Night at the Museum: Movie Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/night-at-museum_24.html
Tuesday, April 28, 2020
Challengers of the Unknown by Ron Goulart: Book Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/challengers-of-unknown-by-ron-goulart.html
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/challengers-of-unknown-by-ron-goulart.html
Hearts in Atlantis by Stephen King: Book Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/hearts-in-atlantis-by-stephen-king.html
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/hearts-in-atlantis-by-stephen-king.html
Speaking: Small Talk
(TESOL Worksheets--Speaking)
Google: docs, pub
This is a list of common small talk questions, with possible responses. I've been using these for a high-beginner student of mine who wants to improve have conversations with his co-workers. The intention is to keep adding and practicing more topics and more questions every class, so I will probably be adding to the google document in the weeks ahead.
Google: docs, pub
This is a list of common small talk questions, with possible responses. I've been using these for a high-beginner student of mine who wants to improve have conversations with his co-workers. The intention is to keep adding and practicing more topics and more questions every class, so I will probably be adding to the google document in the weeks ahead.
Monday, April 27, 2020
The Voice of the People by Jean Vautrin: Book Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/voice-of-people-by-jean-vautrin.html
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/voice-of-people-by-jean-vautrin.html
Sunday, April 26, 2020
I Finally Listen to Hamilton
So, who out there has heard of this musical called Hamilton?
It seems like the kind of thing I would like, right? I like history. I've got a huge - soft spot for musicals. And yet, when Hamilton first started getting popular, I viewed it with disdain and suspicion. I couldn't exactly tell you why--it was more of a gut feeling than something I consciously reasoned out. But I think I just didn't like the kind of people who I perceived as liking Hamilton--those suburban bourgeois liberals who think they're intellectuals but who get all their information from NPR, popular history books and TV miniseries. And now, they were getting their history from Broadway.
They say that most forms of irrational prejudice are just a form of self-contempt in disguise. And boy, is this ever true in this case. I'm exactly the sort of person I despise. I like to think I'm an intellectual, and I'm a self-styled history nerd. But I get almost all of my historical information from TV miniseries, NPR, and popular history books. And this is as true about the founding fathers as anything else. A look over my reading list from the past 14 years reveals that I've only read 3 books on the founding fathers--2 popular histories (The Great Upheaval by Jay Winik, For Liberty and Glory: Washington, Lafayette and Their Revolutions by James R. Gaines) and 1 book written for schoolchildren (Paine by John Vail). And there was also the John Adams HBO miniseries (W), which I saw in 2010, but didn't review on this blog at the time.
I did, however, know vaguely who Hamilton was. That infamous Hamilton-Burr duel (W) had always fascinated me, and I did spend an afternoon reading all about it on Wikipedia once when I was in my 20s.
I think most people know about the Hamilton-Burr duel, and yet its bizarreness doesn't get talked about enough. I mean, The Vice-President of the United States killed one of the Founding Fathers in an illegal duel. And then nothing happened to him. He just kept on being Vice-President. How bizarre is that? Why don't we talk about that more?
I don't recall either my middle school history teacher or my high school history teacher making a big deal about this duel at all. If it got mentioned at all, it was only in passing. Nor was it featured in the textbooks, if I recall. In fact, I think the first place I heard about this duel was the famous Got Milk commercial. And even that commercial framed the fact as some sort of obscure trivia that only a nerd stuck in a museum would know about.
Got Milk? Aaron Burr Commercial (1993)
I don't know, what was your experience? Was this something you remember being talked about at school?
Beyond that, I also knew that Alexander Hamilton was Thomas Jefferson's rival. And Thomas Jefferson is usually thought of as the father of the American liberal tradition, which I identified with. So in my 20s, when I was prone to view history as a conflict between the good guys and the bad guys, I thought Thomas Jefferson was the good guy, and Alexander Hamilton was the bad guy. And that has been largely my view of Alexander Hamilton since then.
This view was also confirmed by the John Adams HBO miniseries in which Alexander Hamilton came off looking like a bit of an ass.
John Adams rips Alexander Hamilton a new one
...so it struck me as a bit strange when I first heard that there was this new hit Broadway musical celebrating the life of Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton? I mean, Hamilton wasn't one of the idealistic founding fathers. He isn't famous for writing about liberty or the rights of man. He was the guy who started the central bank. He was the squarest, most uncool of all the founding fathers! Why make a musical about him? Was this something ironic? Was there a hidden joke in there somewhere?
Anyways, after ignoring Hamilton for the past several years, a couple of things pushed it to my attention recently.
(1) I was having a conversation with a couple of co-workers about Jesus Christ Superstar. The gentlemen in question were older than me--in their early 60s and early 70s respectively. But it interested me to hear them talk about how popular the album was when it first came out. "Everyone had that album back then," they said.
This was interesting to me. I have long been a huge fan of this album, but I had believed, as the AVclub once said, that it was "Always somewhat culturally marginal , even at the height of its original popularity." So it is interesting to hear their reminiscences about how popular the album was. And then we talked about how awesome the songs were.
So there we were, 3 kindred spirits in spite of our age differences, talking about how much we loved Jesus Christ Superstar, and then one of the guys said that he thought that there were two modern musicals--Chicago and Hamilton--that equaled the brilliance of Jesus Christ Superstar. Me and the other guy had never listened to Hamilton, so he recommended it to us strongly. "I think it and Chicago are the only other musicals that are as exciting as Jesus Christ Superstar" he said.
