Yesterday, June 12th, marked what would have been Anne Frank's 84th birthday.  It was also on this day in 1942 that Anne Frank received a diary for her 13th birthday and wrote the very first entry in it.  The life she wrote within those pages has touched millions of people across the globe, not just as a chronicle of the terror of the Holocaust but as a candid look into the life of a teenage girl trying to understand herself. 

The first page of Anne's diary, courtesy of AnneFrank.org

Recently, a mother in Northville, Michigan, filed a complaint, demanding that the definitive, unedited version of Anne's diary be banned by the school district for its, well, frank language when talking about sexual matters.  Here is one passage that has her worked up:

"Until I was eleven or twelve, I didn't realize there was a second set of labia on the inside, since you couldn't see them. What's even funnier is that I thought urine came out of the clitoris…When you're standing up, all you see from the front is hair. Between your legs there are two soft, cushiony things, also covered with hair, which press together when you're standing, so you can't see what's inside. They separate when you sit down and they're very red and quite fleshy on the inside. In the upper part, between the outer labia, there's a fold of skin that, on second thought, looks like a kind of blister. That's the clitoris."

Anne's writing desk in the Annex, courtesy of AnneFrank.org

Well, this is quite a description.  When read in this blunt block quote without truly appreciating the context or the young girl who wrote it, it is easy to see why someone might become uncomfortable.  However, I have two points to make about why it would be wrong to remove this passage or any other passage like it.

The sexual content in this book is of the nature of a young person being curious about sex, as every
young person is around this age.  In her diary, Anne is has depicted her own self-discovery, and part of discovering herself is discovering her sexuality and sexual identity.  Everyone goes through this at some point, and to censor Anne is to deprive today's young readers the opportunity to see that being curious about sex and one's anatomy isn't freakish; it is something everyone goes through and is completely normal.  It removes the guilt that might be associated with wondering such things, and it gives young people the opportunity to learn a little of what Anne learned without having to ask an embarrassing question. Anne even describes giving the "sex talk" to her crush, Peter, who has questions himself.

To remove these sorts of things is to also to remove a part of Anne and to make her seem other than she really is, to place her on a pedestal of sainthood.  It removes her humanity and her realness.  Editions leaving out Anne's more racy entries aren't depicting the real Anne but a false version of her altered to conform to society's mores.

Secondly, removal of sexual content from school books in order to "protect" children doesn't actually protect them; it instead makes them more vulnerable.  In places where young teens don't receive proper sexual education that helps them understand the process and the risks and are instead told only to abstain from sex in order to protect themselves from pregnancy and STDs, rates of HIV contraction and unplanned pregnancy are higher.  Let me just throw this chart up there for you:

Source

When teens, who are going to probably become sexually active whether adults like it or not, are uniformed about sex, they are unable to make informed decisions regarding it.  Censoring what Anne says about female anatomy amounts to pretending that it doesn't exist and telling children to just stay away from it.  It is overall unwise and unhealthy to suppress what a young girl has to say about her own questions about sex and the answers she found.  Pretending sex, sexuality, and sexual anatomy don't exist doesn't make them go away.

But this story has a happy ending.  I honestly can say I've never been prouder of our education system than at this moment, even if it was only one school district.  Instead of giving in to the pressure of uninformed parents, which has been a regrettable trend among states and school districts over the past several years, Northville Public School officials have stated that they will not remove the book.  Their reasoning?  Taking away the unedited version amounts to censorship.  If only certain portions of a book are banned, it changes the book altogether and presents it as something it's not, like those idiotic editions of Huckleberry Finn that censor the n word.  This is fundamentally wrong, and these school officials see that.

If you've not been fortunate enough to read the unedited version of Anne's diary, it really is an enlightening treat.  Anne becomes almost a whole new girl; she even has a period, talks candidly about the subject of sex, and forms sometimes harsh opinions about the people around her and their choices.  If you'd like to have a copy for yourself, new or used, just click here or look under the Shop tab at the top of the page.  Happy reading, and don't ever let book banning stop you!

When it comes to commas, the thing that people seem to struggle with most is whether or not to put a comma before the conjunctions "and," "but," and "or."  I just want you to know that knowing when to put a comma before a conjunction is not one of those mysterious skills that normal people will never grasp; I learned this in elementary school.  Like with many things, there is a simple trick to it that you were simply never shown.

When I was in high school, I once heard a student ask the English teacher about when it is appropriate to put a comma before a conjunction.  Her response?  "It's a judgement call."  Several students in the room jotted this down in their notes hastily, like she had just imparted the secrets of the universe.  WRONG.  She was so wrong, and my whole being was screeching against it on the inside.  Needless to say, they fired her two years later.

