Syllables is an interesting topic. Cunningham talks about clapping syllables and having categories of words to play around with when learning this concept. (Cunningham, 2009) It brought to mind what my daughter’s first grade teacher does in her class. She has these “caught being good” cards which she hands out to hard workers, especially when the person next to them is being disruptive. When a child receives a “caught being good” card that child writes his or her name on it and puts it into a red box. Every Friday Mrs. Vega takes the box, and pulls out five random cards. The kids have to be at school that day, and no one can get picked twice. If a child’s name gets picked then they get to choose a prize out of the treasure chest. Now, what makes this neat is how she goes about revealing who was randomly pulled out of the box. She says this person is a him or a her, or a he or a she. Then she’ll say something like, this person has three syllables in their name. She pauses, letting them think about their own names, and the names of their classmates. Then she’ll say, this person’s name starts with the 6th letter of the alphabet. Each time is a little different, but I love the syllables portion. Sometimes the students guess wrong. Mrs. Vega will say, “You think so, let’s clap it.” The kids enjoy getting prizes but they also enjoy figuring out who gets a prize.

I remember syllables being a frustrating topic in school. It was my mother who made it interesting for me. We didn’t do clapping in school, we simply had to count the syllables on our fingers. My mother had me do clapping. After a while the clapping got boring so we switched to tapping, snapping, head bobbing, and using simple musical tunes. We wouldn’t sing the words, we would speak the words with rhythm, much like the character Professor Henry Higgins played by Rex Harrison in the movie My Fair Lady. That was fun. I was also shown how to separate words out by their syllables. My mother showed me how the dictionary does that very same thing at the time as telling a user how to pronounce a word. There was some disparity there however because the way we speak and the proper pronunciation of words, and consequently the number of syllables in a word are different. A common one is the word family. When we speak we often say fam-ly. However it should be fam-i-ly. While one can come to grips with the commonality of lazy speech it gets particularly annoying in poetry where syllable count matters. I remember reading a free verse poem where the poet had three line stanzas in a 7-12-7 pattern, if I recall correctly. I do not remember what the poem was about, but what do recall was seeing the word family at the end of a line and immediately thinking the poet had gone over the syllable count. Then it occurred to me that the poet was using fam-ly not fam-i-ly. This inconsistency is something to watch out for, especially when you start having your students write Haiku’s. I recall seeing in my daughter’s Kindergarten class at the end of the year the teacher asked the kids to provide words to figure out the syllables to. One child said family. Guess how many syllables they clapped together? Yep, you guessed it. Two. I silently twitched out of politeness.

My mother is a musician, which is probably where she got the idea to incorporate rhythm songs with syllables, and as such she passed on some of that musicianship to me. Because of this background I found the beats analogy annoying since the length of sounds are not taken into account. For example, take the long a. It takes a bit longer to say the word “shake” then it does to say the word, “can”, but both constitute one beat. In music if the quarter note gets the beat and the note lasts longer than a quarter note then the note does not equal one beat, it’s two beats or a beat and a half. If you say, “Will you shake this for me?” the word shake lasts longer than the other single syllable words. So why is shake only one syllable and not one and a half? It is also longer than the other words. The length of a word, according to Cunningham, is supposed to be a clue in about how many syllables a word has. (2009). Yet, at the same time, you can have a four letter word that has two syllables such as “very.” The word very has four letters, the word shake has five letters, but “shake” is monosyllabic while “very” is disyllabic.

In essence I believe that a teacher needs to consider these issues when teaching the concept of syllables. It needs to stay novel. After a while clapping gets boring, so shake it up with other syllabic activities. Some students need to see how the word is broken up into syllables. They also need to be made aware that there is more to figuring out the number of syllables than the way we speak and how many letters a word has. This is where seeing the word broken up syllabically can be of great help in the classrooms. It can also lead to discussions on why there is such a difference between the spoken word and proper pronunciation. We want the subject to be engaging, not an eye roller. If it weren’t for my mother I probably would have thought of syllables as one more dreaded thing to deal with at school. Instead it was something I understood and could help struggling classmates with.

Cunningham, P. M. (2009). Phonics They Use: Words for Reading and Writing. 5th edition. Allyn & Bacon: Pearson Education.

