1/11/05

Here’s to the New Year!

Welcome back to school. I hope your holiday was restful, since it’s a long haul to the end of the year with very few breaks. I’ve always enjoyed this time of year, though. Everyone is settled into the year’s routines, and it’s a time for real learning.

Boy, is my face red! I was called for an error I made in Volume I, Lesson 5, with my definition of diurnal. I wrote, " diurnal (adj) (two lights): Used especially when referring to birds and animals that are active both in the daytime and at night, such as some very northern owls, rabbits and other mammals." Everything else I added was also untrue, as the correct meaning of diurnal is "active in the daytime," as opposed to nocturnal. In fact, diurnal has no relationship to the prefix "di-" which means two but "diu" is a prefix for "day."

I’m not sure how I got so far off track, but I surely did, and I am grateful to the vigilant parent who alerted her child’s teacher. As we all know, we never stop learning!

I’d be interested in knowing how many of you would like to have a midyear quiz for your students, one that would come after the first 18 lessons and which would be in addition to the chapter quizzes that appear after every five lessons. I’ve been working on one in story format, in which I incorporated 20 of the words that appear in these lessons at the request of a Texas curriculum specialist.

Here’s the first paragraph from the story, just to give you an idea of its contents: Alex, her older brother Ken, and their parents were on a spring vacation trip with their parents. As they were driving through the large city (1) of Tucson, they began to look for their rental house. Suddenly Alex called out, "There it is! 5505 200th anniversary (2) Road!" (Answers: (1) metropolis (2) bicentennial).

If you like the idea of this midyear test, would you want your students to put in the proper punctuation, or would you rather they not? Also, would you like misspelled spelling demons included for your students to find and correct? Once I get a sense of what will be helpful to you, I will make this and others available as PDFs on Word Web’s website, www.wordwebvocabulary.com.

As we start the new year, please send me suggestions of any sort that you might

have for improving Word Web’s material. I’ll do my very best to oblige.

Thank you, and Happy New Year!

That’s my word this time,

Ellie

Please contact me (emiller@seepub.com) with questions or comments. I'd love to know how you are making out with Word Web and how your students are doing!

Word Web Vocabulary - recommended on Heidi Hayes-Jacobs' website,
moving vocabulary from the edge of language arts to its center