Okay, here's the trick:
A comma is appropriate and required before a conjunction if the second half of the sentence, which occurs to the right of the conjunction, makes sense when separated and placed by itself. The way I was taught was to cover the first half of the sentence (including the conjunction) and read what is left aloud to determine whether it is a fragment or a whole sentence that makes sense.  If it is a fragment, no comma. If it is a whole sentence by itself, yes comma. 

Here's an example of a sentence that uses a comma before a conjunction correctly:

That woman was supposed to be an English teacher, but she didn't know jack.

If we "cover" the first half (conjunction included)... 

That woman was supposed to be an English teacher/, but she didn't know jack.

...we get this:

She didn't know jack.

This sentence has a subject and a verb and makes sense by itself.  Therefore, a comma is appropriate.  Now let's look at a sentence that doesn't require a comma before the conjunction:

The student raised his hand and asked a question.

 And then we cover the first half and get this:

Asked a question.

Notice that the second sentence makes no sense by itself, because it is a fragment.  There is no subject performing the action.  There is not even an implied "you" performing the action, such as in the sentence, "Do your homework."  The subject of the sentence is still the student from the first half, so the second half can't exist without the first half.  Because of this, it must be attached and not separated by a comma.

Here are a couple more correct example sentences to which the trick has been applied, just in case you're still confused.:

We could go to KFC for some fried chicken, or we could go to Church's.
We could go to KFC for some fried chicken/, or we could go to Church's.
We could go to Church's. 
Complete sentence; yes comma.

NASA is funding research for a food printer and plans to print pizza first. (True, btw)
NASA is funding research for a food printer/ and plans to print pizza first.
Plans to print pizza first.
Fragment; no comma. 


I don't like Kim Kardashian, but I love her clothing line at Sears. (Also true)
I don't like Kim Kardashian/, but I love her clothing line at Sears.
I love her clothing line at Sears.
Complete sentence; yes comma.

I tried to get some work done around the house but accidentally took a nap instead.
I tried to get some work done around the house/ but accidentally took a nap instead.
Accidentally took a nap instead.
Fragment; no comma.

Now that you've got this down, go forth and use your newfound comma skills for good!  Or evil.  Just as long as you use them, really.

As part of my efforts to get into a good graduate school next year (or the year after, depending on application cycles and deadlines), I've been studying for the GRE, or Graduate Record Examination.  There are parts of it I know I'm going to ace, but there are other parts I'm a little worried about.  That's why I picked up a copy of the New GRE 2011-2012 Premier with CD-ROM, a study aide straight from Kaplan, the people who design and give the test.

As part of studying for the Verbal section, it is suggested that you keep a vocabulary journal, a notebook where you write out and define words you've never heard before that you find in books or hear said.  It's supposed to help build vocabulary in preparation for the exam, but like the book says, this is a great practice to keep up for the rest of your life!

The book suggests that the method we were taught in elementary school, trying to derive the meaning of a word from the sentence around it, is flawed and that the only way to truly understand a word and the feelings or connotations that may be behind it is to examine it's true definition and roots.  It also suggests making up your own sentence for the word and writing it out to get a good feel for what you've just learned.  Learning the synonyms and antonyms of the word is good practice too.  Using the tips from the study guide, I created a format for my definitions that incorporates all the good practice habits mentioned: Word - (part of speech), (Greek/Latin roots and definitions of roots), (definition), (sentence using word), (synonyms), (antonyms.).   Remember, learning synonyms and antonyms of a word you know can help you to derive the meanings of the unknown synonyms or antonyms later without actually having to look them up!

I think this is going to prove to be an invaluable tool for my reading and writing ventures, and I just had to share it with all my readers!  The book lists several words that appear often on the exam, and I must admit, I learned a lot of new ones.  I also started taking the time to define new words I encountered while reading, as well as old words I'd never bothered to truly define.

