An Alphabet Book that Proves How Important Etymology Is!

I have read some entertaining alphabet books in my time.  My favorites are the really old ones. The antique ones with the detailed drawings.  But then again, I’ve also enjoyed the variety that has been available for a long time.  There are alphabet books that specifically name flowers, ocean creatures, plants and animals.  There are clever ones like Once Upon an Alphabet by Oliver Jeffers.  Each letter has its own short story and some of those stories connect as you continue reading through the book.  (I recently read this book to my granddaughter.  It was definitely written with both of us in mind!)

Once Upon an Alphabet by Oliver Jeffers

There are alphabet books that aren’t really for children, but for adults like myself who are beginning to understand linguistics!  One such book is An ABC for Baby Linguists by Michael Bernstein.

Recently I found yet another great alphabet book, … but it’s only great if you are willing to ignore some of the statements made by the authors.

What they have collected here is a thing of beauty and wonder, yet they label it as “the worst alphabet book ever.”  The subtitle only makes their ignorance more obvious – “All the letters that misbehave and make words nearly impossible to pronounce.”  See what I mean?  How on earth can a letter misbehave?  It’s an inanimate object!  And for those who were once taught that letters can “say their name,” they can’t do that either.  (I like to prove this to my students by writing down any old letter and then putting my ear right up to it.  Then I wait.  I wait for the thing that will never happen.  The letter will never say its name nor any other letter’s name.  The letter will never push, trip, or pull the hair of another letter.  See?  A letter will never misbehave either.)

A letter WILL however, represent something.  If it is not a grapheme representing a phoneme in a word, it might be an orthographical marker. Either way, it has information to share.  We are so conditioned (and incorrectly so) to believe that a letter’s only purpose is to “say” a sound, that we don’t even consider that there is more to know!  But there is!   And this book does a beautiful job of reminding us of that!  Except …

The authors are painfully unaware of it.  The idea they had in collecting these words is fabulous.  The information they share about each word is interesting.  Their conclusions about this collection are sad and feed into the collective ignorance about how our language really works.  We don’t need more of that.  What we need is to see this collection of words as an opportunity to understand our language better.  To appreciate that our language is full of immigrants and each of those immigrant words enlarges us and completes us in a way.  To appreciate that our language has a history and that in the same way I got my lack of height from my grandfather, so do words acquire and/or lose letters according to their family tree. These words connect our humanity across the world, but also across time.

Armed with my own take on this book, I read it to my students. They thoroughly enjoyed it.  It IS unexpected, isn’t it?  What we expect is “P is for pickle” or “P is for panda.”  What we do not expect is to find the focus on the one letter in the word that is not pronounced.  After all, alphabet books have a mission to help early readers understand letters better by giving examples of words that begin with that letter.  In other words, words in which the first letter IS pronounced.  I guess in that regard, this book misses that mark.  But in my opinion, it hits a bigger mark that seems to be always missed.

The job of spelling is to represent meaning and NOT to represent pronunciation.  I think that is the beauty of this book.  It is best appreciated by people who know that P can be for pickle, panda, AND pterodactyl.

As we read the pages and flipped to the next, the anticipation of which word would represent each letter was kind of a sweet wait.  Our minds raced ahead trying to guess.  Once I finished reading it to the class, I thought it might be interesting to have some of the students find out more about some of what we saw in the book.  The students were ahead of me with that thought.

“Mrs. Steven, can I investigate <pterodactyl>?  I want to find out if there are other words with <pt>.”
“Can I borrow that book?  I want to pick something I might like to investigate!”

And then they were off!



P is for Pterodactyl

Two boys (two different classes) asked to investigate <pterodactyl>.  Let’s start with what Sam presented.  He has a word sum right under the word <pterodactyl>.  He identifies the first base <pter> as having a denotation of “wing” and the second base <dactyl> as having a denotation of “finger.”  The <o> is a connecting vowel.  All parts of this word are from Greek.

He also wrote the word in Greek with my help.  I brought in my Liddell and Scott Greek Lexicon and showed him how to look it up.

Many of the words that shared the <pter> base “winged” he found at the OED (Oxford English Dictionary).  This is the first year my students have had access to the OED.  They were able to find many related words by using this resource.  The thing I asked them to keep in mind, though, was how recently the words they were finding were used.  If the last time we have evidence of a word being used was 1672, it probably isn’t a word we will be using any time soon.  Perhaps it would be better to stick with more commonly used relatives!  This poster was created by Sam.  What I love about it is the key at the bottom.  Some words he marked as “interesting” and some he marked as “favorites.”

For example, one of Sam’s favorites was <pterostigma>.(Sixth from the bottom.)  He has defined it as “a pigmented spot on the anterior margin of the wings of certain insects.”  Here is a picture.  The second base in this compound word is <stigma> and it has a denotation of “mark made on skin” often made with a tool, so something like a tattoo.  I can certainly see why scientists named these spots in this way!

dragonfly wings

Another of Sam’s favorites was <pteranodon>.  (Third from the top.) He has defined it as “a large tailless pterosaur of the family pteranodontidae.” Below is a composite cast of a pteranodon.  The second part in this compound word is <anodon>.  It has the Hellenic privative prefix <an-> that carries a sense of “without” and the Hellenic base <odon> “teeth.” Once again you can see that the scientists thought carefully as they named this flying reptile.

Pteranodon amnh martyniuk.jpg
Mounted composite cast of Pteranodon longiceps (=P. ingens) at the American Museum of Natural History, New York. Photo credit Matt Martyniuk

Sam loves to draw, and did a pretty great job with his pterosaur!

Now let’s look at Jude’s work.

Jude has his word sum up front along with the denotations for each base in this compound word.  He wasn’t finding too many related words, so I sent him to a post I wrote previously that focused on <pter>.  Find it HERE.  In that post, I reflected on some insect names I learned when my husband was working on his masters in entomology.   Quite a few of the insect Orders have <pter> as part of their name.

After Jude wrote word sums for the related words he collected, he created a matrix.  Here is a larger version of it.

You’ll notice that there is an <o> connecting vowel used to connect two bases to form a compound word.  I am noticing that the <dactyl> should be bolded to show it is a base and not a suffix.  The <a> that is listed alone is NOT a connecting vowel.  In the word <siphonaptera>, the <a> is a Hellenic privative prefix added to the base <pter> with a sense of “without.”  You see, a siphonaptera is an insect that has siphoning mouth parts and is without wings.  An example would be a flea.


Another related word that Jude found interesting was <iopterous> “violet wing.”  The first base is from Greek ion “violet, violet color.”  It is related to <iodine> which is an element on the periodic table and means “violet in appearance.”

Hans (
Iodine is a violet vapor or blue-black solid.

As you can see, even though both boys investigated the same word, they each found related words and learned things that the other hadn’t.  This is one of the things I love about Structured Word Inquiry.  There is no expected “complete” answer.  There is only what you find based on the resources you use and the length of time you remain interested in the task.  An answer key would stifle the curiosity and the drive.

One other important observation Jude made when we put both of these posters side by side was that when the <pter> was initial in the word, the <p> was not pronounced.  Most of the related words listed on Sam’s poster had the <pter> base first.  On Jude’s poster, the opposite was true.  The <pter> was usually the second base, and in such words, both the <p> and <t> was pronounced.  Interesting observation, am I right?

So what other interesting words in this book inspired investigations?



M is for Mnemonic

Danny asked to find out more about <mnemonic>.  He was familiar with remembering all five of the Great Lakes by remembering the word HOMES (Huron, Ontario, Michigan, Erie, Superior), so he understood what mnemonic meant.

He read at Etymonline that this word was first attested in 1753, and that it has always had something to do with “aiding the memory.”  He also read that it was from a Latinized form of Greek mnemonikos “of or pertaining to memory”, and before that it was from mneme “memory, remembrance.”  That was helpful because as Danny collected related words, he noticed that although some had the <mnem> spelling, some had something different.  Some had <mnes>.

He sorted the words he found into the two lists and then looked up <amnesia>.  He found out that this word was coined from the Greek amnesia “forgetfulness.”  You see the <a> brings a sense of “without,” so to have amnesia is to be without memory. (There’s that same Hellenic privative <a>!) You’ll notice that same <a> in <amnemonic> on his poster.  I’m guessing that he found that related word at the OED because it is not used much any more.  Since it means the same thing as amnesia, there must not have been a need for both words and amnesia became the more commonly used word.

Another interesting word Danny found that has that same <a> is <amnesty>.  This word was first attested in 1570 and was used to mean “a ruling authority’s pardon of past offenses.”  In other words, when someone is granted amnesty, the party granting it is saying they will not remember your past offenses.

Published byBartholomew Collins

The big thing that Danny couldn’t help but notice was that when <mn> was initial in a word, only the <n> was pronounced.  But when the <a> was initial in the word, both the <m> and the <n> were pronounced.  It’s the same thing that happened with the <pt> in pterodactyl and helicopter!



P is for Pneumonia

Alright, you got me.  There weren’t two “P is for …” pages.  But once I saw what Danny was discovering, I thought of <pneumonia> and the <p> that isn’t pronounced and is also followed by an <n>.  The next person to come to my desk looking for a new project was Cally, so I asked her if she’d like to investigate words that begin with <pn>.  She was excited!

As Cally collected words, she noticed that there was a common sense of “lungs, breath, wind” among them.  She was familiar with <pneumonia> and knew it was a sickness that was centered in the lungs.  It definitely interferes with breathing as the air sacs in the lungs become inflamed and fluid filled.

When I saw she had the word <pneumatic> on her list, I asked her to google “pneumatic drill.”  She did, and immediately understood what it had to do with air.  She watched a few Youtube videos in which someone was demonstrating how a pneumatic drill works.  I asked her to pick one out that we could show the class.  She chose this one.  It does a great job in explaining how the compressed air is used to move the drill bit up and down.

Another word that Cally found pretty fascinating was <pneobiognosis>.  I found this entry in An Illustrated Dictionary of Medicine, Biology, and Allied Sciences by George Milbry Gould.  Notice how the entry names the three stems used to create this word.  The first is πνειν (transcribed as pnein) and has a denotation of “to breathe.”  The second is βιος (transcribed as bios) and has a denotation of “life.”  The last is γνωσις (transcried as gnosis) and has a denotation of “knowledge.”  But what does the word mean?  How do those denotations combine to make a word’s meaning?

Next we went to the OED (Oxford English Dictionary).  Cally read that this word is pretty rare.  It was first attested in 1890, so it’s not that old.  I guess that there are other words we use more often to represent this meaning.  You see this word was created to describe a situation in which a newborn has died and there is an examination of the lungs and chest to see whether or not the baby had ever breathed.  So did it die before or after birth?  While it was kind of a sad thing to think about, it was interesting to Cally to see bases she knew (<bi> and <pne(u)>) used in an unfamiliar word like this one.

When I saw the spelling of another word in Cally’s notebook (pneumatique), I saw an opportunity to point out something to her.  Together we googled this word.  Here is the first entry that popped up.  There were several others on the same page written in French as well.  As you can imagine, Cally wondered why the entry was in French.

“Perhaps Google recognized this word as a French word,” I responded.  “I have a suspicion it is the spelling of the suffix here that is giving this word a French identity.”

So we looked at the OED.  The entry there listed this word as French.  It was defined as “a letter or message sent by a pneumatic post system in Paris.”  My first reaction was to wonder aloud if this is the system we see at our local bank.  We pull up in our car, put our deposit slip in a container that sits in a tube and then watch as the container is sucked up the tube and into the bank.  Cally had seen the same thing and agreed that it was a pneumatic system for transporting money or paper.  But then I noticed something else.

