Reading, Writing and Learning in ESL: A Resource Book for K-12 Teachers (4th Edition)

Book Description

Unlike many texts in this field, Reading, Writing and Learning In ESL (K-12) takes a unique approach by exploring contemporary language acquisition theory as it relates to instruction and providing suggestions and methods for motivating and involving ELL students. Oral language, reading, and writing development in English for K-12 students.

Customer Reviews:

Great!.......2007-08-23

This item is very resourceful! I needed it for my online course and it was certainly an easy read. :)

great resource book.......2007-03-10

This book covers it all! I will definitely keep it on my shelf and refer back to it for ideas.

helpful!.......2006-11-13

the book is very well written and has great information for future esl teachers!

Thorough and practical.......2006-05-15

I use this as the text for a university level ESL Methods course. I've especially liked the authors use of specific classroom examples, as well as suggestions for learning activities that students can utilize. It is also full of suggestions for effective teaching strategies to use with ELLs.

Helpful with strategies for teaching ELLs........2006-04-03

This book is a great source for both mainstream teachers and TESOL teachers. It helps in teaching all kinds of students. Very helpful!

The Three-Minute Classroom Walk-Through: Changing School Supervisory Practice One Teacher at a Time

Average customer rating:

Th e Three-Minute Walk- Through
3 minute walk through easily applied-
Three Minute Classroom Walk-Through

The Three-Minute Classroom Walk-Through: Changing School Supervisory Practice One Teacher at a Time
Carolyn J. Downey , Betty E. Steffy , Fenwick W. English , Larry E. Frase , and William K. Poston
Manufacturer: Corwin Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

General | Education | Nonfiction | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0761929673

Book Description

Change the entire school culture with this collaborative method of supervision.

For years, the classic supervision model has frustrated both principals and teachers by fostering superior-subordinate relationships, focusing on teacher conformity rather than growth, or producing checklist data that is irrelevant to the curriculum. The Three-Minute Classroom Walk-Through offers a practical, time-saving alternative that impacts student achievement by cultivating self-reliant teachers who are continuously improving their practice.

Easy to understand and adopt, this method will answer the questions most important to principals:

Is the work of my teachers aligned with the district curriculum?
Are my teachers using research-based "best practices"?
Are they choosing the instructional strategies that will promote student achievement?

Also known as the Downey Walk-through, the method presented in The Three-Minute Classroom Walk-Through has been developed over a 40-year period, tested and refined in actual teaching environments, and taught internationally.

Also see:
The Three-Minute Classroom Walk-Through (Multimedia Kit)

Customer Reviews:

Th e Three-Minute Walk- Through.......2007-04-06

I was expecting something less technical and more user friendly. I will have to devote some time to reading this in the summer and then perhaps implement next year.

3 minute walk through easily applied-.......2007-02-21

This book was an easy read and had very practical, easy to put into practice, tips on observing classrooms. Time-saving techniques that still are quality practices.

Three Minute Classroom Walk-Through.......2005-07-28

An effective guide for pinpointing effective classroom instruction. This book also outlines specific strategies for engaging teachers in reflective dialogue that could enhance classroom instruction. A must read for administrators.

Average customer rating:

A Very Solid Novel
Couldn't Finish the Book
Chekov would've hated this novel
Lovely characters
Not literally a good book but nevertheless, a great one.

On Beauty
Zadie Smith
Manufacturer: Penguin Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

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ASIN: 0143037749

Amazon.com

In an author's note at the end of On Beauty, Zadie Smith writes: "My largest structural debt should be obvious to any E.M. Forster fan; suffice it to say he gave me a classy old frame, which I covered with new material as best I could." If it is true that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Forster, perched on a cloud somewhere, should be all puffed up with pride. His disciple has taken Howards End, that marvelous tale of class difference, and upped the ante by adding race, politics, and gender. The end result is a story for the 21st century, told with a perfect ear for everything: gangsta street talk; academic posturing, both British and American; down-home black Floridian straight talk; and sassy, profane kids, both black and white.