I realized that not everyone knows what ELL stands for.
It stands for English Language Learners. I hardly ever hear ESL anymore which stood for English as a Second Language. Basically ELL students are those whose primary language is something other than English.

Botelho and Rudman (2009) speak about the oppression against the lower classes and against slaves in learning how to read. Upper classes were afraid that the low class folk would start having higher aspirations and that was a threat to their superior position. If slaves were learned they would be able to use their knowledge to publish their plight and engender more support in their cause of freedom. Slaves were an essential component to the Southern economy and ending slavery would disrupt that. In short, knowledge is power. And the only way to gain knowledge is to be able to read, and not only to read but to be able to think critically.

Many children are obsessed with having magic powers. My daughter Hazel pretends she’s powerful like a character in Naruto or Avatar. Hazel told me last year in the beginning of the school year that she wanted to be powerful. She was mostly playing, but I took the opportunity to sit her down and ask her if she wanted real power in real life, that’s not pretend. She emphatically said yes. So I told her that knowledge is power. I asked her if she knew what knowledge was. She shook her head no. I told her it was knowing things, and that she needed to know as many things as possible, and that she needed to think about things deeply, otherwise people would be able to trick her into doing things she didn’t want to do. Her eyes were big and wide when she asked, “How do you get knowledge?” The answer was, you start by learning how to read and then it’s by learning as much as you can. After that she was more motivated to take the risk of reading on her own. This strategy also worked on her best friend Minhtri, an ELL boy, who is also a Naruto fan. He can now read better than many of the students who have English as a first language. It helps, of course, that he has support from his parents to learn how to read English, but it doesn’t change the marked improvement I noticed in his reading ability after explaining that knowledge is power and how to obtain said knowledge.

I believe that we are still having a literacy power struggle. The basal readers kids are required to read are uninteresting, and in my opinion are worse than Dick and Jane books. There’s no substance to them. They seem to discourage reading. Insisting that children read thirty minutes a day leads many parents who are not avid readers to tell their children they have to read for thirty minutes because their teacher or principal said so. Such tactics demotivate reading. And the less you read, the less good you will be at It, and as a result the less knowledgeable you will be.

The math curriculum is another problem area in this. It is only recently that it is shifting to something more than arbitrary rules and rote memorization. Math is a dreaded subject for most students, and Hazel had already developed a bit of math anxiety. She didn’t want to do any math outside of school. So I asked her, do you know what math is? She said no. I told her it was simply playing with puzzles and patterns using numbers (and shapes too). Her entire view on math changed and she does math for fun now. Sometimes we do it together. This has aided in her ability to think more thoughtfully on things. Mathematics is a precursor to critical thinking skills since you need to understand the fundamentals of statistics, as well as proper procedures in conducting valid studies so that when you read an article about some new study you’ll be able to determine whether or not the study is valid. If you have little to no understanding of what the numbers mean or how those conducting the study came to their conclusion then you will be easily duped by bad science and propaganda.

Public schools generally do not teach children how to become critical thinkers. In most classrooms the teachers have a, do as I say or else, kind of atmosphere and as such do not encourage children to learn how to effectively argue with her if they disagree with her. I teach Hazel how to argue with me. She does not get anything when she fusses, whines or pitches a fit in any way, but she often gets her way when she can present her argument logically and calmly. For example, if she asks me to let her watch an episode of Avatar and I say not right now, she will ask a clarifying question, such as later today? This is good, because it removes false assumptions. I encourage this kind of behavior. If I say, later today, she will look at the time and if it’s nigh onto evening she’ll then say, but Mom, you’re going to be making dinner soon and after dinner we have to clean up and then it’s bed time, I won’t have time to watch it later. I had just told her she could watch it later today, but her argument is reasonable and sound and delivered calmly. As such, she gets to watch Avatar sooner rather than later. However, if she pulls the same argument but has a conniption fit instead she doesn’t get anything. Of course, she doesn’t always do this perfectly. After all, she is only six years old, but it has dramatically increased her reasoning capabilities and has thus aided her at school, church, and in her social life.

