by Ellen Gabrielse

My high school English teacher was an unabashed lover of puns.He argued that the fact that puns are among the earliest forms of humor we appreciate as children is a testament to the sophistication of young brains rather than proof that puns are low humor. He shared with us several elaborate puns he heard on a BBC radio show that related to some works of British literature we studied. To this day, though I've forgotten the contrived story that produced the pun, I cannot look at my copy of She Stoops to Conquer without thinking "Jay Stubbs took Aunka."I had always loved to read, but like most of the students in my classes, I'd not given much thought to the words themselves. Mr. Reynolds opened my eyes to the English language per se.

Unwilling to concede appreciation of the language itself until high school, I searched for a way to heighten my seventh graders' enjoyment of reading and writing by exposing them to the stories of individual words. The middle school classes I teach always contain some students who readily admit that reading is a chore and writing is akin to torture. They and most of their classmates seem indifferent to the words that shout, sing, quarrel, and shimmer on the pages of the stories we teach. Knowing that many middle school students need to see immediate benefit to motivate them, and that they enjoy feeling that they're getting something for nothing (extra credit must have been invented by a middle school teacher), I decided to offer a source of extra credit on weekly quizzes. The result: a word of the week, shortened, of course, to WOW. I cannot guarantee my students are developing a genuine, lasting interest in our language, but their attention as I present the new WOW each Monday is no problem: everyone likes easy extra points on quizzes. I believe I have ample evidence that the larger, less concrete goal of awakening appreciation of the words themselves is also accomplished.

I snag my seventh graders' attention at the beginning of each school year with the offer of extra credit in the form of words whose definitions and origins they will record in a special section of their notebooks. The first word each September is hoagie. Together the students and I establish that "sandwich" is an inadequate definition, that the shape of the bun and the types of filling contribute to a hoagie's identity. Peanut butter and jelly on a long roll is not a hoagie!I tell them the story related by Richard Lederer at an education seminar years ago of Italian immigrants living on Hog Island in Philadelphia who brought the sandwiches, and indirectly the name, to America. We collect all the other names the students know for this sandwich, note together that several of the terms reflect its shape, and speculate on the sources of others. Well over half the students are actively involved in the discussion, a good number for the first day of school, and all seem interested. Frequently a student will bring in a bag from a local sandwich shop that is printed with hero, hoagie, sub, torpedo, and p'ohboy, oh, such sweet reinforcement! Most kids get several points of extra credit on Friday's spelling quiz.

In succeeding weeks we discuss, among others:

• scope as in microscope, periscope, telescope, stethoscope, the scope of the situation, and to scope out – a made-to-order opportunity to point out morphemes such as micro and tele and insights into the meanings of other words using them.
• crestfallen courtesy of The Play of Words (Lederer 68). None of my students have any knowledge of cockfighting, nor much experience with farm animals, but they are intrigued by this word. The tale of the poor rooster losing heart and drooping his proud crest as he faces imminent defeat describes an emotion they know. They have all felt crestfallen, and now they have a name to put on it.
• agony and hexagon at the behest of a curious student who noticed the similarity in spelling and wondered if there were a relationship. What an encouraging question! Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary (29, 62, 668, 1155) provides the clues to the history that connects the two words, other similar geometric terms, as well as protagonist and antagonist. Explaining the connections takes some time and attention, but the students seem to enjoy following the trail of linguistic clues.
• ostrobogulous, a noble piece of onomatopoeia coined by Victor Neuberg in the 1800s when Aleister Crowley publicly claimed that he had turned Newberg into a camel by means of black magic. Neuberg denied such an outrageous claim, calling it "ostrobogulous piffle from beginning to end" (Moore 11). I tell the students that the word never caught on, that its only known written use is in Crowley's biography, but they agree with me that it ought to have. Here is a word to call on when you need your biggest guns!

The students' jaws drop when I tell them that there are 65 definitions for this word in my unabridged dictionary. I only give them about a dozen examples, but it allows them to realize how speakers continue to expand such venerable words' meanings, including such idiomatic expressions as fall back on, fall for, fall short, etc. Fall introduces them to a classic word from Old English—a single syllable, expressive of common basic experience, and related to words in other Germanic languages.

In all the years I've been offerings WOWs, I have never been at a loss for the coming week's word. Experiences in class, my own reading, or best of all, curious students' requests provide abundant sources. I presented immaculate recently because a student wondered if it were like uncouth in which only the negative survives in the language (it's not—maculate is still used). The morpheme im- also provided a neat detour into the variety of prefixes we use to negate, such as un-, in-, il-, and non-. I only needed to pose the question; the students provided the examples. Just this week I received affirmation of the success of my efforts: students in both classes complained that they didn't get a WOW last week when I was out sick. They didn't complain that there was no word for extra credit; they felt cheated of some fun.

I require that the students keep all the words until the end of the year when I record how many they have in my grade book, and I ask on their semester exams (again only for extra credit) for a WOW of which they remember a definition and linguistic source. Other than these ways I have not formalized WOWs in the curriculum. I am sure there are ways that others could do this, but I am content with the interest I see sparked in the students by the common and curious words I present and by my own evident enthusiasm. Presenting a WOW each Monday takes 5-15 minutes. Even without formal evaluation or reinforcement, it is time I wouldn't trade for other instruction.

Week by week, one intriguing word at a time, my seventh graders are learning things I never heard of until I took linguistics in college, such as etymologies and the various routes by which words enter our language. Better than that, they are expanding their appreciation and curiosity about our fascinating, flexible, and powerful English language. I am pleased, and I am confident that Mr. Reynolds would be too.

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