Well, that's strong praise as far as I was concerned. So this was the first thing that made me curious to check out Hamilton.
(2) The other thing was the Some Good News video that was circulating around the Internet a couple weeks ago, and which you've probably already seen. And because everyone was sharing this on Facebook, I watched it as well.
Hamilton Original Broadway Cast Zoom Performance "Alexander Hamilton"
It seems like the kind of thing I would like, right? I like history. I've got a huge - soft spot for musicals. And yet, when Hamilton first started getting popular, I viewed it with disdain and suspicion. I couldn't exactly tell you why--it was more of a gut feeling than something I consciously reasoned out. But I think I just didn't like the kind of people who I perceived as liking Hamilton--those suburban bourgeois liberals who think they're intellectuals but who get all their information from NPR, popular history books and TV miniseries. And now, they were getting their history from Broadway.
They say that most forms of irrational prejudice are just a form of self-contempt in disguise. And boy, is this ever true in this case. I'm exactly the sort of person I despise. I like to think I'm an intellectual, and I'm a self-styled history nerd. But I get almost all of my historical information from TV miniseries, NPR, and popular history books. And this is as true about the founding fathers as anything else. A look over my reading list from the past 14 years reveals that I've only read 3 books on the founding fathers--2 popular histories (The Great Upheaval by Jay Winik, For Liberty and Glory: Washington, Lafayette and Their Revolutions by James R. Gaines) and 1 book written for schoolchildren (Paine by John Vail). And there was also the John Adams HBO miniseries (W), which I saw in 2010, but didn't review on this blog at the time.
I did, however, know vaguely who Hamilton was. That infamous Hamilton-Burr duel (W) had always fascinated me, and I did spend an afternoon reading all about it on Wikipedia once when I was in my 20s.
I think most people know about the Hamilton-Burr duel, and yet its bizarreness doesn't get talked about enough. I mean, The Vice-President of the United States killed one of the Founding Fathers in an illegal duel. And then nothing happened to him. He just kept on being Vice-President. How bizarre is that? Why don't we talk about that more?
I don't recall either my middle school history teacher or my high school history teacher making a big deal about this duel at all. If it got mentioned at all, it was only in passing. Nor was it featured in the textbooks, if I recall. In fact, I think the first place I heard about this duel was the famous Got Milk commercial. And even that commercial framed the fact as some sort of obscure trivia that only a nerd stuck in a museum would know about.
Got Milk? Aaron Burr Commercial (1993)
I don't know, what was your experience? Was this something you remember being talked about at school?
Beyond that, I also knew that Alexander Hamilton was Thomas Jefferson's rival. And Thomas Jefferson is usually thought of as the father of the American liberal tradition, which I identified with. So in my 20s, when I was prone to view history as a conflict between the good guys and the bad guys, I thought Thomas Jefferson was the good guy, and Alexander Hamilton was the bad guy. And that has been largely my view of Alexander Hamilton since then.
This view was also confirmed by the John Adams HBO miniseries in which Alexander Hamilton came off looking like a bit of an ass.
John Adams rips Alexander Hamilton a new one
...so it struck me as a bit strange when I first heard that there was this new hit Broadway musical celebrating the life of Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton? I mean, Hamilton wasn't one of the idealistic founding fathers. He isn't famous for writing about liberty or the rights of man. He was the guy who started the central bank. He was the squarest, most uncool of all the founding fathers! Why make a musical about him? Was this something ironic? Was there a hidden joke in there somewhere?
Anyways, after ignoring Hamilton for the past several years, a couple of things pushed it to my attention recently.
(1) I was having a conversation with a couple of co-workers about Jesus Christ Superstar. The gentlemen in question were older than me--in their early 60s and early 70s respectively. But it interested me to hear them talk about how popular the album was when it first came out. "Everyone had that album back then," they said.
This was interesting to me. I have long been a huge fan of this album, but I had believed, as the AVclub once said, that it was "Always somewhat culturally marginal , even at the height of its original popularity." So it is interesting to hear their reminiscences about how popular the album was. And then we talked about how awesome the songs were.
So there we were, 3 kindred spirits in spite of our age differences, talking about how much we loved Jesus Christ Superstar, and then one of the guys said that he thought that there were two modern musicals--Chicago and Hamilton--that equaled the brilliance of Jesus Christ Superstar. Me and the other guy had never listened to Hamilton, so he recommended it to us strongly. "I think it and Chicago are the only other musicals that are as exciting as Jesus Christ Superstar" he said.
Well, that's strong praise as far as I was concerned. So this was the first thing that made me curious to check out Hamilton.
(2) The other thing was the Some Good News video that was circulating around the Internet a couple weeks ago, and which you've probably already seen. And because everyone was sharing this on Facebook, I watched it as well.
Hamilton Original Broadway Cast Zoom Performance "Alexander Hamilton"
...it's quite a catchy song, isn't it? And it also seems to promise an epic story to follow.
So, I found myself getting sucked in more and more. I started reading up about Hamilton on Wikipedia, and looking up clips on Youtube.
