Susan Fitzell-Educational Consultant & Speaker » Study Skills and Test Taking Strategies

Nineteen examples of good writing advice gone bad

sfitzell — Sun, 06 Sep 2009 15:36:29 +0000

THE GARBLED GRAMMARIAN SAYS …

1. Beware of run-on sentences they are hard to read anyway they confuse people break your ideas up into separate units that can stand alone.

2. Spoken or text-messaged English, has, like, different standards from formal written English, but, like, OMG, u c a lot of ppl 2day who 4get that.

3. Learn too spell it write even tho ewe are use sing a comp pewter; spell-check may knot cache every miss steak ewe make.

4. Your verbs has to agree with their subjects.

5. Step up to the plate and tackle the problem head-on: avoid mixed metaphors.

6. The passive voice should only rarely be used. In most cases, it must be avoided. Writers must be reminded of this rule at every opportunity.

7. Employ the semicolon intelligently, always use it to replace a missing conjunction; and never use it where the conjunction is already there; but don’t use it too much.

8. Sentence fragments. Bad idea. Usually.

9. Eschew obfuscation.

10. Eliminate redundant repetitions that say the same thing more than once.

11. Ask yourself: Did you accidentally any words out or

add add any that don’t belong?

12. Anyways, irregardless of your audience, you lose alot of credibility when you use words that don’t exist.

13. Editing carefully, dangling participles must be revised out of every sentence in which they appear.

14. A person who uses a singular verb with a plural pronoun deserves to have their head examined.

15. “Writers who ‘foolishly’ and “inconsistently” use ‘quotation “marks’” for “emphasis,” rather than to attribute quoted text to a specific source, inevitably

confuse their ‘readers.” ‘ “”"

16. i predict that your Capitalization mistakes Will come back to Haunt you.

17. Punctuation problems too may leave your reader confused

XVII. When creating a numbered list of items, number each item properly and consistently.

19. Having saved the best for last, I definitely don’t want to beat a dead horse here, but it’s a foregone conclusion that you must look before you leap when writing, which means avoiding cliches as though your life depended on it.

–

Copyright (c) 2009 Brandon Yusuf Toropov // Permission to circulate free of charge is hereby granted to those who a) retain this copyright notice, signature, and contact information verbatim, and b) agree not to alter the body of this article in any way. All other rights reserved. “60 Second Master Class” and “The Garbled Grammarian” are registered trademarks of iWordSmith.com.

www.iWordSmith.com

Better Words.

978.289.3030

iwordsmithsupport@gmail.com

twitter: iWordSmithCom

Hit Tunes from Real Teachers

sfitzell — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 16:00:17 +0000

Jeanne from Kirtland, NM teaches Quadratic Equation Through Song

During the week of August 10th I was pleased to work with two great groups of teachers. During the first great session in Kirtland New Mexico, one of the high school math teachers agreed to demonstrate how she uses music by singing the quadratic formula to the tune of “Pop Goes the Weasel.”

Teachers at Ranches Academy and Rockwell Charter HS Sing Testing Strategies!

Then I spent two awesome days in Eagle Mountain Utah with the teachers from Ranches Academy and Rockwell Charter High School. On day two, I presented, “Memorization and Test Taking Strategies”. We talked about testing strategies and three groups of teachers agreed to share the songs they brainstormed to remember testing strategies. Thanks to Sara, Kayla, Allie, Jamie, Stacy, Melanie, Angela, Dorothy, Tiffany, Tammy, and Sue (I hope I got everyone’s name right) for being courageous enough to let me film them to share with the world!

Mandalas: A Classroom Management Strategy

sfitzell — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 06:14:47 +0000

Value of Mandalas in the Classroom

I’ve often talked about the value of mandalas for their calming effect on students and their ability to expand creativity. Michelle Waymouth attended one of my seminars and shared that her students love mandalas and are proud of their work. She said that one year she pieced all of her students’ paper mandalas into a “quilt” and hung it in the hallway. Students were encouraged to write a message about how their mandala made them feel. Those messages were also hung up next to the quilt.

Jennifer Jones, from Ector County ISD, suggests putting a mandala (with enough copies for each student) into each of her substitute folders. The students can work on their mandalas and give the substitute teacher some time to prepare.

Mandalas can also be useful teaching tools. They lend themselves well to math and geometry lessons, and they can also be incorporated into units about Native American or Asian cultures.

Mandala patterns can be simple to complex and can be purchased or downloaded for free. Just do an image search, download the patterns you like, and print them for your students. My website also has several hand made mandala designs that you can use in your classrooms. Enjoy!

Mnemonic Ideas from the Classroom

sfitzell — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 19:57:10 +0000

Mnemonic devices are excellent tools for teachers who want to help their students remember important facts. An interesting and fun exercise that I talk about in my seminars is to have your students try to come up with their own mnemonic devices.

