What research is this statistic based on? And how is "working vocabulary" defined? How was the research conducted? How did researches determine what a "working vocabulary" was 50 years ago, and which population of 14 year olds did they look at? Middle class white? Working class white? Working class blacks? A large number of 14 year olds dropped out of school 50 years ago to work the family farm. And compulsory education laws were not in effect in many southern states 50 years ago. Could this be just another instance of the older generation thinking the younger generation is going to hell in a handbasket? Seems to me Plato/Socrates complained about his students being dimwitted and unable to express themselves. And could this be a case of not privileging or acknowledging new additions to the 14 year old's lexicon that displace some of the more staid expressions of a previous generation? Nancy At 06:15 PM 2/1/01 -0600, you wrote: > >David Orr, "Verbicide" >American Educator, >Winter 2000-2001 >p. 26 > >"In the past fifty years...the working vocabulary of the average 14 year old has declined from some 25,000 words to 10,000 word." ><HTML><BODY STYLE="font:10pt verdana; border:none;"><DIV><BR>David Orr, "Verbicide"<BR><U>American</U> <U>Educator</U>,</DIV> <DIV>Winter 2000-2001</DIV> <DIV>p. 26</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>"In the past fifty years...the working vocabulary of the average 14 year old has declined from some 25,000 words to 10,000 word."</DIV> <DIV> </DIV></BODY></HTML> > Nancy G. Patterson Portland Middle School, English Dept. Chair Portland, MI 48875 "The text is a tissue of quotations drawn from the innumberable centers of culture." --Roland Barthes [log in to unmask] http://www.msu.edu/user/patter90/opening.htm http://www.npatterson.net/mid.html To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html and select "Join or leave the list" Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/