As I mentioned above, I had always been interested in Hamilton's rivalry with Thomas Jefferson. So I started looking up those songs on Youtube first. And boy, are those rap battles of Hamilton versus Thomas Jefferson fun to watch. It's exciting to see the ideological differences of the founding fathers set to rap music. And the verbal dexterity that is going on in these back and forths is truly amazing. So many rhymes dropping so fast. And that guy who plays Thomas Jefferson in the Broadway play is just oozing charisma. So fun to watch.
And at this point I was hooked. So then I was looking to listen to the whole album.
A good place to start is this video here--the whole Hamilton album, illustrated by fan art.
The deeper you dive into Hamilton on Youtube, the more you discover that most of the fans seem to be in their mid to early teens. (Evident by a lot of the fan anime, and also in the comment section.) This is contrary to my expectation of the average Hamilton fan being a 40 year old Broadway-loving yuppie. It took me a little bit off-guard at first (teenagers like Alexander Hamilton?), but it makes sense when you think about it. That's precisely the age when you are most moved by cheesy musicals.
Moving on from the animated version is the full album, including the songs that were cut from the Broadway version, but which actually help to connect the story together more.
The Review
So, if it wasn't apparent already, there's a lot of stuff I like about this musical.
After listening to it a few times over, however, I'm not sure I'm wild about the whole thing from beginning to end. I mean, it's got a lot of really cool and upbeat songs. But man! Does it ever have a lot of depressing songs. The end of the second act especially is just one depressing song after another.
The tragic death of Hamilton's son is unfortunate. It's unfortunate obviously because it was an actual tragedy. But it's also unfortunate from a dramatic standpoint. I mean, I get that the writer Lin-Manuel Miranda couldn't skip over this event. It's too big to cut out. But it's unfortunate, because it's an emotional downbeat that the musical can't recover from.
Dramatically speaking, the final dual between Burr and Hamilton should be the emotional climax of the second act. And the swelling music does try to make this an emotional moment. But it fails, because there's just too little emotion left to give at this point. After Hamilton already lost his son, that was the big tragedy of his life. Being shot by Burr just seems superfluous now.
This is the problem with doing biography as drama. Biography doesn't care about pacing out the emotional beats so that it fits the needs of the theater. It's not Lin-Manuel Miranda's fault, he's doing the best he can with the messy story that he's got. But it does nonetheless have an effect on the listener.
This is the problem with doing biography as drama. Biography doesn't care about pacing out the emotional beats so that it fits the needs of the theater. It's not Lin-Manuel Miranda's fault, he's doing the best he can with the messy story that he's got. But it does nonetheless have an effect on the listener.
But not only that, the whole second act is loaded with sappy weepy songs. Burr and Hamilton singing about how much they love their children, Burr singing about the death of his wife, Hamilton's wife singing about her heart being broken by the Reynolds affair-- and then the death of Hamilton's son on top of that. And then there's that long sappy epilogue where they sing about Hamilton's death and legacy. Enough. I had to stop playing the album in my apartment because it was just making me depressed and melancholy.
But on the other hand, when it's good, it's really really good. The rap battles linked to above were really good. The song about The Election of 1800 was really good. The Adam's Administration song was good. The Room Where it Happens song was really good.
As for the historical inaccuracies... whoa boy, where to start with this one?
Well there's definitely no point trying to list all the things that this musical didn't accurately portray. We'd be here all day. And you don't need me to. A lot of these inaccuracies you'll be able to catch on your own. For example, in my case, even without going to Wikipedia, I knew that the Burr-Hamilton dual wasn't directly about the election of 1800. And I also knew that Thomas Jefferson was not able to prevent Burr from assuming the Vice-President's office (as is implied in the musical). And I was fairly sure that Burr and Hamilton were never close friends.
And for everything else, there's Wikipedia.
Frequently as I was listening to this musical, I would think to myself, "Wow! That's really interesting! I had no idea!" And then I would look the incident up on Wikipedia, and realize that what actually happened had very little resemblance to what was portrayed in the musical.
Basically, if you're watching this musical (or listening to the album), a good rule of thumb is that most of the things in the musical are loosely based on a historical event, but nothing is accurately portrayed.
But I think most people are willing to forgive this. After all, we all understand that Hollywood movies can't be expected to be historically accurate. There's just not enough time. You have to compress events and create composite characters in order to fit everything into 2 hours.
So if a Hollywood film can't be expected to be historically accurate, how much lower must our expectations be for a Broadway musical, in which the entire runtime is taken up by the characters singing about their feelings. You couldn't possibly get into the real history.
Perhaps the most egregious example of over-simplifying history is making King George III into an evil cartoon villain. As history, it's appalling. But as theater, it works brilliantly. One of the best moments of the musical is when King George finds out that John Adams is going to be the next president. "That little guy? That poor man, they're gonna eat him alive!! They will tear each other into pieces. Jesus Christ, this will be fun!"
Hopefully, everyone understands that this isn't real history. If this musical serves to get people interested in the real history, and causes them to do their own research, then it will be a positive. If, on the other hand, people go around quoting this musical as if it were real history, then we'll all be in real trouble. But I'm optimistic it will be the former.
As for me, I think I'm going to add to my TBR the Alexander Hamilton biography that inspired Lin-Manuel Miranda in the first place: Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow (W). (Although I've got a long TBR, so it could be a while before I get around to this.)