Practice Mnemonics as a Group

I’ve had more success with ‘group’ mnemonics than individual student mnemonics. If the entire group or class has the same memory trick, then we can practice the mnemonic as a class and practice it often. When students create individual memory tricks, we have to count on the student to memorize the mnemonic on their own.

So, when as a class, we need a mnemonic to reinforce facts or a concept, I have the students work in small group ‘teams’ to come up with a silly rhyme, chant, acrostic, etc. I give them 3-5 minutes to come up with one. When the time is up, each group shares their mnemonic and then the class votes on the best one. The class vote determines which mnemonic we use to reinforce learning. “Publish” the mnemonic and copyright it and put the students’ names on it. They love that incentive and it’s an effective feel good activity.

Mnemonics: Tips from the Trenches

Here are some mnemonics from teachers that have attended my sessions and been kind enough to share their ideas:

How to remember ’solute & solvent’ in a solution: A thief broke into a building and filled a bag with loot. Then the police came. The thief hid the loot in a vent, so he wouldn’t get caught. The solute goes into the solvent. Lute – loot, Vent – vent, The soLoot goes into the solVent. – Amanda Patenaude, Keene Central School, Keene Valley, NY

Use OREO to teach persuasive writing; O-opinion, R-reasons, E-examples, O-opinion restated. I also bring in Oreo cookies – kids never forget. – Beth Price, Rapid Run Middle School

Beth also has her students come up with mnemonics to help them remember the 27 amendments to the constitution. For example; with the 1st amendment, remember PAPERS spelled PAPRS. The 1st amendment is about the freedoms of Press, Assembly, Petition, Religion, and Speech. Also, PAPER is used for all 4 freedoms. Another example could be the 2 letters in DC (As in the District of Columbia). Washington DC gets 3 electoral votes because of the 23rd amendment. These mnemonics are then made into flashcards for review.

To recall the 13 colonies use 3 different sentences. 1. No More Red Crayons. (New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut). 2. Nice People Need Dessert. (New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware). 3. My Very Nice Son George. (Maryland, Virginia, No. Carolina, So. Carolina, Georgia). Kids can also draw a picture for each sentence to help them remember. -Margie Moore, Spencer School, Brighton, MI

An easy way to remember the continents. North America married South America. They had 4 kids; Africa, Asia, Australia, and Antarctica and they all moved to Europe. – Daniel Carpenter, Beaver Area High School.

Free Online Mnemonic Resources

Online resources for mnemonics can also be incredibly helpful in finding those tricks to helping students pass their tests.

Power Writing for Memory

sfitzell — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 17:30:14 +0000

Power Writing Supports Long Term Memory and Writing Skills

Pat Murray, from Greater Latrose High School in Latrose, PA uses power writing as a technique to help transfer information from short term to long term memory. She suggests that students power write about what they’ve learned for 3 minutes immediately following a 15 minute lecture. Visual learners could also add stick-figure drawings to provide memory cues and enhance what they write.

Power writing can also be used as a way to improve writing skill. Mr. Smiddy, of Staunton Elementary, defines power writing as “a method of writing designed to improve students’ writing through a three step process.

The beginning step teaches word power, sentence power (structure) and basic paragraph structure.

The middle step focuses on stronger paragraphs with elaboration.

The advanced step combines what students have learned into a multiple paragraph essay” For more power writing tips and techniques from Mr. Smiddy, check out his website.

Vocabulary and Spelling Made Fun

sfitzell — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 19:44:20 +0000

Wordle.net

I’m always looking for ways to make learning motivating and fun. Vocabulary development and even spelling are a passion of mine that has been building for the past year. I constantly hear teachers lament that students don’t remember vocabulary. Reading deficiencies, many times exacerbated by poor vocabulary development are impacting test scores – both state and SAT and ACT. In addition to that, students are developing their own vocabulary and re-spellings because of text messaging. Those new spellings are making their way into student class work.

So, how about a homework assignment (students may need access to a school computer) that requires students to create a word collage of sorts with a website like http://www.wordle.net/? Would that encourage practice? It doesn’t necessarily assist with the definitions; however, it is possible to include both the word and the definition in the Wordple design. Not only would this be fun, it would be interactive, verbal linguistic AND non-linguistic representation. We have the best of a few worlds of practice with this activity. I’d love to hear others thoughts on this idea.

Book Review: Umm… Studying? What’s That?

sfitzell — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 03:23:01 +0000

http://dietdew24oz.wordpress.com/2008/08/03/umm-studying-book-review/

I’m thrilled to find such a positive review of my daughter’s book, “Umm Studying? What’s That?” online!