spiraling n.— «Also, instead of spending weeks on a particular math lesson, students are introduced to the concepts for a few days and revisit them later. This technique, called “spiraling,” is designed to help students build...
piggybacking n.— «Sometimes schools will have a student start the lesson by driving another student home, a practice known as “piggybacking.” If there is another student in the car, ask where your teen will be driving and...
sand spur n.— «In personality profiles newspapers use what some refer to as “sand spurs,” referring to little foibles of the person that show him or her as real, rather than just the subject of PR flackery. In Troutman’s case...
two-centimetre n.— «“You don’t come here in a two-centimetre (slang for a micro-mini).”…It was here on Sunday that taxi drivers and hawkers joined forces to teach one young woman “a lesson.” Nwabisa Ngcukana, 25...
punch mine n.— «The museum is a history lesson of Wheatcroft’s rich coal-mining past.…Clark shows a picture of a stooped miner entering a punch mine.» —“Mining a father’s passion” by Garret Mathews in...
If you’re still wondering about how far back in time you could go and still understand the English spoken then, check out written and audio excerpts from the poem Beowulf. Also, this NPR report in which host Robert Siegel gets a lesson in...