In this Sunday's "On Language" column in the New York Times Magazine, I delve into the history of the title Ms. used as a marriage-neutral title for women. As I revealed here on Word Routes back in June, the earliest known proposal for the modern use of Ms. appeared in the Springfield (Mass.) Sunday Republican on November 10, 1901. And as the proposal reemerged over the ensuing decades, two nagging questions kept getting asked: how do you pronounce it, and what does it stand for?  Continue reading...

It really bugs me when I hear someone use the word "individual" when all they mean is "person." It happens a lot with law-enforcement spokespeople. They also tend to say "vehicle" when they could say "car" or "truck."  Continue reading...

Ed researcher Robert J. Marzano suggests that we can help close the achievement gap by explicitly teaching subject-specific academic vocabulary to those students who are lacking the background knowledge to succeed in school. We urge you to check out this handy-dandy chart that demonstrates how the Visual Thesaurus can help you implement Marzano's six steps of vocabulary instruction.  Continue reading...

These sites help educators incorporate current events into their teaching, across the curriculum. 

The New York Times Learning Network

TIME for Kids 

Scholastic's Upfront

NewsHour Extra's Teacher Resources

NBC News iCue

From the blogosphere comes news that President Obama's name has become an eponym, but not in English. In Japanese, Obama has transformed into obamu — a verb that means, according to one blogger, "to ignore inexpedient and inconvenient facts or realities."  Continue reading...

My wife recently spotted the following perplexing line on Crabtree & Evelyn's website, advertising their hand soap:

Our gentle cleansing liquid soaps are pH-balanced and soap-free.

That's right, they're selling soap-free soap. I've heard of a "nothing-burger," but "nothing-soap"?  Continue reading...

You can read it. You can watch it. You can talk about it online with your friends. It's a sort of picture book — or, more precisely, a moving-picture book — but its inventors call it a Vook. That's Vook as in video + book.  Continue reading...