“Cally.  Look at the use of the <-ic> suffix on <pneumatic> in the definition.  Let’s find out more about that suffix and it’s connection to <-ique>.”

I sent Cally to Etymonline to search for <-ic>.  This is what we found:

“Oh!  These two spellings are the same suffix!  Cool!”
“Yes.  Sometimes it is more common to use one over the other.  In the U.S., we spell this word with an <-ic> more often than an <-ique>, but they are both acceptable.”


Because writing this post is such a reflective process, sometimes I think of questions as I am writing that I didn’t think of in the moment.  Right now I am wondering about the words <critic> and <critique>.  There is not just a suffix spelling difference with these two words.  There is a meaning difference as well.  They are obviously morphological relatives with a common denotation, but the <-ic> is an agent suffix in this case whereas that is not the case with the use of the <-ique>.  In other words, they are not interchangeable because each brings a different sense to the overall meaning of the word.  The same applies to the words <mystic> and <mystique>.  But then there is <communique>.  We switch to the <-ic> suffix when we add the <-ate> suffix, as in <communicate>.  It seems that in some words these two suffixes are interchangeable, and in some word families they are but not strictly.  In yet other word families they may not be at all.  Hmmmm.  This sounds like a great investigation for one of my students next year!


One last word that intrigued Cally was a very long one.  It was <pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis>!   After sending Cally to several dictionaries, we came to the conclusion that there is not a consensus on this word’s history.  At Etymonline it is mentioned that it may have been invented by seventh grade students in Norfolk, Virginia.  At Lexico Dictionary there is mention of it being created in the 1930’s and invented “(probably by Everett M. Smith, president of the National Puzzlers’ League) in imitation of very long medical terms.” All sources do agreed that this word describes a lung disease from breathing in very fine ash or dust.



P is for Psychic Pterodactyl

I know, I know.  This is the third investigation regarding an initial <p> that can be unpronounced in a word.  But when I read aloud the “P is for Pterodactyl” page in the book, the pterodactyl was indeed described as psychic which immediately stirred up Samantha’s curiosity.  I sent her to find some words with an initial <ps> where the <p> was not pronounced.  Look at what she found!

Samantha grouped the words she found by their spelling.  One of the bases she noticed was <psyche> “soul, spirit, mind.”  In her left hand list, you’ll see the words she found.  You will also notice that she wrote the denotation of the base as if it were the definition of the word.  That’s not very helpful.  All of the words have something to do with “soul, mind, spirit of life,” but they aren’t synonyms.  The affixes and bases that combine with the target base provide variations to the overall meaning of the word.

For instance, the first word she has listed is <psychologist>.  The word sum would be <psyche/ + o + loge/ + ist>.  This is a compound word with a second base denoting “study” followed by an agent suffix indicating a person.  A psychologist then, is a person who studies the “soul, mind, spirit of life.”  A more current definition according to The New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary is “a person who has, or claims to have, insight into the motivation of human behavior.”  What the bases and affixes add to the overall meaning of the word is important!

Another on that list is <psychosis>.  I’m sure the ending on this word feels familiar.  We see it in halitosis, neurosis, osteoporosis, fibrosis, and mononucleosis.  Notice anything about all of those?  Yup.  They all have something to do with a medical condition.  That is what the <-osis> brings to the word.  Someone with psychosis would have a disordered mental state, usually involving a loss of contact with reality (from the New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary).

The last word in that list is pretty interesting as well.  The word <psychedelic> is a word I heard a lot when I was young.  Bright flowy colors moving on a wall were psychedelic.  Most art images reminded me of the thoughts and feelings that can spill out of our heads.  The colors were always bright.  I was a little too young to understand the drug culture of the times.  But when I look at the word <psychedelic> now, I am intrigued by what the rest of the word means.  The OED (Oxford English Dictionary) lists it as being from Ancient Greek ψυχή (transcribed as psyche) and Greek δηλουν (transcribed as deloun “make visible, reveal”).  In combination, this word describes the effects of mind altering drugs, and the idea that the drugs made the soul and mind visible.

Love, 1969 - Peter Max

Love  Peter Max 1969; c. Peter Max, Fair Use

Notice that in Greek, the letter that was later transcribed into Latin as <ps> was ψ “psi.”  The Romans didn’t have a letter to represent that pronunciation, so they transcribed it as <ps>.  In Greek, both the <p> and the <s> were pronounced.  In the same base we also see the Greek letter χ “chi.”  Again, the Romans didn’t have a letter to represent that pronunciation, so they transcribed it as <ch>.  The pronunciation was /kh/.  You may not recognize the Greek letter, but you’ll recognize the <ch> spelling with the modern /k/ pronunciation in words like chemistry, chorus, and school.

The next group that Samantha found had a base of <pseud> “false.”  She did a much better job of defining the words on this list.  The first word on this list is <pseudonymous>.  This is a compound word.  The word sum would be <pseud + onym + ous>.  The second base <onym> is Greek for “name.”  I see that at Etymonline the word <pseudonym> is a back formation of <pseudonymous> which is originally from Ancient Greek ψευδώνυμος “under a false name, falsely named.”  This <onym> base is present in many commonly used words like synonym “same sense or name,” antonym “opposite name,” eponym” named after a person, “toponym” named after a place, “acronym” formed from first letters of words,” and my favorite, anonymous “without a name”. (There’s the same Hellenic privative prefix <an> that we saw in Sam’s investigation of <pteranodon>, in Jude’s investigation of <siphonaptera>, and in Danny’s investigation of <amnesia> and <amnesty>.)

One last word that is interesting is <pseudepigrapha>.  What I like about this word is that it  is proof that the <o> we see in all the other words Samantha listed is not part of the base – it is a connecting vowel!  What we have here is a compound word made up of <pseud> “false” and <epigrapha> “write on.”  If we look closer at the second base we see <epi> “on” and <grapha> “write.”  This completed word was formed in Modern Latin, which means it was purposely put together using classical stems.  This word was coined in 1842 “ascription of false authorship to a book,” according to Etymonline.


****  Final Thoughts

I could continue.  Another student looked at <qu> because of the page that started, “Q is for quinoa.”  This person didn’t find other words in which the <qu> was pronounced as it is in <quinoa>, but still the investigation was fruitful.  Check out the two lists this student created and what was noticed.  This person noticed that many words with a <qu> has something to do with four.  The second list were words that had something to do with making noise.

Here’s what Etymonline has to say about <quinoa>:

Some of the words in this book are loan words from different languages, but many are not.  All have delightful tales to tell.  I challenge you to look up the story of why <czar> is spelled that way.  It is not the Russian spelling.  Why not?  Etymonline has the story. Then there is <gnocci> and <gnomes>.  Did you know that the first garden gnomes were imported to England from Germany in the late 1860’s?  And what about <heir>, <honest> and <herbal>?  Instead of “the <h> is misbehaving,” why not seek understanding?  Why not find out where this word came from and how its etymology might very well hold some clues to its spelling.  I see the possibility of some fascinating stories and some interesting word families.

So let’s go back to the authors assertion that these words and letters are misbehaving and not following the rules.  I say it is not the letters who are misbehaving.  I say it is the rules. Who set such a narrow view of words anyway?  Why are so many bamboozled into thinking that spelling is solely to represent sound?  This book proves that that notion couldn’t be further from the truth!  This book proves how lost we can get when we ignore etymology!


When Your Students Beg for Grammar, You’re Doing Something Right!







Some notes before you watch …












































“Oh!  Every day!  Cool!”

“And what about a journey?”

“A journey?  That’s like going on a trip.”

“Right.  And your journey is measured in days.”

“That is so cool!”



Instead of Being Submerged in a Sea of “Sound It Out”, We Suggest Spelling Success with Structured Word Inquiry!

My students have been working on several things lately.  Some have been looking at specific graphemes/digraphs and the phonemes that they can represent.  Others have been looking at prefixes and the assimilated forms they often have.  Still others have begun to explore Latin verbs and the unitary/twin bases that come from them.   So with all of these different  investigations going on at once, how do I make sure that all the students are learning all these things?  It happens on a day like today.  It happens when I plan a simple review that turns into a simply rich inquiry.  I can’t imagine that any other review set up in the same way would yield anything less.  You see this wasn’t a fluke.  It didn’t just happen once today.  It happened three times … in each of my three classes.  Fortunately I set up my camera during one of the classes and am able to invite you in.  If I tried to tell you all about it without letting you see for yourself, you might think I was exaggerating.

Setting the scene …

Here are a few of the posters my students have presented lately.  When I say they presented the poster, I mean they told the class what their investigation was all about.  They read any words they found that were related to the investigation, and then they shared the definitions of some of the words that were new to them as they investigated.  After that, the students listening asked questions and discussions ensued.

With other investigations still in process, I thought it was a good time to pause and reflect on what we have been learning.  Every once in a while I see the students sliding back into the comfortable yet unproductive habit of robotic research.  I define that as collecting what has been asked for without thinking about what the words mean or whether or not they fit the focus of the investigation.  Their whole spelling lives they have been asked to mindlessly focus on letters and letter strings.  They have not been asked to see those letter strings as anything in particular.  I am asking them to think critically about whether those letter strings constitute a morpheme in a word.  This is a new skill for most.

Before the students walked in, I wrote the prefix <sub-> on the board along with the most common sense it brings to a base, “up, under.”  Then once the students were seated, I asked them to think of words with a <sub-> prefix.  It could actually be <sub>, but it could also be one of this prefix’s assimilated forms (<suf>, <sug>, <sup>, <suc>, <sur>).  Here is what the board looked like:

At this point I asked the students to look at the board and let me know what they thought.  Did all of these words indeed have an <sub-> prefix or one of its assimilated forms?  Is there anything you question or wonder about?

I turned on my camera and the students were engaged in discussion for 50 minutes.  Fifty minutes! Take a listen and see where their questions and observations took the discussion.  (Don’t worry.  I edited so that the first video is 12 minutes and the second is 7 minutes.  I must say it was hard to find parts of the discussion to cut.  It was all as great and interesting as what you are about to see!)

As you can see, the questions just kept coming and the students exhibited a comfort level in using the resources (on this day it was Etymonline and the Collins Gage Canadian Paperback dictionary).  They were connecting dots all over the place!  They were understanding familiar words in a new way and understanding unfamiliar words enough to connect them to other words by their structure.  Structured Word Inquiry is never about memorizing a word’s spelling.  It is about understanding it.  But becoming a better speller is a pretty reliable side effect of the work my students do each day.  We talk about words every day whether we are focused on SWI or not.

When my third group of fifth grade students brainstormed their own list of words with the <sub-> prefix or one of its assimilated forms, this is what the board looked like.  I did not take video, but you can imagine by what you see that it was every bit as rich a discussion as with my middle class.  You’ll notice that some of the same words were thought of by students in each class, but then there were words that didn’t appear in the last group’s discussion.  Is that important?  I don’t think so.  We focused on the meaning and structure of the words.  And when we needed it, we went to a resource to find out which language the word originated in and perhaps what other languages had an effect on its spelling.