When you are a child, building the foundation for knowledge, and thus power, is much simpler. When you are an adult it is harder to learn how to think critically. You end up challenging preconceived notions which can be a scary thing, and it stretches your brain in ways you are not used to. Many adults start the process but do not finish the process of becoming a critical thinker. I believe that those in politics and other positions of power prefer it that way. After all, the less knowledge you have the more easily manipulated you are and the more susceptible you are to various propaganda. It also means that even if you know in your gut that you right about something but you don’t know how to logically back it up and the opposing position does, then you are on the losing side of the battle.

I work hard to foster the quest for knowledge and reasoning capabilities in children I have influence over. I believe that doing so is vital to their future. I haven’t heard any complaints yet!

Botelho, M.J., & Rudman, M.K. (2009). Critical Multicultural Analysis of Children’s Literature. Mirrors, Windows, and Doors. Routledge.

A few days ago Hazel, who turned six years old last month, started asking me some interesting questions at the dinner table. Not, where do babies come from, but how do they come out. Our conversation went something like this.

Hazel: Mom, if babies aren’t cut out how do they come out? Does it [making belly popping gestures] pop? [she had a that-doesn't-quite-make-sense look]
Mom: No, the baby doesn’t pop out.
Hazel: So, then how does the baby get out?
Mom: [sighing since there doesn't seem to be any way out of the conversation, then looks straight at Hazel] Through your v-.
Hazel: [big eyes, hands covering her v-] Owwwww.
Mom: But it’s not a big deal because your body prepares for it.
Hazel: [pauses and takes a few bites of egg - yes I made eggs for dinner] So, how does the baby come out through the v-?
Mom: [surprised that the conversation isn't over] Contractions, your muscles in your abdomen start moving like this [makes exaggerated contraction motions with hands].
Hazel: How does that make the baby come out?
Mom: The muscle contractions [makes exaggerated contraction motions with hands] help push the baby out.
Hazel: How does it get through the v-?
Mom: Well, the contractions let the body know that it’s time and it makes the v- bigger. It’s small like this [curls forefinger and thumb together] and then when the contractions happen it slowly gets bigger like this [slowly makes about a ten centimeter circle with hands] so it’s big enough to let the baby through.
Hazel: [nods] Oh. [a few minutes later she asks] You know when I came out?
Mom: [what this conversation isn't over yet!?] Yeah?
Hazel: How did you know I was done?
Mom: The contractions. You don’t get them until it’s time [really my water broke first but I was opting for the KISS method].
Hazel: What if it hurts too much?
Mom: Oh, the hospital has medicine for that.
Hazel: Did you have medicine?
Mom: Yep.
Hazel: You couldn’t handle it?
Mom: Only because I wouldn’t listen to Daddy.
Hazel: So, you could handle it if you listened to your husband, if you didn’t listen to your husband you couldn’t handle it?
Mom: That’s right.
Hazel: How long did it take you to get me out?
Mom: From the time my water broke at 10:20 to 3:35 [counts on my fingers and thinks, oops, I hope she doesn't ask me what "water broke" means] was five hours and fifteen minutes.
Hazel: And the contractions made me come out?
Mom: Yes, but at the last part the doctor said I had to help push you out and I only had three pushes.
Hazel: How did you help?
Mom: It’s kinda like when you go poopy, but not.
Hazel: Like this? [makes pushing motions and noises]
Mom: Sort of.
Hazel: [after a bit of thinking, and here Mom notices that whenever Hazel is looking to her upper left she's mulling things over and getting ready to ask another question] How do you get the baby?
Mom: What do you mean?
Hazel: How do you get the baby so that it doesn’t go bonk, pth bleh [makes baby hitting its head on something gestures and noises], and not get hurt?
Mom: Oh! That’s what the doctor’s there for.
Hazel: The doctor catches the baby and helps the baby come out nice and safe?
Mom: Yes.
[A few minutes later while Mom is clearing the table and putting away extra food, Mom realizes the conversation isn't over.]
Hazel: Mom, [turns around in chair towards kitchen] if the baby is in your tummy what happens to your food?
Mom: Well, we say it’s in our tummy but it’s not really. The baby isn’t in your stomach where your food goes.
Hazel: Oh, it’s not?
Mom: No.
Hazel: Where is it then?
Mom: In your uterus.
Hazel: Uterus? [makes a weird face] But where does your food go? [gestures wildly at the trunk of her body]
Mom: Hazel, is your brain the same as your heart? [points to each organ as she says them]
Hazel: [shakes head]
Mom: Is your heart the same as your stomach?
Hazel: [shakes head]
Mom: Then does it make sense for your stomach and uterus to be the same?
Hazel: [smiles] No.
[This led to a discussion of the digestive system, complete with Mom drawing a simple diagram, with Hazel trying to figure out how the body absorbs what it needs. It also led Mom to draw a simple diagram of the uterus and making it slowly get bigger and bigger. After this Hazel was satisfied. Yay! But then she asked]
Hazel: How come only girls can have a baby?
Mom: Because boys don’t have a uterus, only girls do.
Hazel: Why?
Mom: Because boys are different from girls.
Hazel: How?
Mom: [exasperated going back to the basics, thank you Kindergarten Cop] Look boys have a p- girls have a v-.
Hazel: P-? [gives me the what-are-you-talking-about look]
Mom: [sigh] Okay, you know what what Daddy looks like naked? [that's a funny story right there]
Hazel: Yeah.
Mom: That’s not a fat v- [as Hazel previously asserted many moons ago] that’s a p-.
Hazel: Oh. So, why do boys have a p- and girls have a v-.
Mom: Because God made us that way. It’s just the way it is.
Hazel: Okay.
[Done! Huzzah! YAY!]