If you'd like to start your very own vocabulary journal, here are three words to start you off, presented in the format I mentioned:

Vituperative - adj. - from vituperate + ive; Latin vituperatus, meaning to spoil or blame; vitu from
viti from vitium, meaning blemish; perare from parare, meaning to furnish or provide - characterized by or of the nature of harsh, abussive, defaming language; abusive verbally
Ex. - There is no need to be vituperative during these negotiations.
Synonyms: calumniating, castigating, censorious, contumelious, defamatory, derisive, disparaging, insolent, insulting, invective, libelous, maligning, obloquious, offensive, opprobrious, reproachful, reviling, rude, sarcastic, scathing, scolding, scurrilous, sharp-tongued, slanderous, traducing, upbraiding, villifying
Antonyms: N/A

Contraindicate - verb - from contra + indicate, Latin contra meaning against - (medical term) to give an indication against the advisability of something, usually a remedy or treatment
Ex. - The doctor contraindicated certain kinds of exercise in the treatment of his patient's arthritis.
Synonyms: N/A
Antonyms: N/A

Diatribe - noun - from Latin diatriba, Greek diatribe, meaning pastime, study, or discourse - a bitter, sharply abusive denunciation, attack, or criticism
Ex. - Pay no attention to the repeated diatribes against the senator.
Synonyms: harangue, criticism, abuse, castigation, denunciation, disputation, invective, jeremiad, objection, onslaught, philippic, reviling, screed, stricture, tirade, vituperation
Antonyms: praise, recommendation, compliment, defense, support

In my previous post, On Modern Illiteracy,  I mentioned that conquering the failure of our education system to produce functionally literate adults who enjoy a good book might begin with self-education.  This could mean learning a new language, taking risks, learning about another culture, watching something educational instead of reality TV, or reading a book.

I consider reading the most important item on that list.  However, not everyone has learned to enjoy reading.  I don't think it's a matter of people simply not liking to read and therefore never wanting to (although I'm sure this is the case sometimes), but rather a matter of people having never learned that reading for pleasure can actually be fun and entertaining, just as good as watching a movie or television.  Because of the way reading is presented as part of school curriculum, people lose the drive to read and begin to view it as a chore.

So if you're someone who is interested in bettering themselves through self-education, pursuing the things you enjoy and want to learn in order to improve yourself and your life, and learning to view reading as something enjoyable and beneficial instead of boring and forced, I've got a few good suggestions for you!  Here are five books that won't be too challenging for a non-reader but will still be able to capture imaginations and spark interest.  If you're a reader, don't hesitate to suggest these to your non-reading friends; you just might change their lives!

1.) The Giver by Lois Lowry - Alright, I know I've recommended this book so much for everything, but it really is a great and important book!  A lot of people get assigned this book to read in grade or middle school, but how many people really read it or paid attention when they did?  The Giver is about Jonas, a boy in a utopian world of no war, no pain, and no choices, who is about to turn 12.  12 is the age when people in his community are assigned to the job they will perform for the rest of their lives, and Jonas is mortified when he isn't called onto the stage with the rest of his classmates to receive his job assignment.  Then he is told that he will be given the most important job there is, the job of Receiver.  Receiver of what?  Memories of pain, war, pleasure, and the dark truth about the society he lives in.

2.) Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe - Although not as commonly assigned as The Giver, Things Fall Apart is another book encountered in high school English classes that students might be inclined to dismiss.  If you're looking for a starting point for investigating other cultures, this might be the book for you!  Okonkwo is a prominent tribe elder in his Ibo village in Nigeria, and his strong, warrior-like attitude that abhors weakness of any kind has brought him great success.  However, when aggressive European missionaries invade his native land and uproot and destroy the beautiful culture he has always known, Okonkwo refuses to stop fighting the shattering of his fragile world to the very end.

3.) Deadline by Chris Crutcher - So you don't like romance, fantasy, sci-fi, horror, mystery, fiction, nonfiction, any genre!... But you do like sports.  Then Deadline is the book for you.  Chris Crutcher incorporates plenty of good sports action into this book, which just might lure you into a world much deeper than the next touchdown.  Ben Wolf is an 18-year-old high school senior who has just been diagnosed with aggressive leukemia.  He has elected to forgo treatment and won't be telling his family so that he can have the best senior year he could possibly have without the stigma of his disease following him and defining him.  He sets some goals: enlighten his closed-minded civics teacher, help the local drunk clean up his act, become the best darn football player Trout, Idaho, has ever seen, and talk to the captivating Dallas Suzuki.  But keeping his secret isn't going to be as easy as he thought.

4.) Cujo by Stephen King - Horror can be an amazing genre, but if you pick up the wrong book, you'll never be able to get into it.  There are some terrible dime-store novels out there that are just so lame, and if you pick up something too long like Stephen King's It, you might get bogged down if it's your first time and start to hate the tedium.  However, while it will keep you captivated for a long time, Cujo is relatively short.  It's like a concise version of what great horror writing should be.  Vic and Donna Trenton have a son named Tad, and Tad is terrified of the monster in his closet that he is sure will get him one day.  When Donna and Tad find themselves stranded in the countryside, locked in the hot car with a rabid St. Bernard outside, Tad knows exactly what beast they are facing.

