No, I haven’t turned religious; it’s just the title of a great book I just finished. It’s by William F. Pitts, deceased, who did field (Continue Reading)
Pat’s Polemics
On-going brilliance
Extrapolating from rules… does it work?
06/26/2007 Pat Barrett Add CommentThis to me is at the heart of the controversies in foreign language teaching. Teachers believe that teaching the intricate grammatical, phonological and syntactic rules (Continue Reading)
The relation between writing and language
06/19/2007 Pat Barrett Add CommentRecently in a post on a listserv a member showed a great deal of concern about a statement that an American had gone to France, (Continue Reading)
Unions
06/15/2007 Pat Barrett Add CommentThe following post to a listserv speaks to the whole issue of why have any sort of professional organization. Here ’tis: I never thought I’d (Continue Reading)
Teaching Spanish-Speaking Children in the 50s
06/14/2007 Pat Barrett Add CommentAs I was reconfiguring my library I came across a book titled Teaching Spanish-Speaking Children by L.S. Tireman, published in 1951. I was 10 and (Continue Reading)
certification, reasons for
06/09/2007 Pat Barrett Add CommentIn response to a job-seeker highly qualified to teach Chinese EXCEPT for not having a h.s. certificate, I responded on a List thus: Having seen (Continue Reading)
My Eternal Gripe
06/01/2007 Pat Barrett Add CommentOver and over again, good-hearted people join the bandwagon of grammar mavens. Grammar maven is a term coined by William Safire as ’language maven’, as (Continue Reading)
Virginia Tech
04/21/2007 Pat Barrett Add CommentOn one of the foreign language teacher listservs the incident at Virginia Tech was discussed in a few posts. One in particular was poignant: a (Continue Reading)
key clubs
03/04/2007 Pat Barrett Add CommentWhenever teachers get to talking about the good old days, I get a sneaking suspicion that either they are not old enough to remember those (Continue Reading)
Response to mw
01/07/2007 Pat Barrett Add CommentM.W. posted the following to a listserv: *Pat, I teach Spanish. *I want the grammar for communication. *I also would like to know how much (Continue Reading)
Reaction to Bill VanPatten thread 2
12/31/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentI finally read all 200 posts on the thread started by the SLA (Second Language Acquistion) researcher and author, Bill VanPatten (bvp). He asked fl (Continue Reading)
The Power of Language
12/21/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentJust think: George Bush 43 will probably become our most quoted president.
An addendum to the Who/Whom thread on flteach
12/10/2006 Pat Barrett Add Commenthere’s a couple of things to munch on if you believe the teaching of SE to students is simply a matter of setting out and (Continue Reading)
Bibliography on the Doctrine of Correctness
12/05/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentThe original work, as far as I know, on this topic is great for nostalgia buffs wanting a return to the fifies: Robert A. Hall, (Continue Reading)
Bibliography on History of English
12/05/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentA general treatment of English, incl its history, is the ubiquitous David >Crystal’s The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language. > >An easy read but (Continue Reading)
Jean Aitchison’s quote
12/02/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentThe Grammar Mavens (Steven Pinker’s term) cite rules of English only to denigrate those who “break” them. The rules they refer to are not the (Continue Reading)
ACTFL conference 2006 Nashville
11/26/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentThis year at ACTFL did more to rally my spirits this last year of my tenure as a foreign language teacher than any except my (Continue Reading)
Laying the groundwork for learning
11/11/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentAs I was sorting my picture files out in the garage and thinking about how students will talk and write about the pictures after we (Continue Reading)
Me and the African Diaspora
11/04/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentMy wife and I bought a pig-in-a-poke, tickets to a performance at ASU, but it had to do with the influence of African dance on (Continue Reading)
Good program showing how to argue
10/30/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentWhile I cannot recommend it for everyone, those who want to follow intelligent arguments could do worse than to listen to npr’s Intelligence Squared on (Continue Reading)
An effective and long-lasting terror network
10/30/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentAt long last I have found a reference to the terror network I think of when our fearless leader talks about terrorists and religious extremists. (Continue Reading)
The sad decline of grammar :-) OR The Mo the Merrier
10/29/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentRecently on one of the language Lists a discussion brewed up over the use of “less? in places where the grammar mavens insist on “fewer’. (Continue Reading)
Self-censorship
09/25/2006 Pat Barrett Add CommentRecently I posted to the blog some comments about what goes on in my school. I thought it was balanced, but someone kindly pointed out (Continue Reading)