You will notice that we crossed off the words <sucking> and <super>.  It was in a quick discussion that a student explained why the <suc> in <sucking> couldn’t be a prefix like we see in <success>.  In the word <sucking>, the students recognized that the base was <suck> and that the <ck> was representing one phoneme, /k/.  The students decided that if <super> had an <sup> prefix, that would leave <er> which is a pretty common suffix.  But then there wouldn’t be a base!  As I did with the other class, I had someone look up the word <super> to verify that the <sup> was indeed  part of the base and NOT a prefix.  As it turns out, this word is from Latin super “above, over, beyond.”  This word is a free base and it’s spelling hasn’t changed at all!  We talked about superheros and supervisors and how that denotation of “above, over, beyond” made sense.

That brought us to the word <supper>.  Everyone was familiar with supper being a meal eaten in the evening.  One hypothesis was that the prefix was <sup> and the base was <per>.  Another was that the prefix was <sup>, the base was <p>, and that the suffix was <er>.  I had someone go get a dictionary.  That person reported that the base was <sup> with a denotation of “dine.”  That meant that the <er> was a suffix and the second <p> was the doubled <p> from when the vowel suffix was added.  They were not familiar with the base <sup>, so I reminded them of the base <hap> that we see in <happy>.  A very similar thing happens in that word.  So even though the <sup> in <supper> is followed by a <p>, that doesn’t mean it is a prefix.  In this word, the <sup> is the base!  It’s a third word we could have crossed off.

Since we had just found a word in which the <sup> was a base and the <p> that followed it was the doubled <p>, someone wondered if the same thing was happening with <supply>.  They asked if <sup> was the base and there was an <ly> suffix.  But then someone else pointed out that <ly> is a consonant suffix and wouldn’t cause doubling.  (It is so amazing and wonderful to watch one student’s understanding broaden another student’s understanding!)  So then the student who had raised the question went to get a dictionary to find out whether or not the base was <ply>. The student found out that in this word, the prefix <sub> has a sense of “up” and that <ply> is from Latin plere “to fill.”  Someone immediately thought of buying school supplies.  Someone else thought of the way the school supplies desks and chairs for the students.  Both are example of items that fill a need.

From <supply> we went directly to <supplement>.  I wondered aloud what a supplement was?  Someone was familiar with a supplement being extra sheets of ads that comes with their newspaper.  I mentioned that I sometimes take a supplement.  I sometimes take a vitamin C tablet.  Several students nodded and shared that they sometimes do too, like when they have a cold.  So we came to the understanding that a supplement is something added to something else.  When a student looked in the dictionary, the student found out that <supplement> is from Latin supplere “to fill up.”  Then the entry said, “See supply.”  Aha!  This is the same Latin base we saw in <supply>!

Another interesting word was <submarine>.  The students were pretty confident that <sub> was the prefix here because they knew that a submarine was a vessel that went under the water.  So I asked if they thought <marine> would be the base or whether it could be further analyzed.  It was quiet for a bit while everyone gave it some thought.  Then someone said, “Could the <ine> be a suffix like in <saltine>?”   I added, “And <routine>.”  Hmmm.  A student once again offered to look up <marine> to see what evidence there was to help us with identifying the base.  The student found out that it was from Latin mare “the sea”, which really made sense to everyone seeing as a submarine goes under the sea!  Could we think of any other words with <mare> as its base?  I thought of <maritime> which I explained as having to do with the sea.  I could say that a dolphin is a maritime mammal, meaning it lives in the sea.  Then, when I was just about to move on, someone suggested a student’s name.  Marissa.  I had no idea if that would share the base or not.  It shares spelling, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they share meaning.  So I told Marissa to get a Chromebook and find out what her name meant.  Sure enough!  It comes from the Latin maris “of the sea!”  How about that?

Reflections …

In each of my three classes we started the same way, but then followed the path led by their questions.  Over and over we talked about the prefix <sub> and the sense it brought to each of the words it was part of.  We made great discoveries about some unfamiliar bases, both bound and free.  We even talked about twin bases when the opportunity arose.  They eagerly jumped up to get a dictionary when we were ready to understand a word’s structure better.  We connected the literal meanings of the base and prefix to what we understood the words to mean in our daily lives.  We stretched that understanding to other words with the same base when we could.  Most importantly, the students looked critically at the words and determined for themselves whether or not there was an <sub-> or other assimilated form of an <sub-> prefix.  When the letters at the beginning of the word were found not to be a prefix, the students could explain why that was.

This kind of critical thinking, this kind of scientific inquiry comes without judgement.  Students offer suggestions without the fear of being wrong and the embarrassment that goes along with that.  Everyone has the same pursuit, which is to make sense of a word’s spelling.  And everyone participates in that common pursuit.  Some think to themselves.  Some think out loud.  Some ask questions.  Some jump at the chance to look something up in one of our dictionaries or at Etymonline.  The engagement is high and the delight in discovering something about a word or a connection being made is often audible.  (And usually accompanied by a sweet smile!)  This is what I have always imagined learning to be like!  As Malina said at the end of the second video, “Every single time that someone comes up with an idea, we should put a little light bulb above their head.”  Man would there ever be a glow coming from our room!


Having a Blast! Creating a Podcast!

When a colleague forwarded a notice back in January about a podcast contest that NPR was hosting, I was immediately interested.  It sounded like something my students and I would enjoy doing.  The fact that I had never created a podcast before didn’t deter me.  Back when I was doing my own student teaching, I had my students create radio shows.  Wouldn’t this be similar?

The idea of having the students prepare a script that didn’t rely on visuals was appealing.  They would have to make sure they spoke in ways that complemented what they were saying.  They would have to think about the words they were using and not just assume that the orthography terms they use every day would be familiar to their listener.  They would have to rehearse, rehearse, rehearse so that they sounded more like they were speaking than reading.  And in my mind, I knew they would need to write a script that was longer than anything they’ve written to date!  What a lovely marriage of research, writing, revision, reading, speaking, and collaboration this could be!

Podcast Microphone

NPR supplied a well-thought-out plan for guiding educators and students through this process, so I decided to present this idea to my students.  Since I teach three groups of 22 students each, I wondered how many of the students would be interested.  I needn’t have wondered.  It turns out they were ALL interested!  Okay!  We were in!

We began by listening to some of the podcasts recommended by NPR.  We listened to one a day for several days, pausing to discuss the kinds of information we felt was important to have been included, the overall feel of the podcast, the seriousness of the overall information sharing, even when humor was involved, and the sound effects.  Each day, the excitement grew in regards to writing their own.  Many were regular podcast listeners and  were especially enthusiastic.  The majority of students, though, had never listened to a podcast before this.  But they too became enthused as they listened to the well-put-together podcasts each day.

The first thing we had to do was think of our topic.  For me, that was obvious.  The students would be randomly placed in groups and would each investigate a word of the group’s choosing.  They loved that idea!  The students had investigated words on their own several times and were familiar with the resources to use.  This idea gave them a level of comfort as they began.  Putting them in groups of 4-5, meant there were five groups in each class.  That meant we would be creating a series that included 15 podcasts.  The students wouldn’t just be looking at the word’s etymology or root, they would also be looking at how the word’s use or spelling might have changed over time.  It would also be important to include current information about this word’s meaning and its use.  In other words, they would be providing a broad look at a single word.  This was going to require a lot of research before script writing could even begin!

The students took a few days to think about what word they would choose.  Some were inspired by what they had been learning about during their study of the Civil Rights Movement (segregation, peace).  Others brainstormed a list and then looked up information on each to see which sounded more interesting to them.  One group paged through a copy of John Ayto’s book, A Dictionary of Word Origins, and found their word (eureka).  As soon as each group had decided, they let me know and then started learning as much as they could.  As they found out things, they shared the information with the group.

Several days in, each group started writing a script.  According to the NPR guidelines, the podcasts were to be a minimum of 2 minutes long with a maximum length of 12 minutes.  These scripts were no doubt the longest scripts any of these students have been a part of writing!  When they would tell me they were finished, I would ask them if they timed themselves practicing their podcast.  When they did, they would realize their podcast was too short.  So then the real digging began.  The search for related words.  The search for changes in spelling over time or changes in meaning over time.  The search for the word to be used in different ways depending on a context.  The search for how the word is used today and perhaps which people have become associated with the word.

And with this renewed digging, this need to find more, came some surprising facts which were surprisingly satisfying!  I could feel the level of engagement increase among the students.  They would enter my room each day with the same question ready for me, “Are we going to work on our podcasts?”  After a quick progress check (making sure each person knew their role and each group was focused), they grabbed their Chromebooks, found a table or grouped desks together and got to work.

Every once in a while I would hear an extended patch of laughter coming from one or another group.  When I went over to check it out, it was always related to their script or the misreading of it or some information they found that seemed funny.  They were still engaged, just enjoying the team work atmosphere and the shared experience of creating something worth creating!

A few groups included interviews.  The group that was looking at “segregation” interviewed their social studies teacher.  The group that was looking at “frog” interviewed me.  (My fondness for all things “frog” is obvious to those who enter my room!)  And the group that was looking at “lexical” interviewed the creator of The Online Etymology Dictionary, Doug Harper.  That interview was something we all benefited from.  It was a Zoom (online) interview and the whole class was able to meet and listen to Mr. Harper!

After three weeks or so (I kept reassuring them that the research and writing should be the most time consuming of any part of this project) the first of the groups finished, and said they were ready to record.  It was time to start the next phase of this project.

According to the guide at NPR, I could have recorded these audio files on my iphone, but with 15 groups, I could imagine running into problems with space on my phone.  So I purchased a recorder.  I’m so glad I did!  I would get it set up for the students and they took it from there.  Most all of the groups recorded more than once.  That was fine.  We were all getting used to the equipment, being loud enough, being slow enough, and having enough expression in our voices.  We turned a small storage room into our “recording studio.”  You can see my recorder on the inverted tin can in the center.  The students read their scripts from their Chromebooks so they wouldn’t have to worry about the added sound of papers shuffling.

Next we went down to the computer lab and uploaded the audio file into Audacity which is a free software for editing audio files. The students had never used Audacity before, and neither had I.  So the students learned to use the HELP tab.  When they couldn’t find their answer there, they tried looking for a video at Youtube that would walk them through editing at Audacity.  Sure enough!  They not only found answers, but could watch someone do what they needed to do.  They became pretty confident at editing and offered help to other groups who became stuck.  So not only was I seeing cooperation within the groups, I was seeing cooperation between the groups!  This experience just kept getting better and better!

The trickiest part of this editing was that at some point we had five groups in the lab all trying to listen and edit their podcast.  If headphones were used, that meant that only one person would be making decisions, so the groups usually used headphones only for listening to the instructional videos at Youtube.

But one by one, the groups finished the editing and I saved the file to a flash drive.  Then it was back to the classroom for the group.  Once they finished their podcast, I asked them to present their same script as a video.  They now had the opportunity to add pictures, images, and matrices to enhance their information.  This seemed like another way to share their word investigations in a slightly different platform!

As the groups finished, I uploaded each podcast to SoundCloud.  From there, NPR will be able to access them as part of their judging.  Then I filled out the entry form for each group.  They will be judged in the 5th-8th grade category.  Will one of these podcasts win?  Who knows.  All I know is that in the hearts and minds of my students, they have already won.  When I hear students say, “I am really proud of our group!  I’m proud of me!” then I know that this learning experience has been rich and worthwhile.  We all know that learning isn’t just about learning the content.  And this experience was no different.  These students had to persevere when the editing got confusing or they just couldn’t figure something out.  They had to ask for help when needed because this project had a deadline and there wasn’t time to waste.  They had to use patience when one member stumbled over speaking parts or pronunciation of words.  (They were so helpful and kind to one another and never minded practicing just one more time before recording.)  They had to be willing to go back and re-record if the group felt that was the best option.  You see, with every group I saw a serious goal of turning in the best version of their podcast that they could.  I was constantly proud of their attitude, work ethic, and respect for members in their groups.  Were there moments of chaos and discord?  Absolutely!  But all in all, the students learned to redirect their attention, be accountable for their contribution to the group, compromise with members in their group, and compliment each other for little things done well!

