Stress Rule for Words Borrowed from Latin

Two-syllable nouns are usually stressed on the 1^st syllable 

Two-syllable verbs are usually stressed on the 2^nd syllable 

This rule works most of the time, so don’t waste your time remembering the stress for every word in English. Only memorize the exceptions.

 

		Noun	Verb
N	2 reason	Yes
Vb	3 allow		Yes
VB	4 attend		yes
Vb	6 arrange		Yes
VB	7 record		Yes
N	9 success	No
VB	10 announce		Yes

Tom Sawyer, Chapter 3D (EFL version, with notes)--The Funeral

Muff Potter is on trial for killing the doctor, but he didn't do it! Only the boys know the truth. Will they help him?

19

20

Tom Sawyer, Chapter 3C (EFL version, with notes)--The Funeral

Tom and his Friends come back to watch their own funeral. It's fun to hear people say so many nice things about them!

13

14

Tom Sawyer, Chapter 3B (EFL version, with notes)--On the Island

Tom and his friends are busy being pirates

7

8

Tom Sawyer, Chapter 3A (EFL version, with notes)--Medicine to Pirates

湯姆歷險記對外英語版 （詞彙、語法經過簡化）
Here is chapter 3 of Tom Sawyer. I have retyped the text and changed the vocabulary/grammar to make it easy to understand. Have fun!

Tom Sawyer, 1938 Movie Version

The Adventures Of Tom Sawyer, 1938 Movie Version

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1938) - 1/9 - {HQ}

Me and My Cat (Story and Dictionary Work)

After you have listened to "Me and My Cat" 聽完故事

you can use Google Translate to get the gist (main idea) of the story. 谷歌翻譯可以幫你了解這個故事的大意：

VERY IMPORTANT: Then you should reread the story. Retell it to a friend. Practice writing a summary in your own words. Then you can take this short quiz.

Finally, practice your dictionary skills. Look up some of the important common words in this story in the Macmillan Essential Dictionary. Then test yourself to see if you have understood what to do.

Mystery Stories 多媒體製作

Please choose a story and register your choice here.

Fantasy & SciFi Comic Corpus 語言學必看

Please input your text here.

Dictionary Skills - How to Choose Meanings (PCM Method)

The PCM Method is very easy. Some words have more than one meaning. When you look up such a word in the Macmillan English Dictionary [MED], look for a sample sentence with the same grammar pattern and similar collocates. This will help you find the correct meaning.

1. pay

2.6 These are my friends now, Dad ... And they're going to help me pay back [the buzzard] who bushwhacked you! That's a *PROMISE*!

None of these five meanings fits. The patterns and collocates are wrong.

pay back (2) is just right: same pattern, same collocates

PATTERN: pay [somebody] back = VB + [N] + ADV

COLLOCATE: them ~ buzzards (= bad guys)

MED: She was determined to pay [them] back for the trouble they had caused.

MEANING: to do something bad to someone because they have done something bad to you

2. happy

4.4 I get a lump in my throat when I think of the happy [years] when Dad and I lived back of the sheriff's office!

Meaning (3) has the right pattern and the right collocates

PATTERN: happy years = ADJ + [N]

COLLOCATE: a happy marriage/childhood/life (these nouns all refer to time)

MEANING: making you feel happy, or showing that you feel happy

3. case

6.5 Now, Bunco ... I'm paying you off for back-shooting my Daddy!

No! No! I didn't do it! ... Honest! Cade done the shooting! *I SWEAR HE DID IT*! I only stood by in case of trouble.

 

In case of (=if there is) bad weather, the wedding will be held indoors.

PATTERN: in + case + of + [N]

COLLOCATE: trouble ~ bad weather (things that make people unhappy)

MEANING: If there is [N]

4. know

2.5 {Now I know why you made me learn to shoot!}

know what/why/who etc.: None of us really knew what had gone wrong.

PATTERN: know + WH (who/what/when/where/why/how) + sentence

COLLOCATE: you made me learn ~ [something went wrong]

MEANING: to have information about something, or to understand something

Writing a 50-word summary (Part 2) （英文閱讀、語言學必看）

In Part 1, I showed you how to make a long summary by saying a little about each page. In this posting, I will show you how to make your summary shorter. If your first summary is too long, you can take away some sentences and words. If your summary is now too short, you can put back a few words or find new, better words.

Here is yesterday's summary:

Summary	# of words
When Lil Peters was a little girl, her father made her learn to shoot	14
When she went to college, she could shoot better than many men.	12
One day, Lil learned that her father was killed by a bad guy.	13
Lil promised that she would find the man who killed her father.	12
Garson Cade and Bunco tried to kill Lil with dynamite.	10
Lil was very smart, so she saved herself.	8
She then took out her guns and went to find the bad guys.	13
Lil found out that Garson Cade was the killer.	9
This summary is much too long!	91

Summary	# of words
Lil Peters could shoot better than many men.	8
One day, Lil learned that her father was killed by a bad guy.	13
Garson Cade tried to kill Lil with dynamite.	8
Lil saved herself and went to find the bad guys.	10
Lil found out that Garson Cade was the killer.	9
Now the summary is a little too short	48

Summary	# of words
Lil Peters could shoot better than many men.	8
One day, Lil learned that her father, a sheriff, was killed by a bad guy.	15
Garson Cade, a gambler, tried to kill Lil with dynamite.	8
Lil saved herself and went to find the bad guys.	10
Lil found out that Garson Cade was the killer.	9
Now the summary is just right!	50

Dynamite is not important, but I know that her father's job is important. The sheriff told the gambler to leave town, probably because he cheated many people. 

  This explains why Garson Cade killed Lil's father.

Writing a 50-word summary (Part 1) （英文閱讀、語言學必看）

寫摘要其實很容易！如果你選的故事有6頁，每一頁寫兩句話而每句話平均5～6個字，一下子可以寫72個字。經過刪刪減減之後，就可以輕輕鬆鬆地改成50個字的摘要。

1 Reread your story. What important things happened on each page? Write two sentences about those pages. If there are 5 or 6 words in each sentence, you can easily write 10~12 words per page. If there are 6 pages in your story, you can easily write 60～72 words (5 or 6 x 12 = 60 or 72).

2 When you finish, look at all of your sentences. Maybe some things are less important? Maybe you can put two sentences together to make one sentence? Maybe you can take out some words? Do this several times until you have 50 words. That's it! You have finished a 50-word summary! Here is an example, some sentences about the "Two-Gun Lil" story (91 words). In Part 2, I will show you how to change these 91 words into a 50-word summary.

1		When Lil Peters was a little girl, her father made her learn to shoot	14
2		When she went to college, she could shoot better than many men.	12
3		One day, Lil learned that her father was killed by a bad guy.	13
4		Lil promised that she would find the man who killed her father.	12
5		Garson Cade and Bunco tried to kill Lil with dynamite.	10
6		Lil was very smart, so she saved herself.	8
7		She then took out her guns and went to find the bad guys.	13
8		Lil found out that Garson Cade was the killer.	9