Howard Belsey is a middle-class white liberal Englishman teaching abroad at Wellington, a thinly disguised version of one of the Ivies. He is a Rembrandt scholar who can't finish his book and a recent adulterer whose marriage is now on the slippery slope to disaster. His wife, Kiki, a black Floridian, is a warm, generous, competent wife, mother, and medical worker. Their children are Jerome, disgusted by his father's behavior, Zora, Wellington sophomore firebrand feminist and Levi, eager to be taken for a "homey," complete with baggy pants, hoodies and the ever-present iPod. This family has no secrets--at least not for long. They talk about everything, appropriate to the occasion or not. And, there is plenty to talk about.

The other half of the story is that of the Kipps family: Monty, stiff, wealthy ultra-conservative vocal Christian and Rembrandt scholar, whose book has been published. His wife Carlene is always slightly out of focus, and that's the way she wants it. She wafts over all proceedings, never really connecting with anyone. That seems to be endemic in the Kipps household. Son Michael is a bit of a Monty clone and daughter Victoria is not at all what Daddy thinks she is. Indeed, Forster's advice, "Only connect," is lost on this group.

The two academics have long been rivals, detesting each other's politics and disagreeing about Rembrandt. They are thrown into further conflict when Jerome leaves Wellington to get away from the discovery of his father's affair, lands on the Kipps' doorstep, falls for Victoria and mistakes what he has going with her for love. Howard makes it worse by trying to fix it. Then, Kipps is granted a visiting professorship at Wellington and the whole family arrives in Massachusetts.

From this raw material, Smith has fashioned a superb book, her best to date. She has interwoven class, race, and gender and taken everyone prisoner. Her even-handed renditions of liberal and/or conservative mouthings are insightful, often hilarious, and damning to all. She has a great time exposing everyone's clay feet. This author is a young woman cynical beyond her years, and we are all richer for it. --Valerie Ryan

Book Description

Winner of the 2006 Orange Prize for fiction and from the celebrated author of White Teeth comes another bestselling masterwork

Having hit bestseller lists from the New York Times to the San Francisco Chronicle, this wise, hilarious novel reminds us why Zadie Smith has rocketed to literary stardom. On Beauty is the story of an interracial family living in the university town of Wellington, Massachusetts, whose misadventures in the culture wars—on both sides of the Atlantic—serve to skewer everything from family life to political correctness to the combustive collision between the personal and the political. Full of dead-on wit and relentlessly funny, this tour de force confirms Zadie Smith's reputation as a major literary talent.

Named one of the Ten Best Books of the Year by the New York Times Book Review, Entertainment Weekly, Time, and Publishers Weekly A New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, San Francisco Chronicle, Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Denver Post, and Publishers Weekly bestseller A Los Angeles Times, Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle, Atlantic Monthly, Newsday, Christian Science Monitor, and Minneapolis Star Tribune Best Book of the Year Short-listed for the Man Booker Prize BACKCOVER: Praise for On Beauty:

“A thoroughly original tale . . . wonderfully engaging, wonderfully observed . . . That rare thing: a novel that is as affecting as it is entertaining, as provocative as it is humane.”
—Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times

“A thing of beauty. Oh happy day when a writer as gifted as Zadie Smith fulfills her early promise with a novel as accomplished, substantive and penetrating as On Beauty.”
—Los Angeles Times

“Smith's specialty is her ability to render the new world, in its vibrant multiculturalism, with a kind of dancing, daring joy. . . . Her plots and people sing with life. . . . One of the best of the year, a splendid treat. ”
—Chicago Tribune

“Short-listed for [the 2005] Man Booker Prize, On Beauty is a rollicking satire . . . a tremendously good read.”
—San Francisco Chronicle