One last note...
There's a Youtube clip of Lin-Manuel Miranda talking about the Reynolds Affair on Drunk History:
Alexander Hamilton’s Salacious Sex Scandal (feat. Lin-Manuel Miranda) - Drunk History
As for the historical inaccuracies... whoa boy, where to start with this one?
Well there's definitely no point trying to list all the things that this musical didn't accurately portray. We'd be here all day. And you don't need me to. A lot of these inaccuracies you'll be able to catch on your own. For example, in my case, even without going to Wikipedia, I knew that the Burr-Hamilton dual wasn't directly about the election of 1800. And I also knew that Thomas Jefferson was not able to prevent Burr from assuming the Vice-President's office (as is implied in the musical). And I was fairly sure that Burr and Hamilton were never close friends.
And for everything else, there's Wikipedia.
Frequently as I was listening to this musical, I would think to myself, "Wow! That's really interesting! I had no idea!" And then I would look the incident up on Wikipedia, and realize that what actually happened had very little resemblance to what was portrayed in the musical.
Basically, if you're watching this musical (or listening to the album), a good rule of thumb is that most of the things in the musical are loosely based on a historical event, but nothing is accurately portrayed.
But I think most people are willing to forgive this. After all, we all understand that Hollywood movies can't be expected to be historically accurate. There's just not enough time. You have to compress events and create composite characters in order to fit everything into 2 hours.
So if a Hollywood film can't be expected to be historically accurate, how much lower must our expectations be for a Broadway musical, in which the entire runtime is taken up by the characters singing about their feelings. You couldn't possibly get into the real history.
Perhaps the most egregious example of over-simplifying history is making King George III into an evil cartoon villain. As history, it's appalling. But as theater, it works brilliantly. One of the best moments of the musical is when King George finds out that John Adams is going to be the next president. "That little guy? That poor man, they're gonna eat him alive!! They will tear each other into pieces. Jesus Christ, this will be fun!"
Hopefully, everyone understands that this isn't real history. If this musical serves to get people interested in the real history, and causes them to do their own research, then it will be a positive. If, on the other hand, people go around quoting this musical as if it were real history, then we'll all be in real trouble. But I'm optimistic it will be the former.
As for me, I think I'm going to add to my TBR the Alexander Hamilton biography that inspired Lin-Manuel Miranda in the first place: Alexander Hamilton by Ron Chernow (W). (Although I've got a long TBR, so it could be a while before I get around to this.)
One last note...
There's a Youtube clip of Lin-Manuel Miranda talking about the Reynolds Affair on Drunk History:
Alexander Hamilton’s Salacious Sex Scandal (feat. Lin-Manuel Miranda) - Drunk History
I'm posting this here for two reasons: One, I really love Drunk History, and this clip is really funny. But two, it's interesting to see all the differences between this and the musical.
James Monroe is not in the musical at all, but again, I understand that they had to make composite characters, so in the musical Jefferson, Madison, and Burr have to stand in for Hamilton's antagonists at every historical juncture.
But also, it's interesting to see in the Drunk History clip how aware Lin-Manuel Miranda appears to be about all of Hamilton's faults. Much different than the figure he romanticized in the Broadway musical, and he knows it.
(Wait... did I just use an episode of Drunk History to fact check the historical accuracy of a Broadway musical? Truly, I need to give up all my pretensions of being a serious intellectual historian, and just accept myself for the low-brow dabbler that I am.)
(Wait... did I just use an episode of Drunk History to fact check the historical accuracy of a Broadway musical? Truly, I need to give up all my pretensions of being a serious intellectual historian, and just accept myself for the low-brow dabbler that I am.)
Final verdict: I definitely like some of the songs on the Hamilton album. And I found it very entertaining the first couple times listening through. Upon repeat listenings, I've decided I'm not wild about the album as a whole. Too many depressing songs. But if you haven't checked it out yet, it's worth checking out. And there are a few really bopping songs on the album that I still really like.
Addendums:
* I mentioned above that my co-worker also mentioned Chicago as the other musical he really liked. I actually had some frustrations with Chicago. I liked the music well enough, but it was so frustrating to watch the movie the first time. I was involved with the story, and kept wanting the story to move forward. But they kept stopping the story to do more songs.
Well, that's the problem with musicals, right?
To Hamilton's credit, though, they rarely stop the story to do a song. The songs are the story. Each song advances the story. (Mostly--until we get to the second act, and then there are a lot of sappy songs that stop the story.)
* I don't really have a project for reviewing music on this blog, so I'm going to classify this one half under "Sharing Music I like"...even though I've decided I'm not wild about all of the songs on the album. But I at least like most of it. And also I'll classify it under my reviews of Youtube series, because it has been entirely through the Youtube videos linked to above that I've been able to experience this musical.