In other videos my students have created, I have been the script writer.  This time the students can proudly say they did every facet of this project themselves.  Mind you, if I noticed that something was incorrect or mispronounced, I spoke up and the students willingly amended their podcast.  But I’m sure I missed a few things as well.  Just today I was listening to the episode about “Eureka!”  About three fourths of the way through, I realized that the name of the city they were mispronouncing was Syracuse!  Made me chuckle.  Their mispronunciation made me think at first that it was a city I didn’t know!  It is still one of my favorite podcasts in this series.  Okay, so in truth I have around 15 favorites in this series!

Here is a link to my SoundCloud channel.  I hope you will listen to a few of these podcasts.  If you are wondering where to start, you might enjoy “Lexical” which has the interview with Doug Harper.  Some other great ones are “Hippopotamus,” “Not so Nice,” “Kerfuffle,” “Eureka,” and, well, all of them!  You can either listen here by clicking on the arrow in the top left corner, (in which case the podcasts will play in the order they are listed)  or you can click on my name and it will take you to my page on SoundCloud where you can see the full name of each episode and choose the one you’d like to listen to.  You can also scroll through the list below my image and choose one (although the full name of each episode isn’t always showing.)

If you prefer the video versions, there are about four finished so far.  I am busy editing more and will be adding them to my Youtube channel in the next two weeks.  Here is a link to my Youtube channel:




Languishing Over Long S

I came across an article at Science Friday called “The Origin of the Word ‘Thermometer’.”  Since a recent post focused on the base <therm> “heat”, I was interested in seeing what this article said.  It is a pretty interesting article, but I have one big question.  What do I question, you ask?  Here is an excerpt:

“The term is a compound word consisting of a Greek root and a French suffix, also of Greek origin. The ancient Greek word θέρμη, or therme, means heat, and θερμός (thermos) means hot, glowing, or boiling. The second part of the word, meter, comes from the French -mètre (which has its roots in the post-classical Latin: -meter, -metrum and the ancient Greek, -μέτρον, or metron, which means to measure something, such as a length, weight, or width).”

I’m aware that this word was coined in French, but it’s a bit confusing that the author both calls the word <thermometer> a compound word and then also says it consists of a Greek root and a French suffix.  By definition, a compound word is a word that consists of two or more bases.  It can’t be defined as a single base plus a suffix.  If the author is suggesting that <metre> was a suffix in French, that is curious as well.    All of the rest of the information in this paragraph jives with what I found at Etymonline and in my Liddell and Scott Greek Lexicon.  The structure of <thermometer> is <therm + o + meter –> thermometer>.  See?  Two bases joined with the Greek connecting vowel <o>.

“In 1626, the French Jesuit Jean Leurechon (1591-1670) first coined the word “thermometer.” It appeared in his best-selling book, Récréation Mathématique, which he wrote under the nom de plume of Hendrik van Etten.”

This is where the article gets doubly interesting.  The author shares some pages from Leurechon’s book.  And that is when I am taken back to my high school senior class trip to Washington D.C.

Without a doubt, the most memorable museum moment was seeing historical documents such as the The Constitution of the United States.  I was drawn in by the beautiful penmanship.  Once drawn in though, I couldn’t help but notice what seemed to be misspellings.  Surely that couldn’t be the case.  At the time this was written, did they really spell Blessings as “Blefsings?, business as “businefs”, session as “sefsion”, and Congress as “Congrefs?”  I looked around at other words with <s> and the only place this “f” was used was when there would be two <s>’s in a row.  I thought it was so cool.  I just accepted that for whatever reason, that was the convention of the time (1787).  It wouldn’t be until 30+ years later that I would learn more about that interesting convention.  I found this excerpt at The National Archives Catalog .  The first word in the top left looks like “Businefs.”  In the second line from the bottom you can see what looks like “Sefsion of Congrefs.”


What I know now is that it wasn’t an <f> at all, even though the resemblance is still striking.  It is a long <s>.  By the looks of its use in the Constitution, it was already losing its grip and falling from use in 1787.  So I bet you knew that an <s> could be big (as in capitalized) or small (as in lower case).  But did you know that there once existed a long <s> in addition to a short <s>?

This long <s> was derived from the old Roman cursive <s>.  Here is a image from the Creative Commons files at Wikipedia:

Towards the end of the 8th Century, the distinction between majuscule (what we think of as uppercase letters) and minuscule (what we think of as lowercase letters) resulted in the above symbol becoming a bit more vertical.    By the 12th century, the <ſ> was used at the beginning (initially) and in the middle of words, and <s> was used and the end of words (finally).  Below is an example of the long <s> in print. You probably notice that the long <s> looks quite like an <f>.  But a more careful look helps you notice that what looks like the crossbar doesn’t actually cross the down stroke.  It is just a nib on the left.  Compare that to the <f> in the sample below.

Here you can see the slight but significant difference between an <f> and a long <s>.

Sometimes it was written without the left side nub.  When the long <s> was written in italics, it looked different again:

As you look at examples of the long <s> in use, you may notice variations in how the long <s> was presented, but you will no doubt recognize it just the same.  Because the italicized version curved to the left, and that made for some spacing problems when setting the type, both the long and short forms of <s> were used in combination.  Just in case you’ve had the opportunity to study the Greek alphabet, I’m including information from Wikipedia regarding the two forms of the letter sigma (which would be transcribed as <s>) there too.


I was familiar with the fact that one form of sigma was used if the sigma was initial or medial in a word and the other form was used when the sigma was final.  If you are looking for a word in a Greek Lexicon such as Liddell and Short, this information is certainly valuable!  The cool thing is that I never connected the Greek letter and its need for two forms with the English letter <s> and its need for two forms!

Here is a beautiful example of such a Greek word:  σχολαστικός .  The first letter is the initial sigma.  The second letter is chi which is transcribed as <ch>.  That is followed by omicron <o>, lambda <l>, alpha <a>, sigma <s>, tau <t>, iota <i>, kappa <k>, omicron <o>, and sigma <s>.  Note that the final sigma <s> takes a different form than the initial and medial sigma <s>.  If you’ve been following along and putting the transcribed letters together, you’ve no doubt spelled scholastikos.  The denotation of this word is “devoting all one’s leisure to learning.”  The Greeks knew that learning was something to be done leisurely in one’s leisure time!

Now I direct your attention back to the article I read about the origin of the word ‘thermometer.’  This is a photo from the book written by Jean Leurechon.
The first use of the word ‘thermometer.’ Photo by Daniel Peterschmidt, courtesy of the NYPL Rare Book Division.

This 1626 book is the first time the word <thermometer> was seen in print!  It is difficult to read the left side page, but I will rewrite what is on the right hand side starting with the sixth line from the top:

“This is yet more ſenſible when one heats the ball at the top with his breath, as if one would ſay a word in his eare to make the water to deſcend by command, and the reaſon of this motion is that the aire heated in the Thermometer, doth rarefie and dilate, requiring a greater place; hence preſſeth the water and cauſeth it to deſcend; contrariwiſe when the aire cooleth and condenſeth, it occupieth leſſe roome; now nature abhorring vacuity, the water naturally aſcendeth.  In the ſecond place, I ſay, that by …..”

Now that you have a bit of understanding about the two forms of <s> used, what did you notice?  Did you see both forms?  I noticed that the long <s> was used initially (ſenſible) and medially (reaſon).  I also noticed it was used twice in a row (leſſe).  I noticed that the short <s> was used when a final <s> was needed (this, is).

Let’s look at some more pages from an 1674 edition of the same book.

a small sketch on the yellowed page of the book

This is from a page with directions on how to make rockets.  You can probably read it for yourself this time.  In what ways is the use of the long <s> the same as in the earlier book?  Pretty much the same, right?  The one difference I see is when the short <s> is used initially in the word ‘Snow’.  I’m not sure why the <s> is uppercase in that word, but I bet that’s the reason the short <s> is used there instead of the long <s>.

So, interesting, isn’t it?  There are actually lists of rules for when to use each form.  I easily found this list at several sites.  Here’s one from Colonial Sense, the website for all things colonial.  These rules were applied “in books in English, Welsh, and other languages published in England, Ireland, Scotland, and other English-speaking countries during the 17th and 18th centuries.”

  • short s is used at the end of a word (e.g. his, complains, succeſs)
  • short s is used before an apostrophe (e.g. clos’d, us’d)
  • short s is used before the letter ‘f’ (e.g. ſatisfaction, misfortune, transfuſe, transfix, transfer, succeſsful)
  • short s is used after the letter ‘f’ (e.g. offset), although not if the word is hyphenated (e.g. off-ſet)
  • short s is used before the letter ‘b’ in books published during the 17th century and the first half of the 18th century (e.g. husband, Shaftsbury), but long s is used in books published during the second half of the 18th century (e.g. huſband, Shaftſbury)
  • Compound words with the first element ending in double s and the second element beginning with s are normally and correctly written with a dividing hyphen (e.g. Croſs-ſtitch, Croſs-ſtaff), but very occasionally may be wriiten as a single word, in which case the middle letter ‘s’ is written short (e.g. Croſsſtitch, croſsſtaff).
  • long s is used before a hyphen at a line break (e.g. neceſ-ſary, pleaſ-ed), even when it would normally be a short s (e.g. Shaftſ-bury and huſband in a book where Shaftsbury and husband are normal), although exceptions do occur (e.g. Mansfield)
  • short s is used before a hyphen in compound words with the first element ending in the letter ‘s’ (e.g. croſs-piece, croſs-examination, Preſswork, bird’s-neſt)

Wikipedia explains the decline in the use of long <s> like this:

“In general, the long s fell out of use in Roman and italic typefaces in professional printing well before the middle of the 19th century. It rarely appears in good quality London printing after 1800, though it lingers provincially until 1824, and is found in handwriting into the second half of the nineteenth century.”

In my search for more information about the long <s>, I came across this website:  The “ſociety for the Reſtoration of the ſ.”  I was suspicious at first, wondering if this society was a real thing or not.  But as I read through the page and enjoyed the examples from old books, I became a fan of the <ſ> and of a society that would try to preserve it.  I was ready to join!  But then I saw this small print at the very bottom just before the comments.  I was not surprised, although I will admit there was a twinge of disappointment that I could not actually join this group:

“This entry was posted in Collections and tagged April Fools’ Day, history of printing, long s, Society for the Restoration of the Long S, typography by nyamhistorymed. “

All in all, the <s> grapheme has a pretty interesting history.  Makes one wonder what the rest of its story is.  Makes one realize that if <s> has such an interesting history, perhaps every one of our letters has an interesting history as well!  Hmmmm.  What a delicious idea!

“Science is Simply the Word We Use to Describe a Method of Organizing Our Curiosity” … Tim Minchin

Our 5th Grade Science Fair was five days ago, and still I am surrounded by feelings of exhilaration, and great pride.  To guide (and sometimes gently push) ten year old children through the process of a scientific inquiry is a challenge.  To guide (and sometimes gently push) 65 ten year old children through the process of a scientific inquiry is an even bigger challenge!  But at this point in time, I wouldn’t hesitate to do it all over again starting tomorrow!  Why?  Because of what I have seen on their faces during this last week.