Download Description

"Howard Belsey, a Rembrandt scholar who doesn't like Rembrandt, is an Englishman abroad and a long-suffering professor at Wellington, a liberal New England arts college. He has been married for thirty years to Kiki, an American woman who no longer resembles the sexy activist she once was. Their three children passionately pursue their own paths: Levi quests after authentic blackness, Zora believes that intellectuals can redeem everybody, and Jerome struggles to be a believer in a family of strict atheists. Faced with the oppressive enthusiasms of his children, Howard feels that the first two acts of his life are over and he has no clear plans for the finale. Or the encore. Then Jerome, Howard's older son, falls for Victoria, the stunning daughter of the right-wing icon Monty Kipps, and the two families find themselves thrown together in a beautiful corner of America, enacting a cultural and personal war against the background of real wars that they barely register. An infidelity, a death, and a legacy set in motion a chain of events that sees all parties forced to examine the unarticulated assumptions which underpin their lives. How do you choose the work on which to spend your life? Why do you love the people you love? Do you really believe what you claim to? And what is the beautiful thing, and how far will you go to get it? Set on both sides of the Atlantic, Zadie Smith's third novel is a brilliant analysis of family life, the institution of marriage, intersections of the personal and political, and an honest look at people's deceptions. It is also, as you might expect, very funny indeed."

Customer Reviews:

A Very Solid Novel.......2007-09-25

Smith's OB is a fine novel. Not great. Not particularly memorable (at least I don't suppose that it will leave a lasting impression on me; I doubt I'll find myself quoting from it days, weeks, or years from now). But solid: well written, well styled, balanced, strong on character development, well researched. This last point bears underscoring. OB is a perfect evocation of university life, in certain quarters of certain universities. I'm not familiar with the details of Smith's own biography, but I assume she herself was, once upon a time, enrolled in a school similar to the eponymous one at the center of this novel. OB evinces the kind of offhand familiarity with academia that experience (and, I imagine, only rarely research) brings. Kudos to Smith for successfully toeing the very fine line between characterization and stereotyping. The protagonists of this novel, their strengths and their foibles, the storylines, the setting -- in short, everything about OB -- seem genuine. That said, OB gets 4 stars from this reader for the following reason: that which is genuine is not always compelling. In the end, OB felt over-long to me and a little less substantial than it might have been. The classics to which it has been compared, and on which it was consciously modeled, all have something this one lacks. For all the reasons I can imagine reading Howard's End again and again, at different stages of my life, I doubt I'll ever crack the pages of OB again. Smith is a fine writer, to be sure. I look forward to reading more of her in future. OB is a fine novel. It's no masterpiece, though.

Couldn't Finish the Book.......2007-09-17

I initially enjoyed this book and the characters but as I got further into the story, I started to feel like it wasn't going anywhere. The story seemed to run out of steam for me after Carlene discovered the truth about Howard's affair. I found myself wandering and losing interest after that point and then I finally gave up without finishing the book.

Chekov would've hated this novel.......2007-09-06

Chekov would've hated this novel. Why? By the end of the novel, there are a dozen guns on the mantle, not one of them fired.

Every character had potential. Every story thread had potential.
But non of them go anywhere!

I read the whole novel WAITING and nothing ever really happened.

There is an affair which has no real meaning in the book but to supposedly add weight. There are friendships which never go anyhwere.
The supposed main plot never even really happens.

Guns guns everywhere but not a single shot fired!

Lovely characters.......2007-09-01

Una de esas novelas que cuando las terminás, extrañás a todos los personajes como si los hubieras conocido. Tiene buen ritmo. Lo mejor: las descripciones de las familias y susmiembros. Lo de la académica de la pintura me pareció lo más flojo del texto.

Not literally a good book but nevertheless, a great one........2007-08-14

I read this book twice while in Senegal and it really got me interested in the work of Zadie Smith. I have since read White Teeth which I too thought was amazing but quite different in approach and method.

When looking to rate in some nebulous, objective manner the quality of an author's work, it may be best to look into what the author set out to accomplish in the first place. If Smith was setting out to do some sort of historical fiction or dramatized non-fiction about the American academic culture or do some scathing exposition of the dodgy world of Rembrandt criticism, she had done a bad job of it (Zadie Smith is not a documentarian in the strict sense of the word, she is, however, a great recreator of contemporary Western society). That's why I don't think it's the case that she sought to do that kind of story.