Video Review
Video review HERE and embedded below:
Link of the Day
“Gangster in the White House”: Noam Chomsky on COVID-19, WHO, China, Gaza and Global Capitalism
Video Review
Video review HERE and embedded below:
Link of the Day
“Gangster in the White House”: Noam Chomsky on COVID-19, WHO, China, Gaza and Global Capitalism
Saturday, April 25, 2020
Karl Marx: An Intimate Biography by Saul Padover: Book Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/karl-marx-intimate-biography-by-saul.html
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/karl-marx-intimate-biography-by-saul.html
Friday, April 24, 2020
Justice League of America: Superman--The Never-Ending Battle by Roger Stern: Book Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/justice-league-of-america-superman.html
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/justice-league-of-america-superman.html
Life Beginner: 8D One Moment Please p.100
Google Drive Folder HERE
[Notes: Another lesson which I prepared for delivering online, but I believe it can be used for either online teaching or for studying in person. It is mostly adapted from the material in Life Beginner: 8D One Moment Please p.100, but supplemented by one of my speaking warm-ups on movies--in this case the warm-up is completely unrelated to the main lesson aims, and is purely here for a fun warmer/padding.]
Thursday, April 23, 2020
Suggested Professional Development Actions for Teachers
(TESOL Worksheets--Workshops and Teacher Development)
Google: docs, pub
[Note: This one comes under my manager hat. At my school, after we observe teachers, we are supposed to suggest a professional development action for them. This often can take the form of watching a short video, or reading a short article. Recently I was thinking that I was spending a lot of time tracking down appropriate videos or articles, and that it might be useful for me to start indexing the material that I was using. This is a work in progress, so my plan is to keep adding to this index as I find new materials. I'm going to keep editing and updating the google doc, but I might not keep updating this blog post. For for the most recent edition, check the Google doc linked to above]
Google: docs, pub
[Note: This one comes under my manager hat. At my school, after we observe teachers, we are supposed to suggest a professional development action for them. This often can take the form of watching a short video, or reading a short article. Recently I was thinking that I was spending a lot of time tracking down appropriate videos or articles, and that it might be useful for me to start indexing the material that I was using. This is a work in progress, so my plan is to keep adding to this index as I find new materials. I'm going to keep editing and updating the google doc, but I might not keep updating this blog post. For for the most recent edition, check the Google doc linked to above]
General Classroom Management
Giving Instructions
Language Lessons (Grammar and Vocabulary)
Staging
Presentation Stage
Clarification Stage
Controlled Practice
Receptive Skills
Staging
Reading Comprehension Questions
Barbarella: Queen of the Galaxy: Movie Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/barbarella-queen-of-universe.html
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/07/barbarella-queen-of-universe.html
Wednesday, April 22, 2020
Lucky Number Slevin: Movie Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/06/lucky-number-slevin.html
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/06/lucky-number-slevin.html
Life Beginner: 8C Cats in Crisis p.98-99
Google Drive Folder HERE
[Notes: Another lesson which I prepared for delivering online, but I believe it can be used for either online teaching or for studying in person. It is mostly adapted from the material in Life Beginner: 8C Cats in Crisis p.98-99, but supplemented by my other material: How Question Practice with Partner and How Questions: Matching Words.]
Tuesday, April 21, 2020
The Departed: Movie Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/06/departed.html
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/06/departed.html
Monday, April 20, 2020
Ain't: Daily Vocabulary
(TESOL Worksheets--Daily Vocabulary)
Youtube Video--Google: docs, pub-- Slideshow (slides, pub), Playlist--Songsheets: Ain't Got No I Got Life, Ain't No Sunshine, Ain't no Mountain High Enough, I ain't Marching Anymore
(Recycling some material from a previous lesson. Also recycling previous TESOL songsheets from HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE).
Ain’t
Youtube: https://youtu.be/_WkJ9oyR9sM
Today's vocabulary is: ain't. Ain't is a very useful word to know because it is so common in everyday English conversation. It's so common. You can hear it all the time, and yet in my experience, many students of English don't know this word. At least that's been my experience. And I think this is because, even though this word is very common in conversational English, it's considered informal and so teachers don't teach this word in the classroom. But let me know what your experience has been. Did you learn this word? If so, where did you learn it? Did you learn it in the classroom?
Ain’t is used to mean “not”. More specifically, it can be used instead of “am not”. “is not”, or “are not”.
For example:
“I am not a doctor”, can become “I ain't a doctor”.
“He is not a teacher” can become “He ain't a teacher”.
“You aren't a policeman” could become “You ain't a policeman” et cetera.
Now, notice that ain't does not inflect. For example: I am not, you are not, he is not, they are not, et cetera, becomes: I ain't, you ain't, they ain't, he ain't. It's always ain't. Ain’t doesn't change.
Ain’t can also be used instead of has not or have not.
For example:
“I haven't got any money”, can become “I ain't got no money”.
Or “You haven't seen anything yet,” can become “You ain't seen nothing yet.”
Somewhat less commonly, ain't can be used instead of don't, doesn't or didn't, but this isn't as common. Most commonly it's used instead of am not, is not, are not, has not, and haven't.
When I was at school, I was taught by teachers not to use ain't. The teachers told us that ain't isn't a word, and so we shouldn't use it.
When we were children, we used to say a rhyme or a chant: “Ain't ain't a word, so I ain't going to say ain’t anymore”, which translated into standard English would be: “ain’t isn't a word so I'm not going to say ain’t anymore.” But as children we thought it was funny to use the word ain't in the same sentence saying that we weren't going to use ain't. We thought we were quite clever when we were children. It was usually said with a chant or a singsong type voice, for example: “Ain't ain’t a word so I ain't going to say ain't anymore.” Or something like that.
