QUICK
RESOURCE SHEET #2 – October 15,
2004
Vocabulary
Builders
Are you
(or your students) looking for an easy way to enlarge your vocabulary? There
are several websites which will send you a new word every day by e-mail. The
formats vary, but most such sites include sample sentences to give you a good
idea of proper usage. My favorite sites draw these sample sentences from
actual magazine and news articles. Have a look at the following examples (along
with a taste of the type of information you receive when you subscribe).
Most
sites also include etymological information, and some include a link to a sound
file with the pronunciation. By the way, the subscriptions are free – though
you will find inducements on most sites to sign up for unnecessary “premium”
subscriptions, which do incur a charge.
Finally,
you’ll find that many word-of-the-day sites have useful (and free) resources
for teachers, including ready-to-use vocabulary activities.
http://www.wordsmith.org/awad/
heretic (HER-i-tik)
noun - One who holds unorthodox or unconventional beliefs. adjective
- Not conforming to established beliefs. [From Middle English
heretik, from Middle French heretique,
from Late Latin haereticus, from Greek hairetikos (able to choose), from haireisthai
(to choose).]
"(George) Keithley offers a portrait of a Galileo who is anything but
a heretic: In these poems, we glimpse a devout, spiritual Galileo who, because
of the wonders of the sky, is vigilant and in awe of the 'divine creator'."
Jenny Boully; Keithley's The Starry Messenger; Maisonneuve
(
http://dictionary.reference.com/wordoftheday/
affray
\uh-FRAY\, noun:
A tumultuous assault or quarrel; a brawl. An Irish
soldier was stabbed with a boar spear by a German mercenary in 1544 during an affray that followed Henry VIII's capture of
--James Williams, "Hunting, hawking and the early Tudor gentleman," History Today, August
2003
Affray comes from Old French esfrei, from esfreer,
"to disquiet, to frighten."
http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/mwwod.pl
metonymy • \muh-TAH-nuh-mee\ 
• noun
: a figure of speech consisting of the use of the name of one thing for
that of another of which it is an attribute or with which it is associated
Example
sentence:
American journalists employ metonymy whenever they say
"the White House" in place of "the president and his
administration."
Did
you know?
When Mark Antony asks the people of