Yesterday we did a language arts lesson about punctuating direct quotations. One of the optional activities involved reading pairs of sentences that have the same words, but different punctuation -- the point being that punctuation matters to the meaning of the sentence.
Although she punctuates well, apparently this had never fully occurred to the sweet girl -- that one little comma or a pair of quotation marks can make all the difference in how one reads or understands a sentence. She thought it was hilarious!
The children cried today.
The children cried, "Today!"
I thought she was going to fall off the couch she laughed so hard.
Her favorite pair, however, were these two sentences, which I read with great flair and drama:
The duke declared I am now the king!
The duke declared, "I am now the king!"
She thought it was hysterical that I was reading those words. She loves to play with literal meanings. What a silly duke, she teased me, to declare *me* the king -- he should have noticed I was a girl and therefore declared me a queen.
She told her dad all about the lesson last night. And then she got out a piece of paper and wrote with a flourish:
Dear Duke
I think somebody should teach you how to puckcheate.
Love S
Reminding me, of course, that we need to tackle the spelling of punctuate. And where to put commas when writing letters. But mostly making me laugh.
I think we have "Eats, Shoots, and Leaves" in our future.
2 comments:
Hee! Now I've got the giggles!
I remember my dad wrote up a test one time that had a whole paragraph that you had to punctuate two different ways. Seems to me it was a car advertisement, and you were supposed to make it seem attractive with one set of punctuation choices and unattractive with another. You forget what a difference a few little punctuation marks make, but they really do have a big impact!
Glad I could make you giggle. It was hysterical yesterday, watching S. just howl with glee over the realization of what one little punctuation mark could do. She's still having fun with it today!
Your dad's test sounds like fun. He seems like a very creative teacher!
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