But in fact, ain't is a word. In fact it’s a very old word and is a perfectly fine word. It is in a lot of English songs and music. It's in a lot of English movies and TV, and it's even in a lot of very respected English literature, for example The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain or The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn also by Mark Twain. These are some of the most famous and some of the most well-respected works of American literature, and the characters in these books use ain’t all the time. So it is a word, and it is something that you will hear in conversation a lot and you will also hear it in English movies and TV shows and music.
However some people think that the word is associated with uneducated people or that it's low-class, and for that reason some parents or teachers will tell their children not to use it. In my opinion it’s a perfectly fine word, but you should be aware that there are some situations where you can use it, and some situations where you shouldn't use it. It's informal, English, so you shouldn't use it in any formal situations. For example if you are writing a business letter, you shouldn't use ain’t and if you are writing a report for your school, you shouldn't use ain’t and if you are taking any kind of standardized English speaking test like the TOEIC or the TOEFL or the IELTS, you shouldn't use ain’t. However if you're in conversation with your friends, it's perfectly fine to use this word in friendly conversation.
This word is very common in a lot of English music. A lot of famous songs use this word. In fact you may have already heard this word while listening to English pop songs. I'll give you the titles of some of the more famous songs that have this word, and it may be useful to find these songs on YouTube and listen to the-- just to get some idea of how common the word can be. For example “Ain't no Sunshine” or sometimes “Ain't no Sunshine When She's Gone” or “Ain't Got No--I got Life” or “Ain't No Mountain High Enough”. I’ll write the names of these songs in the description to this video down below so you can see the titles and search for these songs on YouTube. If you can find a copy of the song, it may be useful to listen to it, just to see how the word ain't is used in real songs.
One more thing about the word ain’t is it's often used in what we call double negative sentences. So a double negative sentence could be something like: “I don't have no money.” So don't is a negative marker and no is a negative, so we have two negatives in this sentence. So we call it a double negative. Now, in formal English it is usually thought that the two negatives can cancel each other out. For example, “I don't have no money” would mean actually I do have some money. But in informal English, double negatives are often used for emphasis--to make the phrase stronger. So, for example, “I ain't got no money” means I don't have any money and it's a stronger way of saying it, or “Ain't no sunshine when she's gone,” means there isn't any sunshine when she's gone, and it's just a stronger form, or “Ain't no mountain high enough,” means there isn't any mountain high enough. Et cetera. So, be aware that quite often when you see ain't used in conversation or in sentences it may have two negative markers in the sentence, but that's often used in informal English to make the negative stronger.
So let me know in the comments what your experience has been learning ain't in schools, if you study English as a second language, and also if you would like some practice, try using ain’t in a sentence in the comments below, and I can give you some feedback about how natural or unnatural the sentence sounds.
Youtube Video--Google: docs, pub-- Slideshow (slides, pub), Playlist--Songsheets: Ain't Got No I Got Life, Ain't No Sunshine, Ain't no Mountain High Enough, I ain't Marching Anymore
(Recycling some material from a previous lesson. Also recycling previous TESOL songsheets from HERE, HERE, HERE and HERE).
Ain’t
Youtube: https://youtu.be/_WkJ9oyR9sM
Today's vocabulary is: ain't. Ain't is a very useful word to know because it is so common in everyday English conversation. It's so common. You can hear it all the time, and yet in my experience, many students of English don't know this word. At least that's been my experience. And I think this is because, even though this word is very common in conversational English, it's considered informal and so teachers don't teach this word in the classroom. But let me know what your experience has been. Did you learn this word? If so, where did you learn it? Did you learn it in the classroom?
Ain’t is used to mean “not”. More specifically, it can be used instead of “am not”. “is not”, or “are not”.
For example:
“I am not a doctor”, can become “I ain't a doctor”.
“He is not a teacher” can become “He ain't a teacher”.
“You aren't a policeman” could become “You ain't a policeman” et cetera.
Now, notice that ain't does not inflect. For example: I am not, you are not, he is not, they are not, et cetera, becomes: I ain't, you ain't, they ain't, he ain't. It's always ain't. Ain’t doesn't change.
Ain’t can also be used instead of has not or have not.
For example:
“I haven't got any money”, can become “I ain't got no money”.
Or “You haven't seen anything yet,” can become “You ain't seen nothing yet.”
Somewhat less commonly, ain't can be used instead of don't, doesn't or didn't, but this isn't as common. Most commonly it's used instead of am not, is not, are not, has not, and haven't.
When I was at school, I was taught by teachers not to use ain't. The teachers told us that ain't isn't a word, and so we shouldn't use it.
When we were children, we used to say a rhyme or a chant: “Ain't ain't a word, so I ain't going to say ain’t anymore”, which translated into standard English would be: “ain’t isn't a word so I'm not going to say ain’t anymore.” But as children we thought it was funny to use the word ain't in the same sentence saying that we weren't going to use ain't. We thought we were quite clever when we were children. It was usually said with a chant or a singsong type voice, for example: “Ain't ain’t a word so I ain't going to say ain't anymore.” Or something like that.
