10-second review: What is the spirit behind the desire to learn vocabulary? George Eliot, 1856: “I never before longed so much to know the names of things…. The desire is part of the tendency that is now constantly growing in me to escape from all vagueness and inaccuracy to the daylight of distinct vivid ideas. The mere fact of naming an object tends to give definiteness to our conception of it. We have then a sign which at once calls up in our minds the distinctive qualities which mark out for us that particular object from all others.”
Source: LS Golub. Elementary English (May 1971), 450. Elementary English was the NCTE elementary school publication replaced by Language Arts.
Comment: When teaching nouns in grammar, we ought to capitalize on the inherent desire of students to learn the names of things. RayS.
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