Mini-Lessons from Tuesday, Apr. 24, 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!

• Link: Learn through poems and story writing: http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~leslieob/pizzaz.html
  
• Ancient History: Tutankhamen: 1341-1323 BC, "pharaoh" (king) of Egypt. Most famous today because his tomb was found with all its treasures in 1922.
  
• Irregular Verbs: I buy lots of books. I bought two last week. I have bought thousands in my life.
  
• Idiom: make ends meet: make enough money for your needs. "I may need to take a second job to make ends meet."
  
• Pop Culture: Star Trek: 1960s TV series (and later films) about Captain James T. Kirk and his men exploring outer space in the USS Enterprise.
  
• Slang: to not cut it: to not be enough. A: "I'll try to be on time from now on." B: "'Try' doesn't cut it. You MUST be on time!"
  
• Government: legislative branch: part of government that makes laws. In some places, separate from the police (executive) and courts (judicial).
  

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NOTES:

1. The Idiom, the History and Government words, and some of the Pop Culture words, are from lists in the Dictionary of Cultural Literacy. I wrote the definitions and examples myself.
2. The Link was found online; the Slang words, the Irregular Verbs, and some of the Pop Culture words are from my own lists, and I wrote the definitions and examples myself.

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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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