But in fact, ain't is a word. In fact it’s a very old word and is a perfectly fine word. It is in a lot of English songs and music. It's in a lot of English movies and TV, and it's even in a lot of very respected English literature, for example The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain or The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn also by Mark Twain. These are some of the most famous and some of the most well-respected works of American literature, and the characters in these books use ain’t all the time. So it is a word, and it is something that you will hear in conversation a lot and you will also hear it in English movies and TV shows and music.
However some people think that the word is associated with uneducated people or that it's low-class, and for that reason some parents or teachers will tell their children not to use it. In my opinion it’s a perfectly fine word, but you should be aware that there are some situations where you can use it, and some situations where you shouldn't use it. It's informal, English, so you shouldn't use it in any formal situations. For example if you are writing a business letter, you shouldn't use ain’t and if you are writing a report for your school, you shouldn't use ain’t and if you are taking any kind of standardized English speaking test like the TOEIC or the TOEFL or the IELTS, you shouldn't use ain’t. However if you're in conversation with your friends, it's perfectly fine to use this word in friendly conversation.
This word is very common in a lot of English music. A lot of famous songs use this word. In fact you may have already heard this word while listening to English pop songs. I'll give you the titles of some of the more famous songs that have this word, and it may be useful to find these songs on YouTube and listen to the-- just to get some idea of how common the word can be. For example “Ain't no Sunshine” or sometimes “Ain't no Sunshine When She's Gone” or “Ain't Got No--I got Life” or “Ain't No Mountain High Enough”. I’ll write the names of these songs in the description to this video down below so you can see the titles and search for these songs on YouTube. If you can find a copy of the song, it may be useful to listen to it, just to see how the word ain't is used in real songs.
One more thing about the word ain’t is it's often used in what we call double negative sentences. So a double negative sentence could be something like: “I don't have no money.” So don't is a negative marker and no is a negative, so we have two negatives in this sentence. So we call it a double negative. Now, in formal English it is usually thought that the two negatives can cancel each other out. For example, “I don't have no money” would mean actually I do have some money. But in informal English, double negatives are often used for emphasis--to make the phrase stronger. So, for example, “I ain't got no money” means I don't have any money and it's a stronger way of saying it, or “Ain't no sunshine when she's gone,” means there isn't any sunshine when she's gone, and it's just a stronger form, or “Ain't no mountain high enough,” means there isn't any mountain high enough. Et cetera. So, be aware that quite often when you see ain't used in conversation or in sentences it may have two negative markers in the sentence, but that's often used in informal English to make the negative stronger.
So let me know in the comments what your experience has been learning ain't in schools, if you study English as a second language, and also if you would like some practice, try using ain’t in a sentence in the comments below, and I can give you some feedback about how natural or unnatural the sentence sounds.
Saturday, April 18, 2020
Louise Michel by Edith Thomas: Book Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/01/louise-michel-by-edith-thomas.html
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/01/louise-michel-by-edith-thomas.html
Friday, April 17, 2020
Lesson on Present Perfect and Present Perfect Continuous
(TESOL Worksheets--Present Perfect, Present Perfect Continuous, Delta Lessons)
Google Drive Folder HERE
Lesson Plan: drive, docs, pub
Handouts: docs, pub
Picture: drive, docs, pub ,
Essay on Present Perfect and Present Perfect Continuous
[Note, the section on the regular past participle pronunciation was adapted from an earlier lesson I did on regular past tense pronunciation.]
Google Drive Folder HERE
Lesson Plan: drive, docs, pub
Handouts: docs, pub
Picture: drive, docs, pub ,
Essay on Present Perfect and Present Perfect Continuous
[Note, the section on the regular past participle pronunciation was adapted from an earlier lesson I did on regular past tense pronunciation.]
Mutiny on the Bounty (1935): Movie Review (Scripted)
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/06/mutiny-on-bounty.html
Video version of an old post (as I explained about HERE)
For the original post, see:
http://joelswagman.blogspot.com/2007/06/mutiny-on-bounty.html
Life Beginner: 8B A Typical Day p.96-97
Google Drive Folder HERE
[Notes: Another lesson which I prepared for delivering online, but I believe it can be used for either online teaching or for studying in person. It is mostly adapted from the material in Life Beginner: 8B A Typical Day p.96-97, but supplemented by my other material: guessing game for adverbs of frequency, some of us/none of us/ all of us/ one of us game, and Present Simple Formation slides.]
How are you doing? : Daily Vocabulary
(TESOL Worksheets--Daily Vocabulary)
Youtube Video--Google: docs, pub
How are you doing?
Youtube: https://youtu.be/8biVkJQ94AU
Today's vocabulary is: How are you doing?
I wanted to make this video because I've noticed students often get confused when I use this phrase. If I meet a student for the first time, I might say “Oh, hey, how are you doing?” And then the student will often panic and not know how to answer, and they may something-- they may say something like “I'm talking to you” or “I'm studying English”. Quite often the students are unfamiliar with the phrase “How are you doing?” and they think it means “What are you doing?” But it doesn't mean “What are you doing?” “How are you doing?” is the same as “How are you?” The grammar is a little bit different, but the meaning is the same, and it's used in the same situation.
Now I've discovered this problem in many different countries I have been teaching in: in Japan, in Cambodia, in Vietnam. And I believe the problem is the students, when they study English in school, they only learn: “How are you?” But actually, in real conversation, we have a lot of different phrases which have the same meaning, and in fact “How are you?” is not used so often in natural conversation. It sounds a little bit stiff, a little bit formal. People will often use more conversational expressions, for example:
“How are you doing?”
