Today in class we studied idioms.  One of the students was having trouble figuring out the meaning for the idiom, “out of left field”.  When I explained that not a whole lot happens in left field on a ball diamond and so when something does it seems like it is coming from nowhere or that it isn’t related to the rest of the game, he looked at me and simply replied, “Oh, I do that a lot.”

We learned that idioms are expressions we use in everyday speech that have meanings that are most of the time not literal.  The words used in that particular phrase have an established meaning that would not translate to what the words themselves literally mean.

Two important factors that define an idiom:

1. Idioms mean more than just the sum of their individual words. They have a greater, non-literal meaning.
2. Idioms are fixed – they are said the same way each time.

We had a list of 100 common idioms and everyone was assigned one idiom from the list.  Then we completed The Daily Idiom.  There were really some good expressions of just how funny idioms could be if you took them literally.

We were reminded that our English Binders will be graded tomorrow and that anyone who had not received an 80% or higher on the root word test last week needed to take it again.  We also only have three days left to get all of our AR points for this grading period.