FREE DAILY ENGLISH LESSONS!
In time, these lessons and "stubs" will be migrated to the Buzzwords site.
Until then, consider them historical.


Mini-Lessons from Thursday, Jan. 26, 2012

These Mini-Lessons are posted on Twitter, and in China on Weibo, throughout the day. You can follow them there!

To get the most from them, you should try to use them in sentences, or discuss them with friends. Writing something on Twitter or Weibo is a great way to practice!
  • Science: dehydration: loss of water, as when playing sports or in the desert, not drinking enough liquid; can create serious medical problems.
  • Language Study: capital letters: upper-case letters LIKE THIS; these are lower case. Used at the start of sentences, and for proper names, like James.
  • Business: John D. Rockefeller: (1839-1937) American businessman, once the richest man in the world. "Rockefeller"="rich": "I'm no Rockefeller."
  • Literature: Gulliver: main character in Swift's "Gulliver's Travels," who sees little people in Lilliput, horses named Houyhnhnms, and others.
  • New Words: DNA fingerprinting: use of DNA to identify a criminal; not actually fingerprinting, but used in the same way
  • Slang: bus shelter: a small building, often with only one wall, to stand under while waiting for a bus. Often has advertising on it.
  • Modern History: Scopes trial: US teacher John Scopes was tried for teaching Darwin's theory of evolution, which was then (1925) against the law.

NOTES:
  1. Except for the Slang words, all the words in these Mini-Lessons came from lists either on the Oxford University Press site or in the Dictionary of Cultural Literacy. I wrote the definitions and examples myself.
  2. The Slang words are from my own list, and I wrote the definitions and examples myself.

This lesson is ©2012 by James Baquet. You may share this work freely. Teachers may use it in the classroom, as long as students are told the source (URL). You may not publish this material or sell it. Please write to me if you have any questions about "fair use"

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