我前几天在一家美国学校见到五年级孩子的戏剧课汇报演出。其中有一个节目有点类似于中国的打油诗,是关于英文的小段子。所有的台词都是孩子们自己写的,主要是关于在学习英文中遇到的各种各样的语法问题。
关于名词的复数plurals
孩子们调侃了英文名词复数的各种错综复杂的特殊形式和规律
We'll begin with a box and the plural is boxes,
But the plural of ox becomes oxen, not oxes.
One fowl is a goose but two are called geese,
Yet the plural of moose should never be meese.(moose的复数是mooses)
You may find a lone mouse or a nest full of mice,
Yet the plural of house is houses, not hice.
If the plural of man is always called men, Why shouldn't the plural of pan be called pen?(pan的复数是pans)
If I speak of my foot and show you my feet, And I give you a boot, would a pair be called beet?(boot的复数是boots)
If one is a tooth and a whole set are teeth, Why shouldn't the plural of booth be called Beeth?(booth的复数是booths)
关于pronoun代词
Then one may be that and those would be those,
Yet hat in the plural would never be hose,
And the plural of cat is cats, not cose.
We speak of a brother and also ofbrethren(古英文:兄弟,同胞)
But though we say mother, we never say methren.
Then the masculine pronoun are he, his and him,
But imagine the feminine: she, shis and shim!
关于构词法
Let's face it-English is a crazy language.
There is no egg in eggplant not ham in hamburger;
Neither apple nor pine in pineapple.
English muffins weren't invented in England.
We take English for granted,but if we explore its paradoxes,
we find Thatquick stand (高度可调的)can work slowly,boxing rings(拳击场,但ring也有指环,圆形的意思)are square, anda Guinea pig(豚鼠)is neither from Guinea(几内亚共和国) nor is it pig.
And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?
Doesn't it seem crazy that you canmake amends(做出补偿)but no oneamend(改进). If you have a bunch ofodds and ends(零碎物品)and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it?
If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught?
If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eats?(按照刚才素食主义者吃蔬菜的推理,难道人道主义者吃人?)
And think about popcorn...
That's one actually right! It's corn that pops.
But sometimes I think all the folks who grew up speaking English
Should be committed to an asylum(避难所) for the verbally insane.
关于习惯用语
In what other language do people recite at a play and play at arecital(小型音乐会,舞蹈表演会等)?
We ship by truck but send cargo by ship.
We have noses that run(run the nose流鼻涕)andfeet that smell(脚臭).
We park in a driveway and drive in a parkway.
And how cana slim chance and a fat chance(slim和fat是反义词,但是这两个词组的意思都是表明机会很渺茫,后者带讽刺意味,说机会很肥大,实际很渺茫)be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites(wise man是聪明的人,wise guy是骄傲自大的人)
You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns Down,
in which you fill in a form by filling it out,
And in which an alarm goes off by going on.
And in closing, if father is pop, how come mother's not Mop?
That's all for now!
看完以上这些,是不是有点头大?
说句实在话,我当时在看孩子们表演时,很多单词都没听明白,找他们老师要的稿子,我才看明白其中的玄机!
在google里一搜为什么英文很难学,以下列的种种理由,只会更加头疼!
其实换一个角度想想,英文也挺有意思的,不是吗?让我们继续努力学习吧!And enjoy!