5.) Dear John by Nicholas Sparks - Like the horror genre, the romance genre is riddled with terrible books that are just so bad, they shouldn't even exist.  And yet, this is the genre that most people read and that people find easy to read.  If you're ready to read, don't know where to start, and nothing else appeals, perhaps the strong emotions that a romance novel can evoke will capture you.  Not really knowing what to do with himself, John Tyree joined the Army after dropping out of high school, but when he meets Savannah Lynn Curtis, he knows his life is going to change.  Savannah is a college student who volunteers for Habitat for Humanity and loves horses, and although reluctant, she falls quickly and passionately in love with John, pulling him into a world full of meaning that he never had access to before.  They vow to wait for each other while he finishes his tour of duty, but 9/11 turns their lives on end.  John decides to re-enlist, and the extended separation finds Savannah falling in love with someone else.  When John returns home, he finds that Savannah is married and still the girl of his dreams.  Now he faces the hardest decision of his life.

42% of adults admit to buying a book just to look smart and never reading it.
The average reading level of adults in the U.S. is between 7th and 9th grade. 

I know it's been a while, but I'm sure all of you understand how busy one's schedule can get, especially when you're trying to cram in all your school work plus some into the first three months of the semester.  If I'm going to be able to enjoy my time in Germany at all, I've simply got to get those things out of the way.  With that said...

Last week, I decided once and for all to say screw teaching.  I'm changing my major to pure English <3  I've been flirting with this idea for a long time, and I've finally decided that even if it would potentially open up one more job option for me to have the teaching minor, it is simply not worth it in any way.  Tacking a secondary education minor onto my upward climb to professorship was quite possibly one of the largest mistakes I've made in my life, and I'm glad I've finally realized it.

I may have wasted time and money on education courses, but I learned a valuable lesson from it.  It's not that teaching isn't a perfectly honorable pursuit, but like many professions, it is under-appreciated, underpaid, and ultimately fruitless for being discouraged by the very country that needs these teachers the most.  As it stands, the degree just doesn't seem worth the outstanding effort to attain it, the job risks, and various laws and regulations that restrict the everyday freedom of teachers, even in their own private lives.  It's exactly the same as getting a nursing degree: you're going to work a hard, thankless job with the risk of lawsuits or firings coming down on you at the drop of a hat that will effectively destroy your teaching career for the rest of your life.

Courtesy of Toothpaste for Dinner

I understand that many states have different education requirements, laws, and regulations concerning teaching, but whether it be at the national or state level, something must be done to encourage students to become teachers and to save the education of our country.  As for Alabama, there are several teacher examinations that a.) do not test teachers based on their subject of study and b.) test both elementary and secondary teachers the same way.  Is that really the way to determine if people taking these tests are competent?  In every education class I've ever sat down in, the professors announced that the coursework we would do in those classes would never be used by us in the real world of teaching, that no school used the programs or formats encouraged by the education track, and yet Alabama requires potential teachers to fill a portfolio full of these pointless assignments to show that we learned how to do them.  That work isn't just pointless, it is repetitive and extremely time consuming, some of the hardest classwork I've ever done for 10 points or a check +.  No matter what class you are in, you end up doing the same assignments in the same order over and over with slight variations.  The classes are so cookie cutter, one is often able to just turn in an old assignment with some slight alterations.  For every education class you take, you are required to do a certain amount of community service and student teaching hours; the more classes you take, the more hours you must do.  In essence, teaching classes can become like a second job between those outside hours and the plethora of busywork one must do.

So what happens when a student decides to endure all of that, to take a million courses on how not to be racist then write a thesis on revolutionary ideals about what education should be before embarking on a journey into a world where none of those ideals will ever come true?  You enter a struggling job market, perhaps you become a teacher, and that's great, you've got a job, maybe you love young people or your subject, you're totally pumped.  However, think for a moment back to your own high school education, if you will.  Did you ever notice that not very many of your own teachers were truly "pumped" unless they were just starting out?  Did you notice the passion leaving their eyes after teaching the same thing 7 times a day for year after year?  Did you see some sparkle disappear when students learned to hate or mock the subject that the teacher wanted to share with them?  Every day, hundreds of faces passed before them, most of them more occupied with dating and gossip than getting an education.  No one thanked them for the wisdom they imparted, for their passion, or for spending money from their own pockets to try to keep their students captivated.

