True Story – Page 41 – WordyNerdBird

Bohemian Ear Worms.

May 19, 2016 wordynerdbirdLeave a comment

I’ve had ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ playing on the BrainPod every single day, often for hours at a stretch.

It’s a conspiracy.

My Year 12 English class is reading and studying ‘Life of Galileo’, so every time someone says the name, I hear those two different voices singing “Galileo!” … “Galileo!” … “Galileo!” … “Galileo Figaro!” and it just plays on from there.

When I wake up in the mornings, it has usually been replaced by another tune. That is, until I get into the car and head to work.

My favourite radio station has a traffic reporter named Charles Miller. That, apparently, is close enough to hear “CharlesMiller NOOOOO! We will not let you go!” which gets the whole thing playing again in a seemingly endless loop.

This is what my life has become.

Wasn’t Expecting That.

May 17, 2016 wordynerdbird1 Comment

I just asked a Year 10 student to turn his music off while he was working on a history presentation that is due tomorrow.

He said, “I bet you don’t even know that song.”

“I might,” I answered. “What song was it?”

“The Battle of New Orleans” by Johnny Horton.

Whoa.

That stopped me. This kid must have digitized his grandfather’s old record collection.

“I do, actually.”

Then he sang, “We fired our guns and the British kept a-comin’…”

And I sang, “There wasn’t nigh as many as there was a while ago!”

He thought that was pretty cool, I guess. Then I asked him how much he wanted me to tell him about the War of 1812.

It’s incredible how suddenly kids can become motivated to work on the assignment that is due tomorrow. I wish I knew how that happened.

No correct answer.

May 13, 2016 wordynerdbirdLeave a comment

This morning my students were laughing as they told me the story about the black eye one young lady among them is sporting, due to accidentally being hit on the bridge of the nose with a spoon by another student.

The wielder of the spoon got to the point where he was laughing uncontrollably.

“It’s because I’m a comic genius, isn’t it?” I asked him.

Still laughing, he looked at me and almost said no, then stopped himself.

“You know, there’s no correct answer to that question!” said the student next to him.

The laughter stopped, and he said, “Yeah, I’m just not going to say anything.”

I win.

Comic genius, it is.

Out of the mouths of… teenagers.

May 11, 2016May 7, 2016 wordynerdbird1 Comment

My Year 10 English class studied John McCrae’s WWI poem “In Flanders Fields” yesterday. In our discussion, we contrasted it with some of the more brutal poetry about the war that we’ve been studying, such as Wilfred Owen’s “Dulce Et Decorum Est”.

When I asked them what we could learn from the contrasts in the poetry.
one student answered, “Canadians are awesome and generally more polite about things than the English!”

Sorry, English people. He’s getting an A+.

Why Pronunciation Matters #43

May 6, 2016May 6, 2016 wordynerdbirdLeave a comment

While teaching senior high school can be challenging, I have often found it to be highly entertaining.

This morning in my Year 12 English class, I was in the process of assigning roles for my students to read as part of our study of Bertolt Brecht’s play “Life of Galileo”.

Student 1: “Can I be Galileo?”

Me: “Sure! Any other requests?”

Student 2: “I’ll be the Doge.”

Student 3: “That’s pronounced ‘douche’!”

General laughter ensued.
What a great way to start a Friday.

Man, I love those guys!