Look at that smile!  There’s a new layer of confidence built into that smile.  There is an amazing sense of accomplishment right behind it, a head full of experiment-inspired questions in the brain above it, and a heart that beats with pride below it.

Each student’s eyes have been opened in a way that only understanding something for yourself can do.  Those same eyes spent the evening looking with earnestness into the eyes of listening adults in an effort to connect with them in a scholarly way.  And from this day forward, those same eyes are ready to see many things in the world around them with a fresh and wondering engagement.

Yes, their feet hurt from standing so much of the day.  That was expected.  But their cheeks also were sore.  They were sore from smiling and laughing with their classmates – their friends.  For this was a bonding experience.  They didn’t realize it until the day of the fair when each could see that the others worked just as hard, did just as much research, put in just as much time, and were just as excited to share their project as they were.  Their Science Fair t shirts further identified them as members of the fifth grade scientific community.  The name badges they each wore (so that their assigned VIP could find them) were designed by the students.  The advertisements found around the school were designed by the students.  This was their Fair.  This was their celebration.  This was their moment to be the teachers, the guides, the knowledgeable ones.  And they loved it.

Like any multi-step weeks long project, the experience has changed these children.  It changed the way they see each other.  It changed the way they see themselves.  They did this thing – this experiment – this thing they thought they could not do.  And it wasn’t until the last week when they were typing up everything and making graphs and putting together their Science Fair Posterboards that they realized how worthy their project was and how excited (but still a bit scared) that they were to share it.

They explained their projects to each other (visiting each homeroom) from 10:30 am to 12:00pm.  Then we set up in the cafeteria and they explained their projects to others in the school (1st through 4th grade) from 1:30pm to 2:45pm.  Lastly, they explained their projects to parents, families, and friends from 5:30 pm to 7:00pm.  At either the afternoon or evening session, each student had the full attention of an assigned VIP.  (I do not judge this Science Fair.  Instead I invite community members, most with ties to science and/or children to come as VIP’s.  This way each child can expect at least one adult that is not their teacher, their parent, or their grandparent to listen and comment on their project.)

Yes, for some students there were unpleasant moments during the first two weeks of turning in journals (required in order to keep me updated on progress and/or answering questions).  I’m sure that a few parents needed to nudge in the early and middle stages as well.  But this is a project that gets more interesting the more research you do and the further along you get.  By the third week, students not only handed in their journal on their assigned day, they also stopped to tell me how much fun they were having and what was happening!  (Since I am the science teacher to all fifth grade students, I collect journals from one homeroom on Tuesdays, from another on Wednesdays, and from the last on Thursdays.  That way I can keep up with reading and commenting in each journal.  As you can imagine, it is imperative that the students get feedback, encouragement, and guidance throughout this project.)

One student shared that in her case, she learned that sometimes your experiment needs to be redesigned. She was interested in whether or not cats have a dominant paw, similar to how people have either a right hand or left hand preference.  She sat down and thought of five tests she would carry out with three of their cats.  She would do each test 30 times with each cat and then look at the data.  The next week, her journal had that plan crossed out and a new plan written in of testing only two cats (a male and a female) a reduced number of tests.  I asked her what made her change her plan.  “My cats won’t do it!  I had to change to something two of my cats will actually do!”

In the end, she was disappointed that her cats wouldn’t cooperate with her original plan.  She was also disappointed that her results didn’t clearly answer her original question.  Or rather, she was disappointed that her findings showed that neither cat had a decidedly dominant paw.  She felt as if her project was a failure.  But it wasn’t!  Not at all!  Her project was one of my favorites because it gave us so much to talk about!  Having to redesign is part of what scientists do when they realize that the first design is unrealistic as it applies to the situation.  Then we talked about the time frame her project would need if she were to collect the kind and amount of data that would satisfy a scientist probing this very question.  Having tested only two cats, she simply hadn’t collected enough data to know for sure if gender was a factor or if a number of other cats would test the same. She decided she’d have to test many males and the same number of females.  The more data collected, the better.  That would take much more time than the five week time frame we worked with would have allowed.  Because of her experience, this student now has a better understanding of what a true scientific investigation would look like!

As I was making my way around and looking at each Science Fair presentation, I found this gem on someone’s board.  I’d say this student received some wonderful advice from her wise parents!

So many of the parents helped in this way.  They nudged when they needed to, encouraged throughout, supported the thinking their child was doing, and made sure their child had the materials to complete the project.  For many it was an opportunity to share ideas for problem solving and reinforcement of following a procedure.  The students who had that parent/guardian help were lucky indeed.  Check out this student’s hydraulic claw!

I love the Science Fair.  I can never predict who will shine brightly in the end.  Students take their project where they are willing to take their project.  Some dig deeper than others.  In the end, (no matter how much help others claim a particular parent did), it is the student standing there explaining and defending the evidence collected and the findings.  It is the student that has learned that following a protocol, applying consistent effort,  researching their topic, collecting data, and making observations yields results that are reliable and credible.  And when you have results that are reliable and credible, people are interested in what you have to say.  My students now believe in themselves a bit more than before.  I truly believe that.  Check out the video below and see if you don’t agree with me!  This, my friends, is what memorable learning looks like!


“Button up your overcoat when the wind is free….” Ruth Etting

It’s all well and good that we can put on an extra layer when the wind gets chilly and the temperatures drop, but what do the wild animals do?  How do they cope with the heavy snow and freezing temperatures?  That is the focus of the article I read recently.  It’s called “Do Wild Animals Hate Being Cold in Winter?”  It was published in Popular Science, written by Bridgette B. Baker.  You can read it at THIS LINK.

As I read it, I couldn’t help but notice a number of words that share the base <therm>.

“In fact, wildlife can succumb to frostbite and hypothermia, just like people and pets.”

“One winter challenge for warm-blooded animals, or endotherms, as they’re scientifically known, is to maintain their internal body temperature in cold conditions. Interestingly though, temperature-sensing thresholds can vary depending on physiology. For instance, a cold-blooded—that is, ectothermic—frog will sense cold starting at a lower temperature compared to a mouse. Recent research shows that hibernating mammals, like the thirteen-lined ground squirrel, don’t sense the cold until lower temperatures than endotherms that don’t hibernate.”


Most people will acknowledge these are interesting words.  But when summarizing the information, they will skip using them and go back to using simpler, more familiar language.  Often the thought is that these words are too tough for children to remember (especially if the adult doesn’t really understand what they mean).  What if instead of skipping using them, we investigated them further?  What if we looked closer at the sense, the meaning and the function of the morphemes in each of these words?  We have here an opportunity to understand scientific terminology AND word families better!


Let’s begin by looking at <hypothermia>.  It was first attested in 1877 and is from Modern Latin.  When something is noted as being Modern Latin, that means that the word was created by scientists who needed a name for something. They didn’t just make up a name, but rather they looked back to Latin and Greek for what to call it.  The word <hypothermia> did not exist in Greek, but the stems <hypo> “under” and <therm> “heat” did.  The <-ia> suffix indicates that this word is an abstract noun.  If you look at the denotation of the base <therm> “heat” and the denotation that the base <hypo> “under” has, you can see that the word itself tells you that hypothermia is when something is under it’s normal level of heat.  If a person has hypothermia, their body temperature is lower than it should be.  The base <therm> is from Greek θερμός (transcribed as thermos).

What about this base <hypo>?  It is from Greek ύπό (transcribed as hypo) and has a denotation of “under.”  Have we seen this in other familiar words?  What about a hypothesis, which is the groundwork for an investigation.  Do you recognize the denotation of “under” in hypothesis, as in an underlying position?  It is also in hypodermic, which is the area just under the skin.  That gives you a better sense of where a hypodermic needle is used, doesn’t it?  And what about hypotenuse, which is the side of a triangle that is opposite the right angle.  It has a sense of being stretched under the right angle.


When I looked for <endotherms>,  I was lead to <endothermic>.  Etymonline notes that this word was first attested in 1866 and was formed by adding <endo-> and <thermal>.  The suffix <-ic> indicates that the word is an adjective.  The suffix <-al> can indicate the same thing.  When I look at the entry for <thermal>, I learned that the first time it was used to mean “a sense of heat” was in 1837.  So using <-al> is older than the use of <-ic> with this base.

So what about the base <endo->?  It is from Greek ένδον (transcribed as endon) and has a sense of “inside, internal”.  When you pair up <endo> “internal” and <therm> “heat”, you can see that the word itself tells you that endotherms are organisms that regulate their heat from inside themselves.

We see this base in endoscopy which is when a doctor uses a camera and light attached to a flexible tube to examine your esophagus, stomach, and/or intestines.  In other words, the doctor is looking at your internal organs.

This base is also in endoskeleton which is the internal skeleton structure that all vertebrates have.

My dogs are endotherms.  So am I.


There was not a specific entry for  <ectotherms> at Etymonline, but there was an entry for <ecto->.  It is from Greek έκτός (transcribed as ecktos) and has a denotation of “outside, external.”  It is related to the prefix <ex-> “out”, but they are not the same.  When you pair up <ect> “outside” with <therm> “heat”, you can see that the word itself tells you that ectotherms are organisms whose body heat is regulated by their environment (outside themselves).

I went to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) to find related words.  This base is found in science words like ectotrophic.  An example of that is when tissues form on the outside of a root and are being nourished by that root.  Interestingly enough, the opposite of ectotropic is endotrophic!  That is when one organism is getting nourishment from within another organism.

We also see this base in ectocrine which is described as an organic substance that is released from the outer layer of an organism that will effect other organisms in the environment in either a good or bad way.  It will come as no surprise to you that this word is the opposite of endocrine, which is a gland having an internal secretion.  So in one case the secretion is external, and in the other it is internal.

Turtles and snakes are ectotherms.  They bask in the sun to get heat.


There wasn’t a specific entry for <heterotherms> at Etymonline, but there was an entry for <hetero->.  It comes from Greek ’έτερος (transcribed as heteros) with a denotation of “one of two”.  When you pair up <heter> “one of two” with <therm> “heat”, you can see that the word itself tells you that heterotherms are animals that can regulate their own heat AND also have their heat regulated by their environment.  Here’s something interesting that I found at Wikipedia:

“Regional heterothermy describes organisms that are able to maintain different temperature “zones” in different regions of the body. This usually occurs in the limbs, and is made possible through the use of counter-current heat exchangers, such as the rete mirabile found in tuna and certain birds. These exchangers equalize the temperature between hot arterial blood going out to the extremities and cold venous blood coming back, thus reducing heat loss. Penguins and many arctic birds use these exchangers to keep their feet at roughly the same temperature as the surrounding ice. This keeps the birds from getting stuck on an ice sheet.”

Chinstrap Penguin with snow in its mouth

“Chinstrap Penguin with snow in its mouth” by Liam Quinn is licensed under CC by-sa 2.0

Here is a matrix of the words we have looked at:

You will notice that all the base elements are bolded.  The connecting vowel <o> and the suffixes are not.  That means that there are four compound words represented on this matrix:

<hypothermia –> hypo + therm + ia>
(or variations such as hypothermic or hypothermal)
<ectothermal –> ect + o + therm + ic>
(or variations such as ectotherm or ectotherms)
<endotherms –> end + o + therm + s>
(or variations such as endotherm or endothermic)
<heterotherm –> heter + o + therm>
(or variations such as heterotherms or heterothermal)

You may not be familiar with a connecting vowel, so let me explain a bit about them.  They are used to connect two bases (as they are doing in three of the four words above), but they can also connect a base to a suffix or a suffix to another suffix.

