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Elizabeth A. Redd, Ph.D.

Where did Language Come from Anyway?

Do animals have language? Is human language special? This interactive presentation invites students to compare non-human animal communication systems and human language to discover differences and similarities, uncover the biology of language in the brain, including structures and genes involved in communication, and explore the biological and cultural origins of human language. 

Biology Standards

  • HS-LS-4.1 Students who demonstrate understanding can: Communicate scientific information that common ancestry and biological evolution are supported by multiple lines of empirical evidence.
  • HS-LS-4.4 Students who demonstrate understanding can: Construct an explanation based on evidence for how natural selection leads to adaptation of populations.

 

The Science of Speech Sounds

Do you know why a car shimmies when it passes a semi-truck? Did you know sound can kill? Did you know some animals can make sounds that travel hundreds of miles?! Did you know that the study of language includes physics and biology? This presentation introduces the concepts of phonetics, including the physics of sound and soundwaves, amplitude, frequency, and duration, vowel formants, and. Students can play with software that lets them see sound spectrograms and make voiceprints of their own names to print!

Middle School Physical Science

    • MS-PS-4.3 Students who demonstrate understanding can: Present qualitative scientific and technical information to support the claim that digitized signals (0s and 1s) can be used to encode and transmit information. 
    • Supporting Content PS4.C: Information Technologies and Instrumentation • Digitized signals (sent as wave pulses) are a reliable way to encode and transmit information. 
  • (MS-PS-4.3) Further Explanation: Emphasis is on a basic understanding that waves can be used for communication purposes. Examples could include using fiber optic cable to transmit light pulses, radio wave pulses in WIFI devices, and conversion of stored binary patterns to make sound or text on a computer screen.

Physics Standards

    • HS-PSP-3.1 Students who demonstrate understanding can: Use mathematical representations to support a claim regarding relationships among the frequency, wavelength, and speed of waves traveling in various media. 
    • Supporting Content PS4.A: Wave Properties • The wavelength and frequency of a wave are related to one another by the speed of travel of the wave, which depends on the type of wave and the medium through which it is passing. 
  • (HS-PSP-3.1) Further Explanation: Examples of data could include electromagnetic radiation traveling in a vacuum and glass, sound waves traveling through air and water, and seismic waves traveling through the Earth.
  • HS-PSC-3.3 Students who demonstrate understanding can: Develop and use models to illustrate that energy at the macroscopic scale can be accounted for as a combination of energy associated with the motions of particles (objects) and energy associated with the relative positions of particles (objects).
  • Supporting Content PS3.A: Definitions of Energy • At the macroscopic scale, energy manifests itself in multiple ways, such as in motion, sound, light, and thermal energy. (HS-PSC-3.3, HS-PSC-3.4)

 

Wonderful World of Words!

What is a word? How is it different from a syllable or a sound? How do you know when one word begins and another ends? How do different languages build words? Some languages can have words that are entire sentences and still one word! In this interactive presentation, students will explore language typologies, the building blocks of words, and how their language compares to other languages around the world.

English Standards

Word Building 

  • 1a. Use context (e.g., definitions, examples, or restatements in text) as clues to the meaning of words or phrase.
  • 2a. Recognize and explain the meaning of figurative language such as metaphors and similes, in context.

 

Grammar and Conventions

  • 1a. Identify the eight basic parts of speech (noun, pronoun, verb, adverb, adjective, conjunction, preposition, interjection).

 

Memetics- All about Memes

Memes are more than just funny images with words. Memes are ideas that circulate in a culture. Graphic image memes used in social media offer a window into the semantics of speech, including metaphor, metonymy, subtext, and intertextuality. In this interactive lecture, students can dive deep into the hidden meanings of memes and explore how memes illustrate cultural discourses…and decode why some memes are just so funny.

English Standards

Word Building 

  • 1a. Use context (e.g., definitions, examples, or restatements in text) as clues to the meaning of words or phrase.
  • 2a. Recognize and explain the meaning of figurative language such as metaphors and similes, in context.
  • 2b. Interpret figurative language (e.g., hyperbole, paradox) in context and analyze its role in texts (e.g., The Party’s embrace of the slogans “War is Peace” and “Freedom is Slavery” in Orwell’s 1984).

 

Digital Communications

  • 7. Analyze how visual and multimedia elements contribute to the meaning, tone, or beauty of a text presented digitally. /  7. Compare and contrast a text to an audio, video, or digital version of the text, analyzing each medium’s portrayal of the subject. / 7. Analyze multiple interpretations of a text (e.g., recorded or live production of a play or recorded novel or poetry), evaluating how each version interprets the source text.
  • 8. Make strategic use of digital media presentations to enhance understanding of findings, reasoning, and evidence and to add interest.

 

Language, Diversity, and Power

Language is a tool for enacting and preventing access to power. The language you speak, the dialect, and the accent you have all impact how others perceive you and your place in the world. This interactive presentation explores the relationships between language forms, such as slang or dialect, and stereotypes. Students will engage with concepts of dialect, sociolect, and linguistic discrimination.

