ESL Lesson Plan

...monitor and keep a word count of our most frequently used words.

Some words are just plain useful, but other words can become "filler" to take up space when we either can't think of anything or are just lazy. Sometimes we use these "filler" words to give us a few more seconds to come up with a better comment.

President Nixon used one of these evasive statements frequently - he used to say "Let me say this about that". This statement is a masterpiece of circular logic of content-less verbiage.

Politicians basically speak for a living and their public (and sometimes private) statements tell us as much about the times or underlying themes as they do about them as individuals. But sometimes you can sense the history of the linguistic avoidance - you can almost picture the scared little kid in trouble as he (it's usually a "he") tries to think of a good excuse or way out of his trouble.

There are many elections and political movements in motion this year, and like it or not, the American electoral process gets a massive amount of media coverage around the world.

How political candidates frame and define issues - or even which issues they emphasize - tells us a lot about who they are and what they value - but not necessarily what they will do while in office.

Here's a profile of words used by the major current American presidential candidates - http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2012/01/24/us/politics/0124-words.html.

There are many apps to monitor frequently used words. I invite you to check out my writing. Let me know what you find!

Have any words you love - or love to hate? Let us know your favorites. I also welcome you to send us any relevant links or other resources that you think any teachers, students or even just regular people might find interesting or useful.

Listen, read and speak. Make your new language your own.

My best to you as you make your way through this intriguing , constantly shifting linguistic landscape.

Morf

About the author of this entry:

Morf has a B.A.from the Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington, USA and an MAT (Master's in Teaching English) from the University of Washington (Seattle, WA, USA). And, as much as Morf loves writing this blog, he is always open to other opportunities either blogging or teaching. You can contact him at mmorf@mail.com.