My favorite example of a compound word with an obvious connecting vowel is <speedometer>.  We instantly recognize the two bases here because they are both free bases.  We also recognize that the <o> doesn’t belong to either one!  It is simply connecting them.  The <o> can be used because the second base <meter> is from Greek μέτρον (transcribed as metron) “measure”.  The first base is not from Greek. It is from Old English sped.  The sense and meaning “rate of motion or progress” is from c.1200.  The fact that one of the bases is from Greek and one is from Old English makes this word a Germanic hybrid!

Have you noticed that in the above matrix not all of the words have an <o> connecting vowel?  How do I know that the <o> at the end of <hypo> is not a connecting vowel?  I start by doing some research.  If you skim back through the paragraphs in this post, you will find that the origins of the bases are as follows:

<therm> – Greek θερμός (transcribed as thermos)
<hypo> – Greek ύπό (transcribed as hypo)
<end> – Greek ένδον (transcribed as endon)
<ect> – Greek έκτός (transcribed as ecktos)
<heter> – Greek ’έτερος (transcribed as heteros)

Notice that three of the four have the same Greek suffix.  That <os> suffix is called the nominative suffix.  If I remove it, I see the stem that then came into English as a base.  There is one word that has a Greek <on> genitive suffix.  If I remove it, I see the stem that then came into English as a base.  Those four bases entered English without the <o>.  We can also notice that the words we’re looking at today were coined by scientists who needed a word to describe something they were working on.  Oftentimes they joined the Greek (or Latin) bases (that fit best in the context of what they were doing) with a connecting vowel.

I know that <hypo> does not have a connecting vowel because it does not have a Greek suffix that could be removed.  This present day base was a preposition in Greek.  If you look in the OED, you can find several entries for <hypo> as a free base noun.

The bottom line

As you read through this post, I hope your sense of these bases deepened.  When I do this with children, it’s not that I want them to remember every word we talk about.  It’s more that I want them to take an invisible thread and connect each base or morpheme that we focus on to the words in which it is used.  I want them to see that every word is not completely new and unique.  Words belong to families, and the key to understanding an unfamiliar word is by recognizing one or more of its morphemes and being able to recall some related words to help with remembering the sense and meaning that the words share.

The matrix I created above focuses on the words from the article that had the base <therm> in common.  The joy of matrices is that they can be used for what you need them to be used for.  They don’t need to contain every possible word that shares the base (probably impossible anyway).  I love when one of my students presents a matrix they made to the rest of the class and another student asks, “Could such and such a word be added to that matrix?”  The person who created the matrix doesn’t have to feel embarrassed because they missed something.  There is no expectation that a great matrix has x number of words!  A word matrix is a starting point.  It is a thought provoker and a discussion starter.  When another student suggests a word that could be added, it proves that the students in the audience are engaged and thinking about this particular family.  That is a thing to celebrate!

That being said, a fuller matrix is really fun to look at once in a while.  Once you start thinking about this base <therm>, you start wondering what other words you know that share the base.  Have fun thinking about the words represented below.  Do you recognize the bases we just studied?  Do you recognize the others?  Are you familiar with the suffixes? Are you noticing that a connecting vowel is used to connect bases  where <therm> is the second base?  Are you noticing that a connecting vowel is used to connect bases where <therm> is the first base?  Are you aware that any word that contains two or more bases is a compound word?  Do you know the denotations of the bases I haven’t talked about?

I encourage you to use Etymonline as a starting point.  Find out what the bases mean independently, and then find out how we currently use the word by looking in a modern dictionary.  Sometimes I like to search for an image as well to further deepen my understanding.  Notice how the connecting vowel is pronounced in thermographic, thermoluminescence, thermostat, and thermosphere.  Then notice how there is a shift in stress, which changes the way we pronounce that connecting vowel in thermography and thermometer.  Interesting, right?  The pronunciation changes, but the spelling and the meaning does not.  An orthographic truth you can count on!

A warm send off

Well, this here endotherm is going to put on thermal underwear so she doesn’t have to turn up the thermostat.  I wish we had geothermal energy, but we don’t.  Staying warm might prevent the need for a thermometer should she take a chill.  Once she’s dressed in layers, she can gaze out the window and imagine that she can see all the way to the thermosphere.

“It’s cold out there, colder than a ticket taker’s smile at the Ivar Theatre, on a Saturday night.” – Tom Waits

I woke up this morning to a temperature of -26 degrees Fahrenheit with a wind chill of -48 degrees or so.  That’s cold.  The meterologists are calling this a polar vortex.  But what is that exactly?

According to an article at Business Insider called A Polar Vortex is Engulfing the US.  Here’s what that really means and why these events might be getting more common , “The term polar vortex describes the mass of low-pressure cold air that circulates in the stratosphere above the Arctic and Antarctic regions. Sometimes the circulation of the polar vortex weakens during the winter, causing surges of frigid air to splinter off and drift south. The freezing air is carried by the jet stream, a current of wind that extends around the hemisphere and divides the air masses in the polar region from those farther south. ”

The Polar Vortex Explained

In the picture above (here is a link to InsideClimate News), you can see the difference between a stable polar vortex and a wavy polar vortex.  What is happening in my state today is not typical.  The jet stream is weak and because of it warm air moves north in spots and cold air moves south in others.

The image used to indicate the polar vortex is interesting.  There is this sense of swirling movement.  Now I’m curious about the word <vortex>.  What other words is it related to?  Off to Etymonline I go!

It was first attested (first time we see this word in print) in the 1650’s.  At that time it was used to mean “whirlpool, eddying mass.” Earlier than that it was from Latin vortex, a variant spelling of vertex “an eddy of water, wind, or flame; whirlpool; whirlwind.”  The Latin variant vertex is from the stem of the Latin infinitive vertere “to turn.”

Using what I know about the principle parts of the Latin verb (verto, vertere, verti, versus), I spot the two Latin stems that have become modern English bases (<vert> and <verse>).  Now I can list words that share these bases and this denotation of “turn, turn around.”  Stop and think about each of the following words.  Do you see this base and do you sense the denotation in the word’s present day meaning?

adverse                anniversary

avert                     controversy

divert                    convert

extrovert               invert

reverse                  transverse

universe                versatile

versus                    vertebra


There are more, of course, but I just wanted to give you an idea of the connectedness of these words that share a base and a denotation – words that form a family.  I’ve colored coded the two bases because even though these two bases derive from the same Latin verb, they are spelled different and would need to be represented on two different matrices.  They are etymological relatives.

Back to <vortex>

But let’s get back to <vortex>.  Does it have any interesting morphological relatives (meaning words from the same ancestor that share the same base spelling presently)?  For this I went to Word Searcher first.  Besides vortex, vortices and vortexes, I found cavort, cavorts, cavorted, and cavorting.  Hmmm.  They might share a base, but a <ca> prefix?  I’m not so sure about that.  I headed back to Etymonline to investigate:

cavort (v.)
1793, cauvaut, “to prance, bustle nimbly or eagerly,” American English, of uncertain origin, sometimes said to be an alteration of curvet “a leap by a horse,” a word from French that is related to curve (v.). Or perhaps from ca-, ka, colloquial intensive prefix + vault (v.) “to jump, leap.” Modern form attested by 1829. Related: Cavorted; cavorting.
As you can see, there is no evidence that <cavort> is from Latin vortex or its variant spelling vertex.  However, I did find it interesting that <ca-> is a colloquial intensive prefix!  See?  When you go in search of one piece of information, another piece is there sparkling and just waiting for you to notice!  (I’ll have to follow up on that find another time.)

Wordsearcher did not help me find morphological relatives, and there were no other morphologically related words at Etymonline.  My next stop is the Oxford English Dictionary (OED).  Here’s where things get interesting.

Here is the word used in 1653 with a sense of continual spinning.

1653   H. More Def. Philos. Cabbala (1713) App. i. 113   That there are infinite numbers of Atoms or Particles, different in magnitude and figure;..and that they are moved in the Vniverse after the manner of vortices.

Here is an example of its use from 1704 with a sense of strong swirling.

1704   J. Pitts True Acct. Mohammetans vii. 77   In this place is much Danger without a fresh Gale of Wind, because it is a kind of Vortex, the Water running whirling round, and is apt to swallow down a Ship.

Here is a rather poetic use from 1700 or so.

a1700   T. Ken Edmund in Wks. (1721) II. 24   Now the North Wind the crazy Vessel sweeps, And in its rapid Vortex pris’ner keeps.

So we see this same action of spinning and swirling whether the vortex be involving fire, water, wind, atoms or anything.  That denotation of “to turn, turn around” is present in every use.  Next up some unexpected words that share this base!



This word is a noun that was coined in Modern Latin with a diminutive sense.  The OED defines it as an individual belonging to the genus Vorticellidae and gives this use from 1875.

1875   T. H. Huxley & H. N. Martin Course Elem. Biol. (1877) 90   Sometimes a rounded body, encircled by a ring of cilia but having otherwise the characters of a Vorticella bell, is seen to be attached to the base of the bell of an ordinary Vorticella.

Wikipedia describes the organism this way: “The organism is aptly named “Vorticella” due to the beating cilia creating whirlpools, or vortices.”

Image result for vorticella

The camera catches the vortex of cilia on either side, but if you look closely you can see the blurring action of all the cilia that surround the opening.  The movement stirs the water and promotes the flow of food to the organism.  What I find especially striking about this is that I have seen this organism before!  Yes!  I have!  My husband worked for a neighboring water treatment plant as a research biologist for many years.  At one point, he recorded video of what he could see in his microscope when it was magnified 400 times.  When my students studied the classification system and wondered what protists looked like, I showed them videos of this very organism.  How about that?



The OED defines this as “A British art-movement of the early twentieth century, characterized by abstractionism and machine-like forms.”  How interesting that this base show up in art!  The following use listed at the OED is quite entertaining.

1915   Drawing July 56/1 in reality our old and amusing friend Cubism, but Cubism heavily charged with electricity.

More information from Wikipedia reveals that “it tried to capture movement in an image. In a Vorticist painting modern life is shown as an array of bold lines and harsh colours drawing the viewer’s eye into the centre of the canvas.”

Related image
The cover of the 1915 BLAST
Wyndham Lewis
Modern American Poetry: from Blast (19141915)

The cover of the second (and last) edition of BLAST, by Wyndham Lewis and friends. This edition included an article by Henri Gaudier-Brzeska written and submitted from the trenches of WWI.

Image Credit: 

The Poetry Foundation includes in their information that Ezra Pound coined the word “vorticist” and felt that it applied to all of the arts.  Here is a quote from his writing about this, “You may think of man as that toward which perception moves. You may think of him as the TOY of circumstance, as the plastic substance RECEIVING impressions.  OR you may think of him as DIRECTING a certain fluid force against circumstance, as CONCEIVING instead of merely observing and reflecting.”

Here is a vorticist poem by H.D. (Hilda Doolittle)

Whirl up sea —
Whirl your pointed pines,
Splash your great pines
On our rocks,
Hurl your green over us,
Cover us with your pools of fir.