This book is about two things: middle age and social (interpersonal) politics, it is as much about the interaction between middle age and social politics as it is the way each of them affect the whole lives of the characters in the story. The story of Howard is terribly interesting because one can delight in his downfall as he realizes his agedness yet realize that the mistakes he makes along the way are at least human, if not understandable in some instances (the pridefulness of wishing to be recognized for his academic work at the expense of his nemesis). Of course, Smith doesn't stray far from her character wheelhouse of hybrids too, which always adds some pretty attractive complication to the storyline.

A great book on an interesting subject.

Reading, Writing and Learning in ESL: A Resource Book for K-12 Teachers, MyLabSchool Edition (4th Edition)

Average customer rating:

Great Results

Reading, Writing and Learning in ESL: A Resource Book for K-12 Teachers, MyLabSchool Edition (4th Edition)
Suzanne F. Peregoy , and Owen F. Boyle
Manufacturer: Allyn & Bacon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0205449239

Customer Reviews:

Great Results.......2006-02-18

It was a wonderful first time for me purchasing from Amazon. The books came in perfect conditions and in a timely manner. I am very satisfied with the results of my purchase.

Teaching Pronunciation: A Reference for Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages

Average customer rating:

Excellent source of phonology pedagogy
Language Teacher's MUST Have Book!
The single best book!
The ONE! Best!
it was really helpful!

Teaching Pronunciation: A Reference for Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages
Marianne Celce-Murcia , Donna M. Brinton , and Janet M. Goodwin
Manufacturer: Cambridge University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Teaching Listening Comprehension (Cambridge Handbooks for Language Teachers)

ASIN: 0521406943

Book Description

This course includes an overview of current theory and practice. The paperback edition offers current and prospective teachers of English a comprehensive treatment of pronunciation pedagogy, drawing on current theory and practice. The text provides an overview of teaching issues from the perspective of different methodologies and second language acquisition research. It has a thorough grounding in the sound system of North American English, and contains insights into how this sound system intersects with listening, morphology, and spelling. It also contains diagnostic tools, assessment measures, and suggestions for syllabus design. Discussion questions encourage readers to draw on their personal language learning/teaching experiences as they assimilate the contents of each chapter. Follow-up exercises guide teachers in developing a range of classroom activities within a communicative framework.

Customer Reviews:

Excellent source of phonology pedagogy.......2007-05-30

Accurate and easy guide for teachers or anyone who desires to understand, apply and explain phonetics. Simple tables and pictures for better comprehension. Includes NAE transcription key (consonants, stressed and unstressed vowels), and it even covers the history of teaching pronunciation in the first chapters.
Totally recomend!

Language Teacher's MUST Have Book!.......2006-02-05

This book is full of excellent, research based ideas for teaching pronunciation. I have used this book many times to create lessons for students of all ages and abilities. This is an essential reference book!

The single best book!.......2003-07-28

This with the accompanied cassette is really useful. It can be guaranteed that after a thorough study of the book and the cassette one can be a much better ESL teacher or student. You probably won't regret buying them. You would love to have them on your bookshelf as references and resources for many years.

The ONE! Best!.......2003-07-28

This cassette accompanying the book is really useful. It covers some important things that the book doesn't have space for. It can be guaranteed that after a thorough study of the book and the cassette one can be a much better ESL teacher or student. You probably won't regret buying them. You would love to have them on your bookshelf as references and resources for many years.

it was really helpful!.......2001-11-09

this book is not only good for the ESL/EFL teachers but also good for the teachers who is teaching many other language..
if you want to know the theory and the practice of pronunciation I think this book is really helpful for you~

Teaching Children to Read and Write: Becoming an Effective Literacy Teacher (4th Edition)

Average customer rating:

Helps with the RICA Case Study...

Teaching Children to Read and Write: Becoming an Effective Literacy Teacher (4th Edition)
Robert B. Ruddell
Manufacturer: Allyn & Bacon
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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Development of Language, The (6th Edition)

ASIN: 0205435556

Customer Reviews:

Helps with the RICA Case Study..........2007-01-10

This book is pretty good with becoming an effective literacy teacher. Many of the different strategies given are good to know for your own classroom. This book was helpful because I used it in conjunction with other materials to study for the RICA and I passed. This version is just as good with the newest edition. I didn't miss out not having the newest edition...

