I have too. Wikipedia also supports that.
Herb
Herbert F. W. Stahlke, Ph.D.
Emeritus Professor of English
Ball State University
Muncie, IN 47306
[log in to unmask]
________________________________________
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Jane Saral [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: July 17, 2008 8:52 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Nouns - Elementary concept?
I've heard that little pairing attributed to Groucho Marx.
Jane Saral
On Thu, Jul 17, 2008 at 7:31 PM, STAHLKE, HERBERT F <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
Sounds like you've come up with one meaning for the time sentence and two for the fruit sentence. Keep at it!
Herb
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>] On Behalf Of Carol Morrison
Sent: 2008-07-17 18:03
To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Nouns - Elementary concept?
I don't get it; can you please explain? I understand how time can fly like an arrow: the simile implies that time will fly fast or in a linear fashion. But how can fruit fly like a banana? Is there a species of flying banana? Or is it "fruit flies" as the noun phrase (as in drosophila) which are like a banana (which wouldn't be a sentence). Sorry...I'm a little slow here.
CLM
On Thu, 7/17/08, Atchley, Clinton <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
From: Atchley, Clinton <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>>
Subject: Re: Nouns - Elementary concept?
To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
Date: Thursday, July 17, 2008, 12:35 PM
Hi, Herb,
I often have my students compare "Time flies like an arrow" and "Fruit flies like a banana." The little exercise always throws them for a loop at first because of the expectations established by the first sentence.
Clinton Atchley, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of English
Box 7652
1100 Henderson Street
Henderson State University
Arkadelphia, AR 71999
Phone: 870.230.5276
Email: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
Web: http://www.hsu.edu/atchlec
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>] On Behalf Of STAHLKE, HERBERT F
Sent: Thursday, July 17, 2008 8:24 AM
To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Nouns - Elementary concept?
Another important pedagogical point to draw from this discussion is that ambiguity arises when the language doesn't clearly mark structure. In Eleanor's sentence, "I did escape," both the emphatic auxiliary and the main verb interpretations are possible for "did," with different consequences for the grammatical status of "escape." Among my favorite sentences for illustrating this point are
Sylvia rolled up the carpet.
and
The chicken is ready to eat.
The first sentence is a simple constituent structure problem:
Sylvia V[rolled] PP[up the carpet]. (from one end to the other)
Sylvia V[rolled up] NP[the carpet]. ("rolled up" is a phrasal verb and Sylvia works for Bekins.)
The second sentence is one of grammatical relations. Is "chicken" understood as Subject or Object of "eat?"
Of course, discourse pretty consistently disambiguates such sentences, but I find that classes have fun figuring out what meanings a sentence can have and what the different grammatical structures have to be. Try it with
Time flies like an arrow.
Herb
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>] On Behalf Of John Crow
Sent: 2008-07-17 05:18
To: [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Nouns - Elementary concept?
Diane,
Craig's counterexample and your comment about possible confusion are dead on. If there is one thing that I can say with confidence about language, it's that no analysis works all the time. If my students (at any grade) were to call the first "escape" a noun because it passes the noun tests, I would be quick to congratulate them on a very fine job! I would point out, however, that it passes the verb test also: adding today, yesterday, tomorrow to the sentence forces very verb-like changes:
Today, I escape OR I do escape. Tomorrow, I will escape.
So we would have a bit of discussing to do to figure out how "escape" is really functioning. (It is, of course, functioning as a verb here.)
I love it when this type of situation comes up in class because we are problem-solving with an example that is more realistic than any drill-and-kill exercise ever could be. And we are doing so within the context of things that the students already know. We're discussing grammar (of all things!), and the kids are involved and interested. It doesn't get much better than that!
John
On Wed, Jul 16, 2008 at 5:19 PM, diane skinner <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
All,
Thank you for the discussion, the civility throughout the
discourse, and the descriptions and suggestions for teaching nouns.
John, when teaching 2nd graders, I like the idea of using visuals
(the fruit) to explain the inflectional morpheme "s." But might it be
possible that your suggestion of using pronoun substitutes to locate
nouns could be misunderstood? For example, Craig wrote:
"Or how about 'I did escape, but my escape was short-lived.' Is escape a
noun in both instances? It passes the noun test, as do so many other
words that are both nouns and verbs or nouns and adjectives."
Substituting "it" for "escape" in the first instance ("I did [it]")
could throw a curve ball into the mix, especially since "it" can be
substituted for the word "escape" in both instances.
Diane
On Sat, Jul 12, 2008 at 2:29 AM, John Crow <[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
> Hi Tabetha,
>
> I agree with John Alexander in that the way to teach nouns is to use a
> functional or operational approach. To me, when teaching grammar, the best
> approach is to build from what students already know, and to do so in a
> manner that lets them discover the concept. Even 2nd graders would be able
> to handle something like the following:
>
> Bring two each of the following to class: apple, grape, banana. Show the
> students one apple and ask them what it is. Then show them both apples and
> ask them again. Repeat with each fruit. Then ask them to tell you what
> letter (or sound) they added when you changed from one to two. Now intro
> the word "noun," telling them that "apple," "grape," and "banana" are all
> nouns. Ask them what letter you can add to a noun if you need to. They
> will say "s." Then ask them what they have discovered about nouns. They
> will tell you that you can add "s" to it. Ask them what it means when you
> add "s" and they will tell you. Then look at "foot." They will know, of
> course, that you cannot have "foots." I'll skip the details and skip to the
> main point: What you are trying to do is get them to "discover" that nouns
> can normally be made plural, usually by adding "s". Once they grasp that
> concept, they become noun-identifying geniuses. ("Is 'idea' a noun?
> Sure--one idea, two ideas.") I think with 2nd graders I would stop there,
> but you have to be prepared to deal with words like "chalk"--frames are OK
> (the ___________), but proper nouns often do not fit. I prefer pronoun
> substitution as a good test for nouns. (You can't say "the Texas" but Texas
> is an "it.")
>
> Tying what you are trying to teach to what they already know (albeit
> subconsciously) is much more effective than teaching a definition that they
> memorize, but that does not connect.
>
> (If you use this with your pre-service class, for practice, ask them to come
> up with an operational definition of a verb.)
>
> I agree with Craig: we have to fundamentally change the way teachers THINK
> about grammar if we want our teaching to stick and to transfer to
> real-language situations.
>
> John
> 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/
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/
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/
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/
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/
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/
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/
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/
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/
|
