Millard Fillmore was a Know Nothing
This article first appeared here in March, 2006 . I write the following sentence on the board: Millard Fillmore was a know nothing. I ask students to tell me what the sentence means. “Well…..somebody isn’t too smart,” a student volunteers. Another comment is added. “That guy, Mil-, Mil-. That Mil- guy doesn’t know nothing.” I ignore the grammatical error. At this point it will just confuse them. I try to turn students in another direction. “What are nouns?” Someone regurgitates “Words that name people, places, ideas, and things.” I counter with, “What’s our strategy to find nouns?” Several seconds go by. I hold up my board marker and point to it. Several hands go up. “We look for noun markers like the words a, an, and the.” “Good, take a look at the sentence again. What do you see?” “Know nothing is a noun. It has an “a” in front of it.” “Yes. So is Millard Fillmore stupid?” “No, somebody is calling him a name.” “What else do you notice about the words “Know” and “Nothing”? After sever...