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History of English (Source: A History of English by Barbara A. Fennell) The English language is spoken by 750 million people in the world as either the official language of a nation, a second language, or in a mixture with other languages (such as pidgins and creoles.) English is the (or an) official language in England, Canada, Australia and New Zealand; however, the United States has no official language. Indo-European language and people English is classified genetically as a Low West Germanic language of the Indo-European family of languages. The early history of the Germanic languages is based on reconstruction of a Proto-Germanic language that evolved into German, English, Dutch, Afrikaans, Yiddish, and the Scandinavian languages. In 1786, Sir William Jones discovered that Sanskrit contained many cognates to Greek and Latin. He conjectured a Proto-Indo-European language had existed many years before. Although there is no concrete proof to support this one language had existed, it is believed that many languages spoken in Europe and Western Asia are all derived from a common language. A few languages that are not included in the Indo-European branch of languages include Basque, Finnish, Estonian and Hungarian; of which the last three belong to the Finno-Ugric language family. Speakers of Proto-Indo-European (PIE) lived in Southwest Russia around 4,000 to 5,000 BCE. They had words for animals such as bear or wolf (as evidenced in the similarity of the words for these animals in the modern I-E languages.) They also had domesticated animals, and used horse-drawn wheeled carts. They drank alcohol made from grain, and not wine, indicating they did not live in a warm climate. They belonged to a patriarchal society where the lineage was determined through males only (because of a lack of words referring to the female's side of the family.) They also made use of a decimal counting system by 10's, and formed words by compounding. This PIE language was also highly infl

Chronology of Events in the History of English pre-600 A.D. THE PRE-ENGLISH PERIOD ca. 3000 B.C. (or 6000 B.C?) Proto-Indo-European spoken in Baltic area. (or Anatolia?) ca. 1000 B.C. After many migrations, the various branches of Indo-European have become distinct. Celtic becomes most widespread branch of I.E. in Europe; Celtic peoples inhabit what is now Spain, France, Germany, Austria, eastern Europe, and the British Isles. 55 B.C. Beginning of Roman raids on British Isles. 43 A.D. Roman occupation of Britain. Roman colony of "Britannia" established. Eventually, many Celtic Britons become Romanized. (Others continually rebel). 200 B.C.-200 A.D. Germanic peoples move down from Scandinavia and spread over Central Europe in successive waves. Supplant Celts. Come into contact (at times antagonistic, at times commercial) with northward-expanding empire of Romans. Early 5th century. Roman Empire collapses. Romans pull out of Britain and other colonies, attempting to shore up defense on the home front; but it's useless. Rome sacked by Goths. Germanic tribes on the continent continue migrations west and south; consolidate into ever larger units. Those taking over in Rome call themselves "Roman emperors" even though the imperial administration had relocated to Byzantium in the 300s. The new Germanic rulers adopted the Christianity of the late Roman state, and began what later evolved into the not-very-Roman "Holy Roman Empire". ca. 410 A.D. First Germanic tribes arrive in England. 410-600 Settlement of most of Britain by Germanic peoples (Angles, Saxons, Jutes, some Frisians) speaking West Germanic dialects descended from Proto-Germanic. These dialects are distantly related to Latin, but also have a sprinkling of Latin borrowings due to earlier cultural contact with the Romans on the continent. Celtic peoples, most of whom are Christianized, are pushed increasingly (despite occasional violent uprisings) into the marginal areas of Britain: Ireland, Scotland, Wales.

"The Three Stages Of Reading strategy involves teaching students to delve into text. The Before Reading stage provides a scaffold for new concepts and vocabulary, promotes engagement and provides a means for prediction. The second stage, During Reading, allows students to integrate the knowledge and information they bring to the text with 'new' information in the text. The last stage, After Reading, allows students to articulate and process their understanding of what they have read and to think critically about the validity of the text."

The Shakespeare Standard is a news, feature, and blog hub for Shakespeare-related news on the web. They publish news items from around the world on a regular basis while featuring reports, blogs, vlogs, and podcasts from our editorial staff and community contributors.

NewsTrust.net helps people find good journalism online. Each lesson takes about 45 minutes. During that time, we invite you and your students to read a work of journalism (news or opinion) and evaluate it for journalistic quality using NewsTrust review tools. Students will be asked to rate that story on a variety of criteria, such as: facts, fairness and sourcing (news); insights, information and style (opinion).

"Newslo is the first hybrid News/Satire platform on the web. Readers come to us for a unique brand of entertainment and information that is enhanced by features like our fact-button, which allows readers to find what is fact and what is satire. Newslo's "No Need to Satirize" brings you completely factual stories that are so ridiculous, they don't need our trademark touch. Whenever you see #NNTS, you're reading COMPLETELY real news that only seems too absurd to be true."

Being literate in a real-world sense means being able to read and write using the media forms of the day, whatever they may be. For centuries, consuming and producing words through reading and writing and, to a lesser extent, listening and speaking were sufficient. But because of inexpensive, easy-to-use, and widely available new tools, literacy now requires being conversant with new forms of media as well as text, including sound, graphics, and moving images.

The New York Times' collection of resources for teaching F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel The Great Gatsby.

A quick-start guide for teachers who want to try something new in the 2010-2011 school year.

education sources and news

"Graphic organizers will be beneficial to students whenever they are given new information. They can be used to sequence, brainstorm and organize. During reading and listening students should be encouraged to graphically organize new information."

Participating in an online discussion on events and issues in the news not only gives students a forum, but it also helps them build critical thinking, writing and news literacy skills and provides an opportunity to write for an authentic audience.

student produced news videos

Create e-pub books from Wikipedia articles for mobile devices

A great motivational story which gives you new energy & new aspirations for future.

A new study may help explain why extroverts are more motivated to seek the company of others than are introverts.