From the Berkeley Daily Planet

Teaching textbooks call it burnout.  Personally, I hoped I wouldn't burn out before I could escape.  Teaching is a thankless job, and many students consider public school a glorified daycare.  Parents don't come in on parent-teacher conference day to say thank you for educating their child, they come in to scream at you because it couldn't possibly be that their son or daughter was turning in blank worksheets; it must be that you're a horrible teacher who has failed their child and should be fired.  And how is it that the practice of firing teachers whose students make bad grades is incentive for those teachers to get better at teaching students?  It is more likely that that same teacher, fearing for their job, will dumb down the curriculum for the sake of allowing everyone to pass and to save their career.  I won't even get started on standardized tests, let alone mass standardized tests; if you're a teacher for the grades that take the graduation exam or the SATs or what have you, you will teach to that test instead of teach truly valuable things to try and save the school where you work, because if those students fail that test, your school goes on probation and loses funding.  It detracts from the quality of education simply to pass tests that aren't even an accurate measure of student intelligence, talent, or creativity.  School becomes designed to cater to the desperate need of teachers to have all their students, especially the ones with the lowest grades, pass standardized tests for various reasons, catering to the needs of the students who border on failing and leaving especially gifted students bored, burned out, and neglected.  People who have an especially high IQ who often go on the be very successful are consistently let down by public education.

It all sounds so backwards, but it doesn't even end there.  The first classes to get cut when the budget is low are enrichment classes, arts and extracurriculars that inspire passion and creativity in students and offer a welcome break to the monotony of everyday classwork.  Put simply, school does not encourage the pursuit of passion.  If you aren't good at math and want a career in history later in life, you aren't allowed to take extra or more advanced history classes or to drop advanced calculus.  If you play the trumpet well and know you want it to be a major part of your life, you aren't allowed to focus on music and your grades in music courses are meaningless because they aren't "core curriculum."  If anything, your music course is likely to be cut.  The current system not only punishes the teacher, it punishes the student.  Teachers often must pay for many things one would consider necessities out of their pocket, such as tissues, extra tools used for enriching projects, or even books.  You are already severely underpaid (many teachers work second jobs, some of the ones at my high school being farmers on the side), and you're forced to pay for many tools for yourself because of lack of funding.  And yet, just a couple years ago, a 1/2 cent tax increase that would fund schools exclusively was voted down right here in Cullman and continues to get voted down every time it comes up.

It gets better.  Your personal life is no longer your own.  According to one of my teacher education textbooks, courts have upheld the decision of schools to fire teachers for living with a partner without being married.  I'm sure many of you remember a few years back that a teacher (pictured right) was fired for having a second job as a mate on a charter fishing boat service after it was discovered she wore a bikini on the cruises and in the fishing boat's brochure.  After the brochure was exposed, several fishing patrons volunteered photos of her in her bikini.  While sexual harassment may be a serious subject and there should always be regulations in place to prevent it, if a student decides to accuse a teacher of sexual harassment under false pretenses, even if it is discovered the accusation was a lie, that teacher will lose his or her job and probably never be hired as a teacher again, and courts will uphold the decision of schools to fire these teachers and other schools to refuse to hire them.  One must also never forget the threat of student violence, whether it be with guns, knives, or fists.  It happens more than you think.  I know that many of you could say that in your high school career, there was someone, even more than one someone, who brought a serious weapon to school, seemed to have tendencies toward violence and lashing out, or you were sure was just going to snap one day.  Aside from instances like that, my own school saw two bomb threats during the school day, and the year before I moved to my high school, an arsonist burned it down.  All that and I just live in podunk old Cullman, Alabama.

Until new laws and regulations concerning the education of teachers (they should be educated with curriculum that will truly prepare them for the kinds of programs and methods used in normal schools), freedoms within their private lives, proper funding of schools, a dramatic pay increase that reflects the value of the service these teachers are providing, standardized testing, incentive programs, and a million other things, teaching high school is simply not worth the extreme hard work placed both on those pursuing the degree and those already working within the field.  I've got something like over 50 job options with my versatile English degree and never intended to teach for more than 4 years before moving on to professorship, so tell me, nation, what's my motive to teach high school?  Sorry, nation, I've simply got to follow my dreams, whatever the path to them may be.

P.S. -- To all the education majors, especially elementary, who want to make it a career and want to help children, truly help them and devote your life to the pursuit, I respect you so much.  You are giving so much for some children that really need a helping hand.  I admire your nobility and am sorry that I myself am not nobler.