According to The Poetry Foundation, the Vorticist Movement ended just three year after it began.  There is thought that the toll of World War I had much to do with that.


This is an adjective describing something as in a swirling motion.

1891   Atlantic Monthly LXVIII. 68/2   They [sc. tornadoes] possess truly vorticular motion.

Image result for vorticular motion of a tornado


This was an invention by A.L. Coburn in 1916.  It was used in photography.  The following sentence is from the OED.

1966   A. L. Coburn Autobiogr. ix. 102   I aspired to make abstract pictures with the camera. For this purpose I devised the Vortoscope late in 1916. This instrument is composed of three mirrors fastened together in the form of a triangle… The mirrors act as a prism splitting the image formed by the lens into segments.

Here is one of vortocist A.L. Coburn’s photographs using his vortoscope.  The finished picture is called a vortograph.

Here are some pretty cool modern examples from dasascukaphotoblog .

DSC_6763 bw


Final Thoughts

It’s makes sense that this word, this family, would be used in so many interesting situations.  The bases <vort>, <vert>, and <verse> are as close as siblings.  They share a denotation that reverberates through the many many words that share those bases.  Today I focused on that shared meaning and the spirit of human nature to see certain characteristics of the world around us and to apply those characteristics to creative expression.  When I was looking in the OED, I also found that there were words in the <vort> family that have become obsolete.  One that struck my fancy was <vorticordious> meaning “turning the heart.”  The only use listed at the OED was from 1669.  I can imagine someone being vorticordious as easily as I can picture someone who, as we now say, turns heads.  Uncovering this cool word is a reinforcement that our language is not static.  It is living and being shaped, as it always has been, by the people who speak it.

And now, I will turn my attention back to the polar vortex at hand with a new appreciation for the lines, the flow, the turning movement that the polar vortex brings to this temperature map.  Stay warm!


“Would you like an adventure now, or would you like to have your tea first? ” -James M. Barrie

The first time I met Peter Pan, I was sitting in my living room with my brothers and sisters.  He didn’t come flying through the picture window or anything else as exciting and dramatic as that.  Instead, he flew into my imagination via our television set.  Even though the version we were watching was old, the scenery was the furthest thing from life-like, and Peter Pan was himself played by a woman (Mary Martin), I was captivated.   The idea of defying the inevitable enticed me.  For me the idea of living as a child forever was the heart and soul of this story.  Everything that happened happened because Peter Pan wasn’t going to grow up and he was trying fiercely to get others not to grow up either.  But, of course, none of the viewers were fooled.  Growing up can only be prevented by one thing.  And it wasn’t until recently that I read about James M. Barrie’s personal connection with that.  Because it was only recently that I actually read his book.  Thanks to Michael Clay Thompson.

Here’s the song that I sang for weeks after watching Peter Pan for the first time:

Michael Clay Thompson is someone I have mentioned before when speaking of grammar instruction.  But his curriculum materials regarding grammar are only one facet of his vision of a “literacy ecosystem” that involves grammar, vocabulary, writing, poetry, and reading.  I am particularly favorable to picturing literacy in its whole as an ecosystem.  Like an ecosystem, each component is vulnerable, not meant to stand alone, and if instruction of it dwindles or disappears, the ecosystem as a whole weakens.  If, for example, students are not taught about the poetic features or the grammatic stability found in literary sentences, their reading experience will be significantly less than it could be.  If grammar instruction is minimal and found only in work packets, the rest of the literacy instruction becomes narrower in its reach.  It is the same with studying vocabulary.  (MCT’s Caesar’s English books are great for looking at words frequently found in English literature.  They pair well with investigating intriguing word families using Structure Word Inquiry!)  For it isn’t just difficult words that stop students when they are reading.  It is also rich complicated sentence structures that are often missing from the leveled readers handed to students. Therefore, I will continue this discussion with that idea of a “literacy ecosystem” in mind. It is necessary, of course, to look closely at each system on its own, but too often students spend entire school years focused on isolated skills within each of these “habitat” areas.  How regularly do they get to practice the skills as they interact within the entire literacy ecosystem?   As MCT says, “All of it pertains to all of it.”

When looking for teaching materials, it is pretty easy to find books and ideas for each of the areas I have described above.  But where are the materials or ideas explaining how to weave all of the areas together as you teach?  MCT has such a thing!  He has put together trilogies of books that have a common theme.  Last year I purchased the trilogy that includes Alice in Wonderland, Peter Pan, and The Wind in the Willows.  As you may have guessed from the title of this post, we are currently reading Peter Pan.  Below is the first paragraph from the teacher manual that accompanies the trilogy:

“The purpose of this literature program is to immerse children in great books so that they experience literature as literature and not as a drudgery of tedious school activities.  I want children’s minds on the books themselves and not on attendant assignments.  It is by loving to read that children become literate.”

MCT lays out a plan for Four-Level Literature that includes:

Creative Thinking

He suggests a few activities for Preparing, but most of the emphasis is on the actual reading of the story.  That is the main event, as it should be.  The last two levels MCT lists are important in that they help a student think about the story and its characters once the reading is finished. The prompts for Creative Thinking are creative in and of themselves.  They stir discussion and are intriguing to think about.  The last level, the Writing, is especially important for developing a student’s application of grammar and essay writing skills.

While reading, there should be pauses to reflect on the characters and to clarify the meanings of unfamiliar words.  When I pause to talk about the unfamiliar words, I like to point out how the words J.M. Barrie used are something he chose.  He passed over other words that might have kind of fit in favor of the one he used.  At the end of the story or after we have read several chapters, I might choose a quote or a paragraph from the story and ask my students to again tell me about the word choice.  What does the word J.M. Barrie used bring to the sentence or paragraph that a synonym of that word might not?

I especially love the following quote from the teacher manual:

“I do not like the practice of traditional written quizzes every so many chapters; that is too intrusive.  It breaks the continuum of the reading.  We should leave the story alone as much as possible.  Our pedagogy should tiptoe and whisper.”

I love the reminder that we as teachers need to limit our interruptions to the reading.  With that being said, in each of the books MCT includes in his trilogies, he does indeed interrupt the reading to point out some things.  Sometimes it is the grammar of a particular sentence that he points out.  Sometimes it is the rhythm of a particular sentence that is reinforcing the message of the sentence.  Sometimes it is the poetic quality of a particular line, purposely creating a subtle feel in the reader’s mind.  For example, here is one of the “language illustrations” he has included in this story.

As you can see, MCT not only points out the grammar using his 4 Level Grammar Analysis, he also connects the grammar use to the writing.  He points out the meter and the word choice and how all those things enhance the moment in the story for the reader.  His interruptions are not a list of questions for the students to answer.  They actually enhance the reading experience by pointing out something that the readers (and sometimes the teacher) might not have noticed on their own.  This is one way in which MCT is pulling together all facets of the literacy ecosystem that I’ve described above.  If you’d like a look at his materials, here is a link:  Royal Fireworks Press.

James M. Barrie was born in 1860.  He was the ninth of ten children.  When James was 6 and his next older brother was almost 14, his brother died in an ice skating accident.  His brother David had been their mother’s favorite and she was inconsolable.  James tried everything he could think of to make her feel better.  He even dressed in his brother’s clothes.  He spent a lot of time with her and listened as she spoke of her childhood.  Her own mother died when she was just 8, and she assumed the household duties at that time.  She also told him that she found some solace in knowing that David would be a boy forever.  That idea of being a boy forever ….

J.M. Barrie knew he wanted to be a writer early on.  He began by writing some of the stories his mother told him.  As his career began, he met a family with five boys, one of whom was named Peter.  He became close to the family, often telling the boys stories.  One of those stories included Peter’s ability to fly.  When the parents died (1907 and 1910), J.M. Barrie adopted the boys.

Here is a link to a brief biography: The Family That Inspired J.M. Barrie’s Peter Pan.

J.M. Barrie by Herbert Rose Barraud, 1892

I’m going to spend the rest of this post sharing some of the words and phrases my students and I found which have strengthened our connections to the action and to the characters.  First off let me say just how refreshing it is to read a book with such beautiful language!  My students and I are reading it aloud and thoroughly enjoy discussing the action, the characters, the author’s message, but most of all, we enjoy the words that Barrie uses. I’m not sure whether or not readers in his day would have been as intrigued by the vocabulary, but we sure are.

As I list each word, keep in mind that I did not stop the reading to investigate any of these words.  We only stopped long enough to clarify the word’s meaning and its use in the context of the story.  It is my plan to share the following list with my students at another time in our day and give them the opportunity to choose one to investigate.  I’m sharing things with you that I find interesting about these words and giving suggestions for possible activities.



One of the first words to catch our attention was perambulator.  It was in the middle of a paragraph describing the nurse dog, Nana.

“… the Darlings had become acquainted with her in Kensington Gardens, where she spent most of her spare time peeping into perambulators, …”

At the bottom of the page, MCT had included a definition of this word so that we didn’t have to look elsewhere at the moment and could get back to the reading.  But a look later at Etymonline told me that this word was first used to mean a baby carriage in 1856 (that is what it is referring to in the story).  Prior to that, the <-or> suffix indicated an agent noun.  So a perambulator was someone who perambulated.  The word <perambulate> is from Latin ambulare from <per-> “through” and <ambul> “walk, go about”.  Here is an example of a matrix that could be created using the base element <ambul>.

What I absolutely love about this family of words are the compound words that can be made.  Looking at <circumambulate>, we see the first base element <circum>, which is from Latin circum “all around, round about” and Latin ambul “walk, go about”.  So someone who is circumambulating is walking all around an area.  The next compound word on this matrix is <funambulist>.  This word is from Latin funis “a rope, line, cord” and Latin ambul “walk, go about”.  The suffix <-ist> is an agent suffix here and is indicating that a funambulist is a person who walks on rope – a tightrope walker!  The last compound word is <somnambulate>.  This word is from Latin somnus “sleep” and Latin ambul “walk, go about”.  If you are guessing that to somnambulate would be to sleepwalk, you would be correct!

Of course, familiar words like <ambulance> would need to be noticed as well.  But what does an ambulance have to do with walking?  According to Etymonline, around the 17th century, the French used the phrase, a hôpital ambulant, which literally meant a walking hospital.  The hospital was built in such a way that it could be torn down and moved to a new location.  We might think of them as field hospitals.  By 1798 it was known as simply ambulance.  I know that any of my students would enjoy this rich treasure hunt!



According to Etymonline, <exquisite> was first attested in the 15th century.  At that time it meant “carefully selected”.  It is from Latin exquisitus “carefully sought out”.  As it is used in the passage below, it has more of a sense of “with perfection of detail, elaborately, beautifully” (as listed in definition 2 in the Oxford English Dictionary).  Both sources identify this word as from <ex-> “out” and quaerere “to search, seek”.  So something that is exquisite is carefully sought after for its perfection of detail!  That would make sense in the context of describing Tinker Bell’s skeleton leaf gown.


The word <exquisite> is just one of many descendants of Latin quaerere “to search, seek”.  Others include question, quest, query, inquire, inquisitive, acquisition, conquer, and require.  If you think about it, can you see how the denotation of their common ancestor quaerere “to search, seek” binds them in meaning? Perhaps this would be a great opportunity for your students.  Have small groups or individuals investigate the present meaning of one of the words I’ve listed and then come back together as a group to share.  See if the students can notice the common sense and meaning at the core of each word.



