MonkeyPants

New Phone Battery!

Hooray! It is a day for celebration!

Our house phone battery has been weaker than a mewling kitten for some time now. That means that all coversations have to be fifteen minutes or shorter, and the phone has to go right back on the base to recharge. E is not instinctive about re-basing the phone, and so sometimes we have no phone at all other than my cell. As I am one of Nature’s chatters, this has been as a greivous wound to my chatting time. I can talk on my cell, but that costs money, and besides, I have to be out of the no-phone-zone that is my house. With colder weather coming, that could be inconvenient.

But the final straw came tonight when his old friend Darren called from Manitoba, and E had to confine it to a five-minute conversation because the battery was almost dead. He said it, “I’ll get a new battery tomorrow.” That’s it! New battery for us, Hooray!

I have often thought about going and getting it myself, but I charged him with this duty some time ago, and I am now glad that I stuck to my guns. It’s the principle of the thing, you know? I didn’t nag, I didn’t whine. I just let it become woefully inconvenient to him as well.

Also, a big thanks to John from the band for being such a great conversationalist. I know our phone has died on you twice, and I apologise for the inconvenience. E loves talking with you, as do I. We’ll speak-at length- soon!

ESL and Dyslexia

Often when ESL students first start to write in English, they confuse b’s and d’s. Sometimes a u becomes an n, or vice versa. This, we are told, is nothing to worry about. It happens even with first language emergent writers. But at what point should we worry? When is it not okay anymore for a student to be transposing? And how frequent do transpositions have to be before we should look for problems in phonological awareness?

I can find no information that is of any use to me, but have found a lot of studies concluding that we need to know more about the differences in acquiring functional literacy in native and non-native students. Yes, thank you, I know that. Now tell me what I want to know.

Given that a huge chunk of the world is trying to learn English, you’d think that someone would have done some specific studies about people who have a hard time decoding written English and how this relates to ESL students. But no.

On the other hand, I would not relish trying to explain to a Korean mom that her son is not stupid at all, he simply has a different brain that cannot recognize letters the same way most people’s brains do.

Me: He is smart, he just sees things differently. Sometimes upside down. Sometimes backwards.
Typical Korean Mom: He must study. He (typical Korean mother movement indicating she hasn’t mastered the Simple Future tense) be Doctor. (Or dentist, Koreans love Dentistry as a profession as much as the Seventh Day Adventists love it.)
Me:He needs special help. Needs to know the right way to see letters.
Typical Korean Mom: He will study harder. Now, he cry. He say it too hard, uncomfortable.
Me: It is uncomfortable.
Typical Korean Mom: He lazy. He study harder. (Apologetic laugh)
Me: No. Not lazy. Different brain from other students. (Notice my own fluency level breaking down?)

Arrgh, I’m getting worried even writing about it.