16. Taking Chances

Don't know much about your life

Don't know much about your world

but Don't want to be alone tonight

On this planet they call earth.

You don't know about my past

and I don't have a future figured out,

and maybe this is going too fast,

and maybe it's not meant to last

but what do you say to taking chances?

What do you say to jumping off the edge?

Never knowing if there's solid ground below

or hand to hold, or hell to pay,

What do you say,What do you say?

I just want to start again,

and maybe you could show me how to try,

and maybe you could take me in,

Somewhere underneath your skin?

and I had my heart beaten down,

but I always come back for more, yeah.

There’s nothing like love to pull you up,

When you’re laying down on the floor there.

So talk to me, talk to me, Like lovers do.

Yeah walk with me, walk with me, Like lovers do, Like lovers do...

15. If Grief for Grief can Touch Thee

If grief for grief can touch thee,
If answering woe for woe, If any truth can melt thee Come to me now!
I cannot be more lonely,
More drear I cannot be! My worn heart beats so wildly 'Twill break for thee..

And when the world despises..
When Heaven repels my prayer..
Will not mine angel comfort? Mine idol hear?!

Emily Bronte

14. Live One Day at a Time

We cannot change the past;

We just need to keep the good memories and acquire wisdom from the mistakes we've made..

We cannot predict the future;

We just need to hope and pray for the best and what is right, and believe that's how it will be.

We can live a day at a time, enjoying the present and always seeking to become a more loving and better person.

-Karen Berry

13. Pragmatics

We talk to others, to our pets and even to ourselves. It is a fact that since human started to make contact, to live with others and to communicate his taught, feelings and needs; he has created language. Language gives human the means by which he negotiate (tell, say) meaning through symbols and signs. Every single word opens a view to us. The choice of word could be way toward insight of man. The identity of man could be explained through the language, he/she expresses. Language is an activity and it is not only a set of grammar or rules to be considered. How people communicate and interact signify the fact that human can use words, gestures, silence and so on to mean something to affect somebody and to produce certain effect. It shows the importance of verbal and nonverbal effect. Because they are referring to a simple word, slight smile, a long pause or a deep silence, it is full of layers of intention, ideas, feelings, thoughts and activities.

Pragmatics is the science of utterances meaning beyond the sentence meaning and it studies the role which context plays in an utterances meaning. George Yule in the book “Linguistics” defines Pragmatics as: “Concerned with study of meaning as communicated by speaker/writer and interpreted by a listener/reader”.Pragmatics is the study of speaker meaning. Therefore, context is important because its influence is on the meaning. It requires a consideration of how speaker organize what they want to say in accordance with who they are talking to, where, when and under what condition. Pragmatics is the study of contextual meaning.

12. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

1) Physiological Needs: Provide lunch breaks, rest breaks, and wages that are sufficient to purchase the essentials of life.

2) Safety: Provide a safe working environment, retirement benefits, and job security.

3) Social Needs: Create a sense of community via team-based projects and social events.

4) Esteem: Recognize achievements to make employees feel appreciated and valued. Offer job titles that convey the importance of the position.

5) Self-Actualization: Provide employees a challenge and the opportunity to reach their full career potential.

11. Human Motivation

Psychologists from all branches of the discipline study the topic of motivation, an inner state that moves an organism toward the fulfillment of some goal. Over the years, different theories of motivation have been proposed. Some theories state that people are motivated by the need to satisfy physiological needs, whereas others state that people seek to maintain an optimum level of bodily arousal (not too little and not too much). Still other theories focus on the ways in which people respond to external incentives such as money, grades in school, and recognition. Motivation researchers study a wide range of topics, including hunger and obesity, the effects of reward and punishment, and the needs for power, achievement, social acceptance, love, and self-esteem.