Average customer rating:

Charming but not engaging
Von Igelfeld and the Villa of Reduced Circumstances
Feeling Depressed?
Inspired Wildness
I loved it!

At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances
Alexander Mccall Smith
Manufacturer: Anchor
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs
Portuguese Irregular Verbs
44 Scotland Street
Espresso Tales
Blue Shoes and Happiness (No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, Book 7)

ASIN: 1400095093
Release Date: 2004-12-28

Book Description

Readers who fell in love with Precious Ramotswe, proprietor of The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, now have new cause for celebration in the protagonist of these three light-footed comic novels by Alexander McCall Smith. Welcome to the insane and rarified world of Professor Dr. Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld of the Institute of Romance Philology. Von Igelfeld is engaged in a never-ending quest to win the respect he feels certain he is due–a quest which has the tendency to go hilariously astray.

In At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances, Professor Dr. von Igelfeld gets caught up in a nasty case of academic intrigue while on sabbatical at Cambridge. When he returns to Regensburg he is confronted with the thrilling news that someone from a foreign embassy has actually checked his masterwork, Portuguese Irregular Verbs, out of the Institute’s Library. As a result, he gets caught up in intrigue of a different sort on a visit to Bogota, Colombia.

Customer Reviews:

Charming but not engaging.......2007-10-10

Fun, simple read but not enough to make me want to read more of this series. I was never really sure what the point was and yes there is some satire to be found, but maybe just too subtle for my taste.

Von Igelfeld and the Villa of Reduced Circumstances.......2007-05-13

I LOVE McCall Smith's books. Read the entire Ladies' Detective Agency series. This third part of Dr. Dr. Moritz Maria von Igelfeld is the least engaging of the three. Having lived in Germany, I was interested in Von Igelfeld's cultural approach to life. His thinking is funny, and I DO like McCall-Smith's humor and insight. However, as he travels around, at one point becoming the President of Columbia, doesn't bring forth McCall-Smith's sense of humor as much. The first two had me hating to put it down, this one I had to get myself to finish it. It does better as an audio book.

Feeling Depressed? .......2007-05-07

If you need a lift, this book, along with the others in this series will do it. The improbable adventures of Professor Dr. von Igelfeld are wonderfully funny, the books are short, and, yes we can love a pompous stuffed shirt.

Inspired Wildness.......2007-03-16

Hard to describe this other than as hilariously and totally out-of-control in the most charming and literate way. This is author Alexander Mccall Smith's wild side. If you like farce--this is witty farce, and not to be missed.

I loved it!.......2006-12-22

This is the first Alexander McCall Smith book that I've listened to. The audio version is funny as heck...especially von Igelfeld's toilet difficulties at Cambridge. The narrator has captured the true essence of our German hero! I highly recommend it...I even sent a copy to my dad. He loved it too!

Average customer rating:

LOVED IT!
Acquiring a taste for Professor Dr. Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld of the Institute of Romance Philology
A quaint and readable book
Disappointing
Not what I expected

The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs
Alexander McCall Smith
Manufacturer: Anchor
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Portuguese Irregular Verbs
At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances
44 Scotland Street
Blue Shoes and Happiness (No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, Book 7)
Espresso Tales

ASIN: 1400095085
Release Date: 2004-12-28

Book Description

Readers who fell in love with Precious Ramotswe, proprietor of The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, now have new cause for celebration in the protagonist of these three light-footed comic novels by Alexander McCall Smith. Welcome to the insane and rarified world of Professor Dr. Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld of the Institute of Romance Philology. Von Igelfeld is engaged in a never-ending quest to win the respect he feels certain he is due–a quest which has the tendency to go hilariously astray.

In The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs, Professor Dr. Von Igelfeld is mistaken for a veterinarian and not wanting to call attention to the faux pas, begins practicing veterinary medicine without a license. He ends up operating on a friend’s dachshund to dramatic and unfortunate effect. He also transports relics for a schismatically challenged Coptic prelate, and is pursued by marriage-minded widows on board a Mediterranean cruise ship.

Customer Reviews:

LOVED IT!.......2007-09-18

McCall Smith's character The Professor Dr. Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld is up to his shameless behavior once again! McCall Smith's books are always fun and entertaining reads.