I didn’t start asking such in depth questions until I was nine, I was happy knowing that having babies is something that big people can do. . . Dang. No wonder her school teacher said that Hazel was academically ready for third grade. Geez. . .

Edit: Note, all instances of “v-” refers to the female nether regions that start with that letter, and all instances with “p-” refers to the male nether regions that start with that letter. I changed it because I have been having some spam issues and I am hoping that they will cease since they started soon after this post was created.

I know, 100%, the difference between these three words, there, their, they’re.  I know how they are to be used.  So, imagine my horror when I found a grievous error whilst rereading an ish of my old Ruthiechan’s Station: e-APA Division fanzine .  The sentence read thus; “They’re music is, really cool.”   . . .     . . .     . . .     *cries* *sniff* Way to go to look like an idiot.  What probably happened was that I didn’t have time to do a proper editing job which was rather common with my e-APA (electronic Amateur Press Association)  contributions.  Another possibility is that sometimes I’ll start saying one thing one way, and then I’ll change the way I’m going to express that one thing but, then forget to rework the grammar or syntax.

I’m pretty anal about this sort of thing, especially when it comes to the internet. What you write, and how you write is ALL that people have to go on.  So, if I am using the improper word then it looks like I’m an ignorant git which can cause people to not take me seriously.  I remember playing Shadowbane nearly five years ago.  I was typing into guild chat saying something like, Your crazy. I then saw my typo and typed into guild chat a correction, *You’re.  The response was an immediate, Oh my god,  someone actually knows the difference! and Thank you for displaying intelligence, and Hey, it’s nice to see a newb who understands these things.  Those responses caused me to be even more careful about my writing, especially since I almost didn’t bother with making the correction. The less careful I am the more stupid mistakes I make (hey, maybe there’s a life lesson in there somewhere).

I remember in an online class I had a while back one of the students always used the word “are” in place of “our”. I politely mentioned it to her in a private email because she did have some interesting things to say but the error was distracting and made her posts harder to read. Her response? She didn’t care because her way was easier and everyone understood what she was saying anyway. Gah! I couldn’t believe it. My response was, Okay, if you want to make yourself look like an idiot go right on ahead. If our roles had been reversed I would have been grateful that someone cared enough to talk to me about it. In fact, I remember confusing the words retribution and restitution. I was grateful when someone pointed it out to me when he heard me use the wrong word in a conversation. It was embarrassing, sure, but I’d rather feel a bit embarrassed for a brief moment than perpetuate an error.

I’m not saying that I have to write absolutely perfectly every time, nor does anyone else. Typos happen, no matter how careful you are. I do know that some people have language disabilities so they mix stuff up a lot or suck at spelling, but disabilities are no excuse to not try. What I am saying is that we need to pay attention to how we are expressing ourselves with the written word. It makes a difference in how we are perceived. Communication in writing is fostered best (and dare I say in speaking as well?) when we take the time to think about what we want to write, how we’re going to write it (which may involve a bit of research), and to reread, read aloud, and revise when necessary what it is we are writing.