In 1954 American psychologist Abraham Maslow proposed that all people are motivated to fulfill a hierarchical pyramid of needs. At the bottom of Maslow’s pyramid are needs essential to survival, such as the needs for food, water, and sleep. The need for safety follows these physiological needs. According to Maslow, higher-level needs become important to us only after our more basic needs are satisfied. These higher needs include the need for love and belongingness, the need for esteem, and the need for self-actualization (in Maslow’s theory, a state in which people realize their greatest potential).

10. Linguistics

Language, the principal means used by human beings to communicate with one another. Language is primarily spoken, although it can be transferred to other media, such as writing. If the spoken means of communication is unavailable, as may be the case among the deaf, visual means such as sign language can be used. A prominent characteristic of language is that the relation between a linguistic sign and its meaning is arbitrary: There is no reason other than convention among speakers of English that a dog should be called dog, and indeed other languages have different names (for example, Spanish perro, Russian sobaka, Japanese inu). Language can be used to discuss a wide range of topics, a characteristic that distinguishes it from animal communication. The dances of honey bees, for example, can be used only to communicate the location of food sources. While the language-learning abilities of apes have surprised many—and there continues to be controversy over the precise limits of these abilities—scientists and scholars generally agree that apes do not progress beyond the linguistic abilities of a two-year-old child.

Linguistics is the scientific study of language. Several of the subfields of linguistics that will be discussed here are concerned with the major components of language: Phonetics is concerned with the sounds of languages, phonology with the way sounds are used in individual languages, morphology with the structure of words, syntax with the structure of phrases and sentences, and semantics with the study of meaning. Another major subfield of linguistics, pragmatics, studies the interaction between language and the contexts in which it is used. Synchronic linguistics studies a language's form at a fixed time in history, past or present. Diachronic, or historical, linguistics, on the other hand, investigates the way a language changes over time. A number of linguistic fields study the relations between language and the subject matter of related academic disciplines, such as sociolinguistics (sociology and language) and psycholinguistics (psychology and language). In principle, applied linguistics is any application of linguistic methods or results to solve problems related to language, but in practice it tends to be restricted to second-language instruction.

9. Self - Assessment

Assessment plays a key role in all aspects of human's life, principally, in education, the effects of measurement and assessing is considered by many scholars and researchers. Nowadays and after the emergence of constructivists' school of L2 learning in 1960's. (Brown, H. D. 2000), a great shift was happened form the role of teachers to the role of learners. Learning became the point of many surveys rather than teaching. Consequently, in assessment, the learners' role was influencing more and more.

More effectively, alternative assessment (or alternatives in assessment, a term used by Brown & Hudson, 1998) was a new trend in assessment and testing. Among the different forms of alternative assessment, self-assessment (S.A.) was very attracted by scholars since the early of 1990's. Many researchers worked and studied on different facets and effects of S.A. McNamara, T., Chapelle & Brindly, Brown, H. D. and Hudson, Alderson, J. C., Brantmier, C., Saito, Y., Srimavian, and Kariki, Wiseman and many other scholars have worked on different aspects of Self-Assessment. Most of these studies have been done to introduce S.A. as a new form of assessment and to clarify the effective nature of S.A. in improving learners' motivation and their involvement in the process of learning.

The role of S.A. in learning new words and improving learners reading abilities are some other works that are investigated by researchers and teachers. The reliability and validity of S.A. questionnaires are done in large numbers. But little works are done on the influence of S.A. on learners mind and strategies of learning. Most of the works are done on the effects of S.A. on writing skill and reading comprehension strategies (Liang, John, & Oscarson, M., & Marcy, T.). But considering the role of vocabulary learning and the strategies which learners use in their learning processes highlights the importance of a study on the relationships between S.A. and V.L.S. which can explores the effectiveness of learners' self-assessment in learning. Consequently this study aims to find out any existed relation between S.A. and vocabulary learning strategies that will be a practical guide for all those who are teaching and learning a second/foreign language.