Another interesting word in the same quote from the book as <exquisite> is <embonpoint>.  According to Etymonline it means “plumpness”.  It was first attested in 1751.  Earlier (16 c.) it is from French embonpoint “plumpness, fullness.”  Before that it was a phrase in Old French en bon point “in good condition.”


If the word <embonpoint> is skipped over in this quote, the reader will get a different impression of Tinker Bell than the author intended!  I quite like the idea that Tinker Bell had a realistic body shape.  That is not the way she has been portrayed in any movie version I’ve ever seen!

According to the OED, it has been used as both a noun and an adjective.  They offered no recent examples of its use, which is probably why it feels so unfamiliar.  The most recent use they list is from 1876:

1876   R. Bartholow Pract. Treat. Materia Med. ii. 308   An increase in the body-weight and the embonpoint of those who take stimulants.
James M. Barrie, however, wrote this story in 1906.  I wonder if this word is currently used in France?
Peter Pan tries several times but is unsuccessful in putting his shadow back on.  That’s when Wendy offers to do it for him.
“I shall sew it on for you my little man,” she said, though he was tall as herself, and she got out her housewife, and sewed the shadow on to Peter’s foot.”
MCT defines a housewife as a sewing kit.  I’d heard this term before, but was sure my students hadn’t.  I was right.  Later on that same day, I found a picture of a housewife that was used by a soldier in World War I through Wikipedia Commons.  I’m glad I did because it won’t be the last time Wendy uses her housewife.  The Lost Boys will wear holes in the knees of their pants and in the heels of their socks quite often!
It will also give us the opportunity to talk about why a soldier might need a housewife, and why this sewing kit would be called a housewife.  In the 18th and 19th century, it was common for a mother, wife, sister, or girlfriend to make a housewife for someone who was going off to fight in a war.  At that time, it was pronounced as “hussif” or “huzzif”.  Read more about them HERE.

We came across this word just before leaving for a two day holiday.  It was a timely find as this holiday is typically a day focused around a big meal. Before they left I wished them a great time with their families and warned them about stodging. We even joked around and wished each other a “Happy Stodgegiving!”


When I see these students again, they will no doubt want to talk about how stodged they felt (as Barrie says, “…the next best thing being to talk about it.”)

Both Etymonline and the OED agree that this word is of unknown origin. The OED suggests that it is “perhaps phonetically symbolic after words like stuff, podge. I particularly loved the imagery in this OED citation:

“1790 W. Marshall Agric. Provincialisms in Rural Econ. Midland Counties II. 443 Stodged, filled to the stretch; as a cow’s udder with milk.”

I think “filled to the stretch” says it all!



Peter Pan uses this word to describe what he would be required to learn in school.  I can’t help but think that his biggest hurdle in attending school would be the confinement to a schedule!

“I don’t want to go to school and learn solemn things.”

This word was first attested in the mid 14c. according to Etymonline.  At that time it had a sense of “performed with due religious ceremony or reverence.”   Prior to that it was from Old French solempne  and directly from Latin sollemnis  “established, formal, traditional.” It has this sense of seriousness, and that is no doubt the aspect of schooling that troubles Peter Pan the most!

What is interesting about the spelling of <solemn> is the <mn>.  We see this same final spelling in autumn, column, and hymn.  Some may wonder why the <n> is needed since it isn’t pronounced.  But if we remind ourselves that spelling doesn’t represent pronunciation, that instead it represents meaning, we are apt to look for another reason that the <n> is final in these words.  If I take a look at relatives of each word, it doesn’t take long to see that the final <n> IS pronounced in some of the members of each word family.  It isn’t pronounced in solemn, but it is pronounced in solemnity.  It isn’t pronounced in autumn, but it is pronounced in autumnal.  It isn’t pronounced in column, but it is pronounced in columnist.  It isn’t pronounced in hymn, but it is pronounced in hymnal.

If we look back at the etymology of <solemn>, we see that the <mn> has always been part of this word’s spelling.  It is the same with <column> from Latin columna, <autumn> from Latin autumnus, and <hymn> from Greek hymnos.  Interesting, right?



This word was not unfamiliar to my students.  What was unfamiliar was its use as a verb.


At Etymonline, I find that this word was first attested as a verb in 1590 with a sense of “to smear or stain with blood.”  By the 1620’s it was “to cause to bleed,” which I think is the sense being used by Tootles in this story.   At the Oxford English Dictionary, I found several ways <blood> was used as a verb, but when it referred to “to cause blood to flow from … (a person or an animal)” it was for therapeutic reasons, not specifically to cause harm.

1597   P. Lowe Whole Course Chirurg. viii. i. sig. Dd   Bee circumspect in blooding the foote.
1780   Johnson Let. 14 June (1992) III. 275   Yesterday I fasted and was blooded, and to day took physick and dined.
1908   Brit. Med. Jnl. 13 June 1463/1   He was very fond of telling tales the country labourers would come in be ‘blooded’.
2007   M. Noble Case of Dirty Verger viii.107   She burst the girl’s eyebrow, blooding it immediately and sending the victim backwards, dazed and distraught.

Here is what Tootles did next:

“He drew back his hanger; and for that instant his sun was at noon.”

A hanger is a short sword that hangs from a belt.  It was a common weapon used by hunters.  What I really love about this sentence though, is the image created with “for that instant his sun was at noon.”  Can’t you just picture this scene?  Tootles is defending Wendy’s honor and all the rest of the Lost Boys are looking on. Tootles is having his moment.  Just as with the sun at noon, there are no shadows cast on Tootles.  His character is illuminated.



I know this word as a noun.  We have a rain gutter on our house, and there is a gutter at the side of our street that directs water to the storm drain.  But I am not as familiar with it as a verb, especially when it is not pertaining to a channel for water.  James M. Barrie creates another wonderful image with an intriguing use of this word.

“Peter slept on.  The light guttered and went out, leaving the tenement in darkness; but still he slept.”

As a verb, this word is first attested in the late 14th c. and was used to mean “to make or run in channels.”  We see the same information in the OED where gutter most often refers to water being channeled and moved.  But according to both Etymonline and the OED, it can also refer to a candle when the hot wax flows down its side by way of a gutter that has opened up.  That use began in 1706.  I’ve certainly lit my share of candles and have seen that happen many times, but never thought to describe it as guttering.  Cool.



This word has been investigated by my fifth grade students in the past as part of understanding the water cycle, along with condensation, evaporation, transpiration, respiration, and infiltration.  I remember enjoying what we found out.  Prior to that, I was aware of words like precipice, precipitate, and precipitation, but never had a solid sense of how or if they were connected in meaning.  I may have wondered, but if my tabletop dictionary didn’t make the connection obvious with its entry, I didn’t know how to pursue an investigation of this on my own.  (I am grateful every day that I happened upon a fellow teacher’s blog, and that it magnified my enjoyment of language!)  These are my own understandings of the words I mentioned:

Precipice – When you are at the precipice of a place or situation, you are at a steep edge with the possibility of falling.

Precipitate –  This word can be used in many ways.  It can be used as a verb meaning that water vapor is condensing and falling from the sky.  Another meaning it has as a verb is to cause something to happen quite abruptly.  It can also be used as a noun to describe a substance separated from a solution or a suspension (in science).  There are other (less frequent) ways to use this word as well!

Precipitation – This form of the word is a noun, but you probably saw the <-ion> suffix and knew that.  It refers to the various forms water vapor can take as it falls to the earth.  It can also refer to the process of forming a precipitate (as described above).

Here is how James M. Barrie used <precipiate> in Peter Pan:


Long Tom is a cannon on the deck of the pirate ship.  At this point in the story, Starkey is told by Captain Hook that he must go into the cabin.  Starkey doesn’t want to go because three others have gone into the cabin already and they have all been killed.  Nobody knows what is in the cabin that is killing the men, and Starkey decides to die by precipitating himself into the sea rather than face whatever is in that cabin.  Using context and combining that with the sense of falling that this word can have, it makes sense that by “he precipitated himself into the sea,” it means that he threw himself overboard.

At Etymonline we learn that this word was first attested in the 1520’s and meant “to hurl or fling downwards.”  It is from Latin praecipitatus “throw or dive headlong,” from prae- “before, forth” and caput “head.”  The chemical sense of this word is from the 1620’s, and it isn’t until 1863 that we see it used in the meteorological sense.  Interesting, right?  So in every use of this word or one of its related words, there is a sense of falling head first or the possibility of falling head first.


Final Thoughts

If you have not read this book with a child, I encourage you to do it.  The character of Peter Pan is rather complicated.  By that I mean that he isn’t consistently one way or another.  Sure he delights the other characters and he saves them from harm, but he also disappoints them and sometimes he even lets them down.  His personality is not as simple to understand as it is in movie versions.  He seems a bit more human as described in the book, and that makes a big difference.  It has led to wonderful discussions about what to expect from him next.  The Lost Boys and the Darling children were at the mercy of his whims often.  For instance, there were times that everyone ate food and other times in which everyone pretended to eat food.  Peter decided which it would be based on his own preference.  He wasn’t trying to be mean, he just didn’t consider anyone’s needs for that sort of thing besides his own.

Another character that we found amusing was Mr. Darling.  He was so worried about appearances that some of his behaviors bordered on ridiculous.  Okay, they were ridiculous!  The scene near the beginning in which he is bragging about how he takes his medicine like a champ is particularly funny.  As readers, we saw through his false bragging.  We also saw the events of that night get out of hand because of it.  Near the end of the book, we are informed that Mr. Darling feels guilty for his part in the children leaving and has imposed a punishment of confining himself to the dog kennel!  The students had so much to say about that!  “Did he go to work like that?  Why?  Did he sleep in there too?  Why is he doing that when he doesn’t have to?  Where did the dog sleep?”

Even if you have not read this book, I bet you’ve heard the following line in a movie or play version:

“Boy, why are you crying?”

This is said by Wendy when she is awakened by the sound of crying.  Peter is sitting on the nursery floor and can’t seem to get his shadow to stick on.  Of course, Peter quickly insists that he wasn’t crying.  That’s the kind of vulnerability that he doesn’t like to show.  Well, only pages from the end of the book, we find Peter once again in the nursery.  He has come back for Wendy only to find that she has grown up and has a child of her own named Jane.  Peter is so distraught that Wendy will not ever come to Neverland again, that he cries.  It is at this point that her little girl is awakened and says:

“Boy, why are you crying?”

I will never forget what it felt like to share this story with those students as I read that line!  They immediately recognized the words that had once been said by Wendy, but were now being said by her daughter.  Their eyes jumped from the page to the other faces in the room.  There were gasps and nervous laughter as they realized that what those words meant this time was so much bigger than what those few words meant the first time they were uttered.  It meant there was a never ending ending to this story.  And we all smiled big to know it.

My students would have given up on this book if it had just been handed to them or if they had been told to read chapters by themselves.  Instead we read it aloud together.  Sometimes I read, sometimes students volunteered to read, and when we could see a lot of conversation happening, we assigned parts and read it that way.  We paused at the language illustrations that Michael Clay Thompson provided, and we sometimes stopped to talk about our reactions to the action or the characters.  I helped when a sentence was particularly long or when I could tell that what was being read was not being understood.  I shared my delight at a wording I wasn’t familiar with or a word that evoked a perfect image.  The experience wouldn’t have been as rich with an abridged version.  It just wouldn’t have.  When asked why MCT doesn’t seek out modernized versions, he said this:

“It is precisely these articulate, complex sentences and powerful words that we seek; it is the very thing that we want not to miss.”

I couldn’t agree more.