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Eight rules for writing short fiction: 1. Use the time of a total stranger in such a way that he or she will not feel the time was wasted.2. Give the reader at least one character he or she can root for.3. Every character should want something, even if it is only a glass of water.4. Every sentence must do one of two things - reveal character or advance the action.5. Start as close to the end as possible.6. Be a sadist. Now matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them - in order that the reader may see what they are made of.7. Write to please just one person. If you open a window and make love to the world, so to speak, your story will get pneumonia.8. Give your readers as much information as possible as soon as possible. To heck with suspense. Readers should have such complete understanding of what is going on, where and why, that they could finish the story themselves, should cockroaches eat the last few pages. The greatest American short story writer of my generation was Flannery O'Connor (1925-1964). She broke practically every one of my rules but the first. Great writers tend to do that. - Vonnegut, Kurt Vonnegut, Bagombo Snuff Box: Uncollected Short Fiction (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons 1999), 9-10.

The process of reading, being able to connect semantic input with the letters on the page, does not mean much if language learners cannot understand what they have read. The following exercises, modified from Sherrill Flora's Everyone Reads! will give you and your students some fun ways to make sure the meaning came through the words on the page.

1. Kids get into groups and are given a stack of pictures into which I have put pictures from each of the above category. I usually put around 15-20 in each stack. When we do nouns.... I will place big signs on the board with "common" "proper" "abstract" "concrete" "plural" and any others we are studying. Their group has to go through their stack and find one to correspond with each topic AND they have to have a justification for each. 2. When I do prepositions, I give each student a situation picture and have them list as many preps. as they can find in each picture. I give a prize for the most found. 3. When we study characterization, I give each student one picture from the "people" envelope and have them write a brief character sketch based on what they perceive. 4. When I do verbs, I will give each row ONE picture. I tell the students in the first seat of each row to take out one piece of paper. When I say "GO", the first person looks at his picture and comes up with one action verb. Then very quickly writes it down and passes it back. The next person has to write down another action verb and pass it back to the next. It just keeps going. The person in the back runs the picture up to the front person. I usually start another picture back as soon as the first person passes it to the next. In about 4-5 minutes, I stop and the row with the most and the most accurate verb list gets a prize or pig points. 5. When we do short stories, I give each person an envelope in which I have put 2-3 people (characters), 1 place picture (setting) and 1 picture from the situational. After we have discussed the "elements",they begin to write their own short story based on what they have in front of them. 6. When I teach a vocabulary word that is a little more difficult, I always go to my stack to find one that illustrates it. For example, I found a perfect picture of a clear blue lake with not one ripple to show them "placid". They never forgot that word. 7.

One of the major keys to success in language acquisition is making reading a habit. Extensive [Sustained] Silent Reading (ESSR) is thus useful as it allows readers to improve their language skills in various aspects (grammar, vocab, spelling etc) and levels without the stress of classroom learning and a teacher's supervision. I aim to read (at least) one English text (eg. short story, article, poetry) a day - although this may be slightly stretched from time to time, depending on academic/personal commitments.

Need an idea to help you get started writing? You'll find hundreds of fun writing prompts here - perfect for beginning a new novel or short story, or simply giving your writing muscle a workout.

Victor turned on his computer. White letters appeared near the bottom of the black screen: "Resuming Windows." Victor wondered how long it was going to take this time. Five minutes later, the light blue screen appeared: "To begin, click your user name." He clicked on his name. Then he filled a pot with water to make some fresh coffee. He returned to his computer. The desktop icons had still not appeared. Victor went into his bedroom, took the sheet off the bed and the pillowcases off the pillows, and threw them all into the clothes basket on the floor. He vacuumed his bedroom, and then returned to his computer. A few minutes later, the desktop appeared, with about 40 icons on it. He liked how colorful they were. He clicked on his Word icon. Then he went into the bathroom and shaved. He came back out to the dining room, made himself a cup of coffee, and sat down. Word opened, a full half hour after Victor had turned his computer on. Victor typed his first name into the document. For about ten seconds, the screen was totally blank. Then "Victor" slowly appeared, one ... letter ... after ... another.

Gordon was hungry. He opened the refrigerator. There must be something in here to eat, he thought. There was-a single hot dog. He took it out of its package and put a small frying pan onto the stove's gas burner. He turned on the heat. Then he poured a little bit of vegetable oil into the pan. He sliced the hot dog in half lengthwise. When the oil got hot, he put the two halves in the pan. About a minute later, he flipped each half over. After another minute, he took the hot dog out of the pan. Gordon put two slices of bread into the toaster. This was tasty and healthy bread. The first ingredient listed was organic sprouted wheat. The first ingredient in ordinary bread is usually unbleached flour. When the toast popped up, he put mustard, mayonnaise, and ketchup on one slice. Then he added two slices of onion. On top of the onions, he placed the hot dog. On top of the hot dog, he put a couple of slices of apple. Then he added some bits of hot green chile, and then put the top piece of toast onto the chile bits. Ahh, what a sandwich, he thought, as he sat down to eat.