To this end, 100 Iranian university EFL students will be joined in our survey. They will fill a self-assessment questionnaire which conducted form two questionnaires by Brantmier, C. & Vandeplank, R. (2008) and Brantmier C. (2006) and Roever, C. & Powers, E. D. (2005). Another questionnaire to finding the patterns of learners' vocabulary strategies will be used which were used in a study by Kudo, Y. (1999). The results will be used to examine the correlations between two questionnaires to answer the research question.

8. Why Teachers Not Only Stay in Teaching, But Actively Keep Developing?

1. Growing with colleagues
2. A commitment & joy in lifelong learning
3. Making opportunities for reflection
4. Intellectual satisfaction
5. Respect & belief in our students
6. Congruence & presence.

7. What Undermines the Energy and Vitality of Our Teachers?

1. We feel unappreciated.
2. We feel undermined.
3. We feel overwhelmed.
4. We feel isolated.
5. We feel vulnerable.

6. For a Happy Life

Believe in yourself, but don't be overconfident.
Be satisfied, but know that you can always improve.
Accept love graciously, and always be ready to give more.
Be modest in victory and success and courageous in defeat.
Give comfort and Security to others and you'll always receive it in return.
Be glad ... just for being the wonderful person that you are!

5. What Keeps Teachers Going? What keeps them developing?

To be a passionate teacher is to be someone in love with a field of knowledge, deeply stirred by issues and ideas that challenge our world, drawn to the dilemmas and potentials of the young people who come into class each day or captivated by all of these. A passionate teacher is a teacher who breaks out of the isolation of a classroom, who refuses to submit to apathy or cynicism...only when teachers bring their passions about learning and about life into their daily work can they dispel the fog of passive compliance or active disinterest that surrounds so many students. We all have it within ourselves to be passionate teachers, and that nothing else will quite do the trick.

4. Advices for English Learners

If you want to speak pure American English, you must study British English.

Phonetic transcription is more important than audio in computer dictionaries.

Be a competent learner.

Don't worry about fluency - speaking slowly is OK.

Learn proper pronunciation before you decide to speak.

Definition of good pronunciation.

English language version software for those who learn English.

3. An Island!

Once upon a time there was an island where all the feelings lived; happiness, sadness, knowledge, and all the others, including love. One day it was announced to all of the feelings that the island was going to sink to the bottom of the ocean. So, all the feelings prepared their boats to leave. Love was the only one that stayed. She wanted to preserve the island paradise until the last possible moment. When the island was almost totally under, love decided it was time to leave. She began looking for someone to ask for help. Just then Richness was passing by in a grand boat. Love asked, "Richness, Can I come with you on your boat?" Richness answered, "I'm sorry, but there is a lot of silver and gold on my boat and there would be no room for you anywhere." Then Love decided to ask Vanity for help who was passing in a beautiful vessel. Love cried out, "Vanity, help me please." "I can't help you", Vanity said, "You are all wet and will damage my beautiful boat." Next, Love saw Sadness passing. Love said, "Sadness, please let me go with you." Sadness answered, Love, I'm sorry but I just need to be alone now." Then, Love saw Happiness. love cried out, "Happiness, please take me with you." But Happiness was so over overjoyed that he didn't hear Love calling to him. Love began to cry. Then she heard a voice say, "Come Love, I will take you with me." It was an elder. Love felt so blessed and overjoyed that she forgot to ask the elder his name. When they arrived on land the elder went on his way. Love realized how much she owed the elder. Love then found Knowledge and asked. "It was Time", Knowledge answered. "But why did Time help me when no one else would?", Love asked. Knowledge smiled and with deep wisdom and sincerity, answered, "Because only Time is capable of understanding how great Love is!!!

2. Life

Life is the dish of today… . Life is the enthusiasm to reach the tomorrow, that never comes… & you aren't nor in yesterday nor in tomorrow. The dish of today is full of being you…

1. Useful Suggestions for Life

Before you speak, listen,

Before you write, think,

Before you spend, earn,

Before you invest, investigate,

Before you criticize, wait,

Before you party, forgive,

Before you quit, try,

Before you retire, save,

Before you die, give...!!!