In The Water is Wide, novelist Pat Conroy tells the story of his year (1969 - 70) teaching elementary school in the poor, isolated black community on Daufuskie Island, South Carolina (called Yamacraw Island in the book). At first glance, it wouldn't seem to have much relevance to teaching ESL to adults. But as I read it, I realized Conroy faced some of the same challenges an ESL teacher does - and that we could learn from the way he overcame them.

I'm not just talking about the fact that, at the beginning of the year, he and his students could barely understand each other, though they were all speaking English. The only cure for that is time and better acquaintance. (Conroy does not blame this completely on the students' Gullah dialect, but calls his own speech "an indefinable nonspeech, flavored subtly with a nonaccent, and decipherable to no one, white or black, on the American continent". Some of us could say the same.)

As a teacher, I found at least five chunks of good advice in Conroy's story:

1. Activate your students' background knowledge. The kids on the island knew all about hunting and cooking squirrels - so this was the subject that got them talking and gave them the feeling of ease and competence necessary for learning. Though their teacher felt that squirrel was about as appetizing as rat, he encouraged them to share what they knew.
2. Get your class shouting "No!" Better to have them saying no than nothing at all. Conroy's students may have been uncertain of the name of the ocean they lived near, but they had to contradict him when he told them it was the Conroy Ocean. I was reminded of the time I got a class of reluctant talkers to speak out with a very simple activity from Zero Prep - Tell It Like it Isn't. I got one student to mime sweeping the floor, then told the rest I thought she was washing dishes. They found they knew enough English to tell me I was wrong.
3. Realize that your students don't know things you might expect. Conroy's students all believed in ghosts and witches, but had never heard of Halloween. Likewise, there are adults living in your country who don't know that school lets out at three o'clock, or that waiters expect tips.
4. Realize also that your students do know things you might not expect. The kids on Daufuskie/Yamacraw knew nothing about Halloween, but everything about the movie version of The Wizard of Oz. (The island had electricity, and therefore TV, but no phones. As Conroy puts it, "electricity is enough of a miracle for one century".) Your students may well have seen many of the same movies and TV shows you have, which leads to the final point . . .
5. Don't look down on pop culture as a way to reach your students. When Conroy found out his students were so familiar with The Wizard of Oz, he realized every child in the country must know about it. It was something that both caught their interest and connected them to the outside world.

The Water is Wide, by Pat Conroy, is available from Amazon.com. So is Zero Prep: Ready-to-go Activities for the Language Classroom, by Laurel Pollard and Natalie Hess.



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People in the armed forces mainly use tactical knives during combat. This is mostly self-defence when an adversary who also has a knife or an equally strong weapon confronts the user of the knife. They go through enough training to ensure that they can get the knife away from the attacker before being attacked. The tactical knife is designed in a way that it is easily rotated in the hand to give the fighter good grip and different positions of holding the knife in order to get the attacker. It is also light for easy rotation.

Trained people like the police usually use tactical knives to combat criminals like drug dealers and gang members who usually attack them with knives. The police use the tactical knives in self-defence and in trying to make the attacker release the weapon they are using. This is usually by striking the hand of the attacker. The police are trained to use the knife and not inflict any injury or kill but only to arrest the attacker.

Tactical knives have hard blades that do not bend under pressure. They also have firmly attached handles that do not break or snap under pressure. Since the knives are used for combat, they are mainly designed with rough handles that can be held firmly with or without gloves. Some of the blades are made in a way that they can be rotated and stored in the handle though they are easily retrievable in case there is sudden attack and the owner needs to use the knife.

The military mostly use the knives to attack other armies while at war and to cut track lines of the enemy. Divers use tactical knives when they are defending themselves from man-eater sea creatures like sharks. They hit the sharks and pierce them making them move away. They also defend themselves against small attackers like scorpions. The training that is mainly incorporates the use of knives incorporates other fighting tactics like tae-kwondo and karate. This involves fast movement of the wrist in defence and this is a compulsory part of training in the army under self-defence and one-on-one combat. It makes the fighter a professional in knife fighting.



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