Acquiring a taste for Professor Dr. Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld of the Institute of Romance Philology.......2007-04-23

This book was my introduction to the wry, dry humour of Alexander McCall Smith. Professor Dr. Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld of the Institute of Romance Philology is perhaps an acquired taste. Some readers will appreciate the humour, others will not enjoy it and some will not recognise it for humour at all.

Of the three books in this trilogy, I enjoyed this one the best. For me, this was 'laugh out loud' humour and I expect those around me were grateful when I resumed more serious lunchtime reading.

A recommended light-hearted read.

Jennifer Cameron-Smith

A quaint and readable book.......2007-03-18

After having read all of McCall's Ladies Detective Agency books, I was definitely not disappointed in "Sausage Dogs". There are moments when you can't help laughing out loud. While being somewhat frivolous, it still manages to present the vulnerable side of human nature. A quick and most enjoyable read. I look forward to reading more of this series.

Disappointing.......2007-01-04

The title story is amusing enough, but after that, the "adventures" of Professor von Igelfeld are pretty tedious.

Not what I expected.......2006-12-11

I have read all of Smith's #1 Ladies Detective Agency series and loved every one. This is not of the same quality. Not very interesting and took effort to read it to the end. Will wait anxiously for more in the #1 Ladies series.

Average customer rating:

intellectual humor
very different from his other works
Philologists are more amusing than "fun..."
Not Smith's best work
A delicious, quiet read

Portuguese Irregular Verbs
Alexander Mccall Smith
Manufacturer: Anchor
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

Comic | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

Contemporary | General | Literature & Fiction | Subjects | Books

The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs
At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances
44 Scotland Street
Blue Shoes and Happiness (No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency, Book 7)
Espresso Tales

ASIN: 1400077087
Release Date: 2004-12-28

Book Description

Readers who fell in love with Precious Ramotswe, proprietor of The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, now have new cause for celebration in the protagonist of these three light-footed comic novels by Alexander McCall Smith. Welcome to the insane and rarified world of Professor Dr. Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld of the Institute of Romance Philology. Von Igelfeld is engaged in a never-ending quest to win the respect he feels certain he is due–a quest which has the tendency to go hilariously astray.

In Portuguese Irregular Verbs, Professor Dr von Igelfeld learns to play tennis, and forces a college chum to enter into a duel that results in a nipped nose. He also takes a field trip to Ireland where he becomes acquainted with the rich world of archaic Irishisms, and he develops an aching infatuation with a Dentist fatale. Along the way, he takes two ill-fated Italian sojourns, the first merely uncomfortable, the second definitely dangerous.

Customer Reviews:

intellectual humor.......2007-07-29

A different kind of book, but fun none the less. Some of the humor was laugh out loud and some very subtle and some probably flew over my head. The title alone caused many raised eyebrows!!

very different from his other works .......2007-07-20

I bought this because I loved the botswana series. This is so different in tone that it's as if it's from a different author. Not bad, just radically different.

Philologists are more amusing than "fun...".......2007-06-15

If you are an academic with a sense of humor about yourself, or a non-academic who is connected with scholars and enjoys their foibles to some degree, you will cackle at this book. If you are not, and also dislike the Isabel Dalhousie books, move right on, this series won't do a thing for you.

Prof. Dr. Von Igelfeld's claim to fame (besides having an appropriately-sized nose and a surname meaning "hedgehog field") comes from having authored the definitive work on Portuguese irregular verbs. This book reads more like a series of short stories, loosely connected, moving from our hero's youth (in Heidelberg, naturally, where he instigates a malaprop duel) to his establishment in an academic position in Wiesbaden, to a later-life trip to Venice which recalls in a surreal way Thomas Mann's Death in Venice. His fellow scholars are featured as "tennis" companions in the first chapter, and later as fellow travelers to Italy (where an unforgettable power struggle over food develops with an innkeeper, Signora Cossi) . Von Igelfeld is aptly named, since he is prickly, snobbish, but also vulnerable in competition with those who pursue their desires more energetically. The chapters in which he competes with his colleague Unterholzer (of the "large and inelegant nose") reveal his humanity and move past humor to comment on the subtle frustrations of a life limited to "the life of the mind."