English Standards

Grammar and Conventions

  • 1a. Apply the understanding that usage is a matter of convention, can change over time, and is sometimes contested, consulting references (e.g., Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage, Garner’s Modern American Usage) as needed./ 1a. Identify the eight basic parts of speech (noun, pronoun, verb, adverb, adjective, conjunction, preposition, interjection).
  • 1b. Form and use verbs in the indicative, imperative, interrogative, and conditional mood.
  • 1e. Adapt speech to a variety of contexts and tasks, using formal English when appropriate to task and situation; and distinguish where informal discourse is more appropriate.
  • 1g. Recognize variations from standard English in their own and others’ writing and speaking and identify and use strategies to improve expression in conventional language. 

 

Native American History-Myths and Heroes

Did you know there is a Chickasaw astronaut? An Osage ballet dancer? A female Cherokee chief? Did you know that the U.S. system of government is modeled on a Native system of governance? There is so much more to Native American history than presented in the Hollywood ‘Indian’ stereotype. This discussion and presentation challenges the one narrative approach to U.S. history. Students will discuss and examine how these stereotypes are perpetuated through media and are invited to build new understandings of the history of Native North American. This session is intended to open a dialog, not be the sole lesson on Native history.

 

Social Studies Standards

U.S. History Standards

  • 6-12.USH1.2.3.1 Describe Pre-Columbian migration to the Americas.
  • 6-12.USH1.1.1.1 Compare and contrast early cultures and settlements that existed in North America prior to European contact.
  • 6-12.USH1.1.2.3 Analyze the concept of Manifest Destiny and its impact on American Indians in the development of the United States.
  • 6-12.USH1.1.3.1 Trace federal policies and treaties such as removal, reservations, and allotment that have impacted American Indians historically and currently. 6-12.USH1.1.3.2 Explain how and why events may be interpreted differently according to the points of view of participants and observers. 
  • 6-12.USH1.1.3.3 Identify the impact termination practices such as removal policies, boarding schools, and forced assimilation had on American Indians
  • 6-12.USH1.1.4.1 Explain the effects of scientific and technological inventions and changes on the social and economic lives of the people in the development of the United States
  • 6-12.USH1.1.5.1 Examine the development of diverse cultures in what is now the United States.
  • 6-12.USH1.1.5.3 Describe and analyze the interactions between native peoples and the European explorers.

Civics Standards

  • Goal 4.2: Build an understanding of the organization and formation of the American system of government.
  • Goal 4.3: Build an understanding that all people in the United States have rights and assume responsibilities.
  • 6-9.WHC.4.4.3 Analyze and evaluate the global expansion of liberty and democracy through revolution and reform movements in challenging authoritarian or despotic regimes.
  • 6-12.USH1.4.1.2 Identify fundamental values and principles as expressed in basic documents, including the Declaration of Independence, Articles of Confederation, and the United States Constitution.
  • 6-12.USH1.4.2.2 Explain how and why powers are distributed and shared between national and state governments in a federal system.
  • 6-12.USH1.4.3.1 Provide and evaluate examples of social and political leadership in early American history.
  • 6-12.USH1.4.4.1 Describe the role of gender, race, ethnicity, religion, and national origin on the development of individual rights and political rights
  • 9-12.USH2.4.3.1 Identify the impact of landmark United States Supreme Court cases, including Plessy v. Ferguson and Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.
  • 9-12.USH2.4.4.1 Trace the development and expansion of political, civil, and economic rights.
  • 9-12.G.4.4.1 Analyze the struggles for the extension of civil rights.

 

Native American Languages- A Window to Many Worlds

Why do some languages not have words for ‘thank you’ or ‘good bye’? Why do some languages have ‘genders’ and other don’t? Why do some languages have extra complex verb structure? Why do some languages have Why do some languages only have 2 color terms and others have 14? How does ‘tense’ work in Hopi? Where does the word ‘okay’ come from? This interactive presentation and activity examines the connection between language and worldview through engagement with a diverse set of Native American languages. Includes activities focusing on kinship terms and colors.

English Standards 

Grammar and Conventions

  • 1g. Recognize variations from standard English in their own and others’ writing and speaking and identify and use strategies to improve expression in conventional language.

World Languages Standards

  • Objective: CLTR 1.1 Analyze the cultural practices/patterns of behavior accepted as the societal norm in the target culture.
  • Objective: CLTR 1.2 Explain the relationship between cultural practices/behaviors and the perspectives that represent the target culture’s view of the world.
  • Objective: CONN 2.3 Compare and contrast cultural similarities and differences in authentic materials
  • Objective: COMP 2.2 Compare and contrast appropriate gestures and oral expressions in the target culture with the learner’s culture

 

Writing around the World

Where did writing first emerge in the world? How is writing connected to speech? What are the types of writing systems? How does each relate to the sounds in a language (or do they even?)? This presentation and activity examine the origins, variations, and types of writing systems used around the world. Students will engage in an activity in which they transliterate their names into another language’s writing system and debrief on what they learned about language and writing from the activity.

 

World Language Standard

Objective: COMP 1.2 Identify patterns and explain discrepancies the sounds and the writing system in the target language.