What if Gore Had Been President?

The 2000 U.S. presidential election was extremely close. Al Gore, the democratic candidate, actually won the popular vote, but not the electoral vote. The final state to swing the election was Florida, and that state's election was so close that the votes were being recounted, and the Supreme Court had to rule on when to stop the recount. (Here's a link to the Wikipedia article about it.) The Supreme Court decided to stop the recount, and George W. Bush became president.

I sometimes wonder what would have happened if Gore had been elected. I'm sure we would not have gone to war in Iraq. Gore is an environmentalist, and with him as president I'm sure we would have had stronger laws to protect the environment and prevent global warming.

At the time Bush took office, the U.S. economy was in good shape, and there was no budget deficit. Many people think that our current economic difficulties result from decisions made during the Bush administration--the Iraq war, tax cuts and removing regulation from banks and financial institutions. If this is true, the recession we are suffering from today might have been prevented.

Not Getting Married

When I was nineteen, I was planning to get married. I was very much in love, and very excited about it, but it didn't work out. My boyfriend decided he didn't want to go through with it, and broke it off. At the time, I was heartbroken, but now I realize that we would not have been happy together, and that I was actually lucky even though I didn't think so at the time.

Soon after we broke up, my former boyfriend joined the Navy, and later became a career officer. I would have hated the life of a military wife, moving from place to place. I would probably have been bored with the social life in the military. I think it's very likely that the marriage would have ended in divorce. Perhaps I would have had children to raise on my own. I might not have been able to travel on my own, or had the kind of career I have today.

Sometimes things turn out for the best, even though you are very unhappy about them at the time.

No Sports for Me

I've never enjoyed sports much at all.


I was terrible at sports when I was in school. I was always a little bit plump, and clumsy, and I have no depth perception--a visual problem that is not much of a handicap except for a few situations like ball games. When a ball is coming toward me, I can't see just how close it is, so I can never catch it.


In gym class, nobody wanted me on their team, and if they were stuck with me someone would say, "Don't try to do anything. Just stand there."


I don't enjoy watching sports much, either. I've never been much interested in who wins, so I've never even learned the rules of basketball or football.


For exercise, I love to swim but not competitively. I take my dog for walks. That's about all the exercise I get!

The Voynich Manuscript

The Voynich manuscript is a hand-written book that was made in Europe in the 1400’s. The mystery about it is that nobody understands the language in which it is written, and nobody has ever been able to read what it says. It is named after Alfred M. Voynich, an American collector of old books, who discovered it in 1912.

According the Wikipedia article about the Voynich manuscript, the book looks like an old medical handbook. Scholars think it must be that because of the pictures in it, and because the text seems to include recipes. They think it must have been written in some kind of secret code, but military code experts have tried to figure it out and have not been able to. Some people think that Voynich might have created the book himself as a hoax to make money, but scientific analysis of the book’s paper and ink shows that they must have been made more than 500 years ago.

I think that the book must have been the secret personal handbook of some early medical practitioner, maybe someone who mixed medicine with magic, as often happened at that time. If the book is partly about magic, that might have been one reason why the writer wanted it to be secret. But the writer must have been extremely clever to create a whole secret language that nobody has ever been able to read. The writer may have used some little-known language, one that is no longer spoken today, and then created an original code based on that, so there are two layers of secrecy.

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voynich_manuscript

http://www.world-mysteries.com/sar_13.htm

My Introduction

I've taught English as a second or foreign language since 1971. During the 1970's, I worked in Morocco and then in Japan. During the 1980's and early 90's, I taught ESL classes for immigrants and refugees with a number of Bay Area Adult schools and private agencies. During the 90's I worked for about five years as coordinator of two family literacy programs serving immigrant families in Richmond. I have been teaching in the ESL Department at Laney college since 1998, first part time and now full time.

At present, I am especially excited about guiding college-bound English language learners as they develop the skills they will need to reach their goals. I try to do everything I can to encourage my students to think on their own and take responsibility for their own learning, because I feel this is the real key to academic success.

             

Important! Exams for the Course

Although this is an online course, you will be required to come to the Laney College campus in Oakland to take your midterm and final exams.


For the midterm exam, you will choose ONE of the following dates and times:
 8-10 a.m. Thursday, Oct. 13
OR
7-9 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 13
OR
1-3 p.m. Friday. Oct. 14


For the final exam, you will choose ONE of the following dates and times:
7-9 p.m. Monday, Dec. 12
OR
8-10 a.m. Thursday, Dec. 13
OR
1-3 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 13


Plan now to be able to come to the Laney campus for the midterm and final. If you know that none of the above dates and times will work for you, contact the instructor to make other arrangements for the exams. Room numbers will be posted at a later date.

Welcome to Grammar 5!

When the fall 2011 semester begins, we will be using a Peralta Moodle site at


http://www.eperalta.org/fall2011


At the beginning of the semester, you will be able to sign onto this site and begin working on the course.


Right now, use this temporary blog site for information about the course and  the textbook.


For this course, you will be required to publish short writing assignments in your own Google blog. Follow the links on the right to see examples of student blogs from past semesters and directions for how to do it yourself. If you like, get a Gmail address and get started with your blog before the semester starts!


The textbook you will need to buy is:

Focus on Grammar 5: An Integrated Skills Approach, Third Edition (Full Student Book with Student Audio CD)

Edition:

3rd

Author:

Jay Maurer

Publisher:

Pearson ESL

Release Date:

August 2005

ISBN-10:

0131912755

ISBN-13:

9780131912755

Be sure that the book you buy has one of the above ISBN numbers; there are books with similar titles that are NOT the one you want. You need the 3rd edition of the student book, with audio CD. Here is a link to online sources of the textbook, at CheapestTextbooks.com