I studied Shakespeare years ago under a maddening philologist who insisted that we ferret out the derivation of every unusual word and write plot summaries of all the plays. My boredom threshold was low and I would exit every class bursting with repressed fury over such a lifeless approach to Shakespeare. Ah, but now I am older...would still be bored, no doubt...but would have more sympathy for the old gentleman, as I have sympathy for Igelfeld...who does laugh at himself by the end of the book! The ending in Venice with flashbacks to Thomas Mann is a wild one and the buildup of deja-vu references is irresistible...but then the actual ending is abrupt and not quite satisfying. 4 ½ stars, really...

Not Smith's best work.......2007-04-22

There are funny spots in the book, but really only his "No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency" series is any good.

A delicious, quiet read.......2007-02-20

Portuguese Irregular Verbs is one of only three books in Alexander McCall Smith's series featuring Professor Dr Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld, author of the philological masterwork that gives this book its title. (See my reviews of the other books in the series, The Finer Points of Sausage Dogs and At the Villa of Reduced Circumstances.) All of the von Igelfeld books were published in 2003, so that there is arguably no starting point to the series, yet readers would be advised to begin with this volume. The eight stories included in Portuguese Irregular Verbs provide a great deal of background information about our hero. We learn of his acquaintance while a student with Florianus Prinzel, now his colleague at the Institute of Romance Philology in Regensburg, and of his early work as an assistant to a professor of Celtic philology:

"'I couldn't have hoped for a better start to my career,' he confided in Prinzel. 'Vogelsang knows more about past anterior verbs in Early Irish than anybody else in the world.'"

We are given accounts, too, of the very moment when the idea of writing about Portuguese irregular verbs came to Igelfeld, and of his ill-fated near courtship of a certain lady dentist. Von Igelfeld travels to Ireland and Zürick, Siena and Venice and India in these stories. He meets a holy man and (maybe) a murderer, gets a tooth pulled, and provokes a sword fight. Throughout von Igelfeld is characteristically self-important and endearingly out of touch:

"Von Igelfeld sat down in the reception room and picked up the first magazine he saw on the table before him. He paged through it, noticing the pictures of food and clothes. How strange, he thought--what sort of Zeitschrift is this? Do people really read about these matters? He turned a page and began to read something called the Timely Help column. Readers wrote in and asked advice over their problems. Von Igelfeld's eyes opened wide. Did people discuss such things in open print?"

Some of the stories included in the book are better than others. In the most poignant of them ("Portuguese Irregular Verbs") Igelfeld attempts to beef up sales of his monograph to save it from being sold off by shelf foot. His quest for readers leads Igelfeld for the first time to the home of his colleague and nemesis, Professor Dr Detlev Amadeus Unterholzer. The visit is initially infuriating:

"Von Igelfeld peered at the plate above the bell and drew in his breath sharply. Professor Dr Dr D-A. von Unterholzer. What extraordinary, bare-faced cheek! It was little short of an outrage, on three counts, no less. Firstly, Unterholzer did not have two doctorates; there was no doubt about that. Secondly, what was all this nonsense about the hyphen between Detlev and Amadeus? Amadeus was his second name, as the whole world knew, not part of his first. And finally, and perhaps most seriously of all, there was the von. Von Igelfeld felt the anger surge up within him. If people got away with adding vons to their names whenever the mood took them, then that immeasurably reduced the significance of the real vons."

But after a moving discovery while browsing Unterholzer's bookshelves, von Igelfeld finds himself warming to the man.

Alexander McCall Smith is a charming writer, and von Igelfeld a delightful character--pretentious and jealous and deeply flawed, but ultimately capable of goodness. The Igelfeld stories are delicious, quiet reads. It's unfortunate that there aren't more of them.