“How's it going?”
“How have you been?” and
“What's up?”
There are others, of course, but these are some of the more common ones you will hear instead of “How are you?” They all have the same meaning and the answer to all of these can be the same. You can just say, “I'm fine”.
Now, if you want to get technical, the grammar could be a little bit different. For example:
“How are you doing?” “I'm doing fine.”
“How's it going?” “It's going fine.”
“How have you been?” “I've been fine.”
“What's up?” ...I don't know. “I'm fine.” “What's up?” is a strange one.
But the answer is usually just, “I'm fine”. So technically the grammar could be different, but in real conversation this is one of those cases where nobody cares too much about the grammar. In this case. So the answer to all of these could just be: “I'm fine”.
“How are you doing?” “I'm fine.”
“How's it going?” “I'm fine.”
“How have you been?” “I'm fine.”
It's okay.
It's also useful to remember that in English, this is just used as a greeting. It's most often used as a greeting. So the person asking you is usually not really concerned with how you're really feeling., They just want to say hello. So the appropriate answer is usually “I'm fine”. Even if you're not fine, it's probably best just to say “I'm fine”. Unless this is a real close friend who really cares about your feelings.
I've noticed that often students will give honest answers to this question, for example:
“How are you doing?” “Oh I'm sad because my grandfather died.”
Now I've been teaching English for a long time, so if a student says this to me I don't get annoyed, I don't get upset. I understand that the student has misunderstood the question. But it is useful to remember if you're going to an English speaking country, or if you have a lot of English speaking friends, that most commonly, this is just used as a way to say hello, and the person asking you just expects you to say “I'm fine”. And then the conversation can move on after that. If you have any problems you want to talk about, those usually will come up later in the conversation.
So, to sum up, if somebody says to you, “How are you doing?”, don't panic. It means the same as “How are you?”
Youtube Video--Google: docs, pub
How are you doing?
Youtube: https://youtu.be/8biVkJQ94AU
Today's vocabulary is: How are you doing?
I wanted to make this video because I've noticed students often get confused when I use this phrase. If I meet a student for the first time, I might say “Oh, hey, how are you doing?” And then the student will often panic and not know how to answer, and they may something-- they may say something like “I'm talking to you” or “I'm studying English”. Quite often the students are unfamiliar with the phrase “How are you doing?” and they think it means “What are you doing?” But it doesn't mean “What are you doing?” “How are you doing?” is the same as “How are you?” The grammar is a little bit different, but the meaning is the same, and it's used in the same situation.
Now I've discovered this problem in many different countries I have been teaching in: in Japan, in Cambodia, in Vietnam. And I believe the problem is the students, when they study English in school, they only learn: “How are you?” But actually, in real conversation, we have a lot of different phrases which have the same meaning, and in fact “How are you?” is not used so often in natural conversation. It sounds a little bit stiff, a little bit formal. People will often use more conversational expressions, for example:
“How are you doing?”
“How's it going?”
“How have you been?” and
“What's up?”
There are others, of course, but these are some of the more common ones you will hear instead of “How are you?” They all have the same meaning and the answer to all of these can be the same. You can just say, “I'm fine”.
Now, if you want to get technical, the grammar could be a little bit different. For example:
“How are you doing?” “I'm doing fine.”
“How's it going?” “It's going fine.”
“How have you been?” “I've been fine.”
“What's up?” ...I don't know. “I'm fine.” “What's up?” is a strange one.
But the answer is usually just, “I'm fine”. So technically the grammar could be different, but in real conversation this is one of those cases where nobody cares too much about the grammar. In this case. So the answer to all of these could just be: “I'm fine”.
“How are you doing?” “I'm fine.”
“How's it going?” “I'm fine.”
“How have you been?” “I'm fine.”
It's okay.
It's also useful to remember that in English, this is just used as a greeting. It's most often used as a greeting. So the person asking you is usually not really concerned with how you're really feeling., They just want to say hello. So the appropriate answer is usually “I'm fine”. Even if you're not fine, it's probably best just to say “I'm fine”. Unless this is a real close friend who really cares about your feelings.
I've noticed that often students will give honest answers to this question, for example:
“How are you doing?” “Oh I'm sad because my grandfather died.”
Now I've been teaching English for a long time, so if a student says this to me I don't get annoyed, I don't get upset. I understand that the student has misunderstood the question. But it is useful to remember if you're going to an English speaking country, or if you have a lot of English speaking friends, that most commonly, this is just used as a way to say hello, and the person asking you just expects you to say “I'm fine”. And then the conversation can move on after that. If you have any problems you want to talk about, those usually will come up later in the conversation.
So, to sum up, if somebody says to you, “How are you doing?”, don't panic. It means the same as “How are you?”
Thursday, April 16, 2020
Life Beginner: 8A Day and Night p.94-95
Google Drive Folder HERE
[Notes: This is a revision of my lesson on daily routines, which I adjusted to incorporate the material from Life Beginner: 8A Day and Night p.94-95. I did this lesson as an online lesson. (For the various google docs involved, this involved making copies and giving the students editing permission in order to do it online). However I believe this lesson can function either in person or online]