It was noon on Friday. Friday was wash day, Kerry's least favorite day. Doing the wash was such a pain. He had to gather together all the dirty clothes. He had to turn the shirts and slacks inside out to save wear and tear on the outside of the shirts and slacks. He had to empty all the junk out of all the pockets of his clothes. Then he had to find quarters for each load of wash-four for the washer and three for the dryer. It'd be so nice to have a weekly maid, like his downstairs neighbor. Kerry piled all his clothes into the laundry basket and went downstairs. He was relieved to hear silence as he approached the laundry room; no one was using the machines. He put laundry soap and quarters into the washer, and set it at Warm Temperature and Regular Wash. A few minutes later, it was full of soapy water. He stuffed in half of the dirty clothes. This was going to be a two-load day. He placed the half-full basket on top of the churning washer. He shut the laundry room door and walked back upstairs. He set his electronic timer to 35 minutes. When the washer was done, he'd reload it and put the first load into the dryer. He sat down and opened the newspaper to the California section: "Truck Runs Over Crossing Guard," said the headline.

It was a strange day-Thursday-for a wedding. Who ever heard of a Thursday wedding? "Well," Harlan explained to everyone, "the Thursday event is going to cost me half of what Friday, Saturday, or Sunday would cost me. And a 50-percent discount is a lot of money, believe me." Everyone believed him. Harlan knew how to count his pennies. The early evening event was at Cowfish, a popular restaurant and meeting place on campus. Nevin and Janelle arrived at 5 p.m. for pictures, but the photographer had been delayed on the freeway because someone had jumped off an overpass. So they decided to take a stroll on campus. Walking westward, they soon found a fish pond. About a dozen small turtles were swimming in the eastern end of the pond. As Janelle kneeled at water's edge, all the turtles swam toward her. A couple of them climbed out of the water and onto the footpath. They wanted food, but a sign advised visitors not to feed the fish or turtles. So she apologized to the turtles-not that she had any turtle food anyway, she added. Nevin and Janelle took pictures of themselves and the turtles. They walked back to Cowfish just before the ceremony was to begin. Some of the preacher's words were unclear because of static on the portable microphone. After the preacher pronounced Harlan and Ellen husband and wife, guests clapped and cheered. The photographer, who had gotten "some great pictures" of the fallen body, busily took pictures of the bride and groom, the preacher, the parents, and the guests. After their meal, Nevin and Janelle said good night to the newly married couple. This was the fourth marriage for Harlan, so everyone was hoping it would be his last. Then Nevin and Janelle walked out to their car, holding hands and talking about what would be the same and what would be different at their own wedding. That is, if they didn't decide to just drive to Las Vegas for a quick marriage, with Elvis performing at their ceremony. "That way, our only

ESL students don't share the same cultural context as their instructor in most cases, making humor in the ESL class dicey.

"It's no secret that I am a passionate advocate for using video in the classroom. When used well, videos can help students make connections to people and ideas beyond their usual frame of reference. That's why I've been really excited to see a wave of new (and mostly free or low-cost!) tech tools recently that enable teachers to take favorite clips and make them more valuable for educational use. Whether you use videos to flip your classroom or you just appreciate the power of video to engage kids, maybe one of the tools in my playlist below will help you go deeper in 2014."

[I'm not sure what to think about this video, there's kinda a lot of clashes between what is said & done in this video that I;m kinda confused... but it's interesting to discuss about I guess]

"The year was 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren't only equal before God and the law. They were equal every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else. All this equality was due to the 211th, 212th, and 213th Amendments to the Constitution, and to the unceasing vigilance of agents of the United States Handicapper General."

Literature has been a subject of study in many countries at a secondary or tertiary level, but until recently has not been given much emphasis in the EFL/ESL classroom. It has only been since the 1980s that this area has attracted more interest among EFL teachers. The purpose of this article is to look at some of the issues and ways in which literature can be exploited in the classroom. There are also links to classroom activities and lessons with literature that you can download and use straight away.

many schools, and certainly students automatically think of a younger person when they imagine their "ideal" teacher. It's the job of an older applicant to make them see otherwise. And it should be the job of the hiring staff to hire the best teacher - not just the teacher that might work out.