Debra Hamel -- author of Trying Neaira: The True Story of a Courtesan's Scandalous Life in Ancient Greece (Yale University Press, 2003)

CliffsTestPrep Praxis II: English Subject Area Assessments (0041, 0042, 0043, 0048, 0049) (Cliffstestprep)

Average customer rating:

Great Test Prep
Paid for Incorrect Answers!!!!!
Good study guide but has at least one wrong answer in Practice Test
Helped me receive a perfect score
Well-organized with good detail

CliffsTestPrep Praxis II: English Subject Area Assessments (0041, 0042, 0043, 0048, 0049) (Cliffstestprep)
Diane E. Kern
Manufacturer: Cliffs Notes
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Binding: Paperback

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English Language, Literature, and Composition: Content Knowledge Study Guide (Praxis Study Guides)
CliffsTestPrep Praxis II: Principles of Learning and Teaching (CliffsTestPrep)
English Language, Literature, and Composition: Essays and Pedagogy Study Guide (Praxis Study Guides)
CliffsTestPrep Praxis II: Social Studies Content Knowledge Test (0081) (Cliffstestprep)
Study Guide for the Middle School Tests (Praxis Series)

ASIN: 0471785067

Book Description

Your guide to a higher score on Praxis II®: English Subject Area Assessments (0041, 0042, 0043, 0048, 0049)

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About the contents:
Introduction

Specific content covered on each test: English Language, Literature, and Composition: Content Knowledge (0041), Essays (0042), and Pedagogy (0043); Teaching Foundations: English (0048); and Middle School English Language Arts (0049)

Part I: Preparing for the Format of the Praxis II

Strategies for answering all 3 types of questions: multiple choice, constructed response, and essay; plus practice questions to give you experience

Part II: Preparing for the Content of the Praxis II

Outlines of the 4 categories of content: Reading and Understanding Text, Language and Linguistics, Composition and Rhetoric, and Teaching English

Part III: Full-length Practice Tests

5 full-length practice tests (one per subject area) with answers and explanations

Part IV: Closing Thoughts (Study Plan; Additional Resources)

Test-Prep Essentials from the Experts at CliffsNotes®

More than Notes!

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Customer Reviews:

Great Test Prep.......2007-09-20

This book was an excellent resource for me while studying for the Praxis II 0041. The book presented an organized view of the types of questions and sections within each test series. Although there are some incorrect answers, the practice test undoubtedly will help you gauge your level of preparation. I especially appreciated the book and resource list. I decided to read all the suggested novels (of while I read about 2/3) as additional preparation. I received my scores and I did very well, especially for someone who wasn't originally an English major. Again, I feel that this book does a wonderful job in helping one prepare for the Praxis II: English Subject Area tests.

Paid for Incorrect Answers!!!!!.......2007-08-31

I purchased the book Cliff Test Prep Praxis II: English Subject Area Assessment expecting that it would prepare me for the Praxis. Well while I was studying I discovered at least two questions in the practice test for th e 0041 section that gave incorrect answers! At first I was like what are the odds that a praxis prep book is incorrect, but then after confering with several English majors, I discovered that I was right and the book was in fact displaying incorrect answers. I have not recieved my Praxis scores yet, but I am seriously concerned. I passed the Praxis for general Content Knowlegde (0014) in June and I passed with 177 on my first try- but for that I used the ETS Prep book. Seriously, if you are reading this please buy the ETS book, not this one!!!

Good study guide but has at least one wrong answer in Practice Test.......2007-08-24

Do not use this booklet as your only study guide. Some of the questions are irrelevant and/ or ambiguous. In the 0041 practice test, the answer to number 45 is completely wrong. It also looks like Dr. Kern didn't edit the explanation of the answer for this question as well.

Helped me receive a perfect score.......2007-08-01

Despite the 0041 test being very obscure, the preparation questions and tests in this book helped me more than adequately prepare for the Praxis II exam. In fact, I was able to get obtain the highest score possible. I doubt that would have been possible without this resource. Thank you!

Well-organized with good detail.......2007-07-14

The book starts with some good test taking strategies and the content review is concise and well organized. Even though there was only one test per assessment area this book covered--I took the book's suggestion and took all of the tests since there is so much overlap in subject area.

I haven't taken the test yet, but I'm feeling much better about it after using this book. I definitely recommend it.

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