening to me in grammar or high school.

I was asking because I had a classmate who was sent to a US high school for a year. It was one of the better/ posh schools and she chose to try an English class for native speakers. And she said they used to get lists of words like that, too. She found it interesting as one can obviously expect such methods being used in foreign language classes, but this course was aimed at proper American students.

College educators may have reason to complain regarding the level of incoming students, but the political aim to embrace diversity has been apparently achieved. This a tragedy because those same political forces put forward a laudable objective without supplying commensurate commitment of real resources to achieve this within most venues.

This also the case here. More and more uni teachers complain about level of high school Math. Students come unprepared and at least some lessons in the first year of Math and Physics courses have to be dedicated to explaining stuff that used to be taught at HS before. The simplification starts at primary level (grades 1-9 here). For example, teaching equations with 2 unknowns was omitted. I was a witness when an angry high school teacher called a primary Math teacher asking her why she hasn't taught equations to the students. And the poor primary school teacher explained that it was omitted in the new standards. Also, she explained, students have great difficulties grasping basic concepts that used to be easily taught in the past (due to lack of interest and increasing discipline problems). She is an experienced teacher who has been teaching for 39 years.

Edit: I don't know if this is the case in the US, too, but while many things are omitted from the standards, new ones are added constantly. For example, compulsory English from Grade 3 and second foreign language is compulsory from Grade 7. Or IT classes from the 2nd grade. Schools have options to incomporate environmental, regional and media education as well. Than there are compulsory Religion or Ethics from the first grade. There is also pressure to include projects and creativity to the classes instead of memorising new information. And that takes more time compared to traditional lectures.
It seems to me that the educational system is standing on crossroads now and we must decide if we want to continue teaching a few subjects deeply or a broad range of subjects on a more shallow level. And whether to emphasise traditional methods or new, more creative ones.

 

[Psinter]

At my place, once a Kindergarden teacher went to Germany to learn about the Germans' educational system. She liked what she saw and when she came back she asked our government for help to implement in our country's public schools the same K-12 teaching system the Germans were using. But of course the government did not fund the project. Like always.

 

[Sophia]

At my place, once a Kindergarden teacher went to Germany to learn about the Germans' educational system. She liked what she saw and when she came back she asked our government for help to implement in our country's public schools the same K-12 teaching system the Germans were using. But of course the government did not fund the project. Like always.

That's typical. There's too much politics and ideology involved in education. And people like to keep the system the same as when they were students. That's perceived as a golden standard and everything new is either a regress or redundant and useless.
At the same time there is pressure from international comparisons (eg Czechoslovakia used to have good ratings before the revolution but now we get worse results each year). And each minister of education (there were 16 of them in 23 years) wants to prove that he "does something" so more and more beraucracy is invented all the time. We have got tons of projects on paper but none of them works in real life.

 

[Psinter]

We have got tons of projects on paper but none of them works in real life.

I know that feeling bro... I mean sis... I mean... The point is I know that feeling .

 

[Astronuc]

Edwin Shifrin seldom discussed his time at war. He escaped from a German POW camp toward the end of WWII.

"We knew he'd been in the war, that he had been captured and that he escaped. That's about it. He didn't talk about it," said Dan Shifrin, who lives in the Denver area. "My guess is he figured it was just part of his life — many went through it, many didn't return. Many of those who did return didn't return in one piece."

https://www.yahoo.com/news/missouri-veteran-escaped-nazi-prison-camp-gets-medal-134952763.html

 

[zoobyshoe]

Beware: Roving Herds of Weird, Purple Jellyfish:

https://www.yahoo.com/news/thousands-jellyfish-wash-ashore-florida-191000663.html

Beachgoers in a South Florida town found their terrirory invaded by little purple jellyfish this past week.

Hallandale Beach outside Miami was covered in thousands of sea creatures called Velella velella, which have little sails that normally allow them to steer clear of the shore.

However, the jellyfish, which are also known as "purple sailors" or "by-the-wind sailors" can sometimes find themselves blown toward beaches en masse in a phenomenon that locals say happens every three years or so.

"We are flying our Purple flag for dangerous marine life," the city wrote on its Facebook page Thursday...

 

[ShayanJ]

Science Kombat!
Nice idea. Wish it had more characters though!

 

[Borg]

I'm curious how the post office can label my package as 2 day priority mail and then tell me that the estimated delivery date is 4 days. Are they really that bad at math?

 

[Pepper Mint]

I'm curious how the post office can label my package as 2 day priority mail and then tell me that the estimated delivery date is 4 days. Are they really that bad at math?

Psss... maybe they are planning something.

 

[Borg]

Psss... maybe they are planning something.

Like planning on taking their time?

 

[Pepper Mint]

Like planning on taking their time?

Yes that is. Otherwise, please seek other services. In my area I use FedEx, for example, which is more reliable.

 

[Sophia]

Like planning on taking their time?

arent there state holidays in your area?
or they consider shipping time only two days between the day you sent it and the day when the recipient gets it. So the "traveling" time is 2 days, while actually it is 4 days :) (1-sending+2 travel+1 recieving=4 days)

 

[Borg]

arent there state holidays in your area?
or they consider shipping time only two days between the day you sent it and the day when the recipient gets it. So the "traveling" time is 2 days, while actually it is 4 days :) (1-sending+2 travel+1 recieving=4 days)

It doesn't need to be that complicated. I think that it's just simple false advertising.

 

[zoobyshoe]

It doesn't need to be that complicated. I think that it's just simple false advertising.

She may have a point though. I couldn't get through to the DMV on Friday because it turned out to be Caesar Chavez Day: government offices on holiday.

 

[Psinter]

I have this feeling that John Doe is not a real name. It sounds a little fake to me. (ಠ_ಠ)

*suspicious*