Sentence Tree: Do & What

From Twitter:

Do (.) Do is a statement; it means something like “go ahead.”
……・you (?) “Do you?” is a tag question, meaning “do you (+ an implied basic verb)?”
……….・know (?) “Do you know?” asks whether the listener(s) are aware.
………………..・what (?) “Do you know what?” is an interjection and audience.
……………………….・time (?) “Do you know what time?” asks an event time.   
……………………………….・it is? “Do you know what time it is?” (asks the given time or the time of an event.) 
……………………………………….・we should be there? “Do you know what time we should be there?asks about an expected or desirable arrival time.
………………………………………・it starts? “Do you know what time it starts?” asks about the time something begins, like a movie-start-time. 
………………………………………・where (?) “Do you know where?” asks a location.
…………………………………………………..・it is (?) “Do you know where it is?” asks about the placement or location of a third-person specific object.
…………………………………………………..・we are? “Do you know where we are? asks whether the listener(s) knows the location of the the speaker, him- or her-self and the listener(s).    
…………………………………………………..・should be ? “Do you know where we should be?” asks what location the speaker and listener(s) and (an)other(s) must be in or are expected at.
………………..・me? “Do you know me?” asks whether the listener(s) knows the speaker as a person or his or her identity.
………………..・the Ims?* “Do you know the Ims?” asks whether the listener(s) knows the Im family. *a family name
………………..・it? “Do you know it?” asks whether the listener(s) knows something that’s been referenced.
………………..・how (?) “Do you know how?” asks whether the listener(s) is aware of a method.
………………………….・to go? “Do you know how to go?” asks whether the listener(s) are aware of a way or path or route.
………………………………・do it? “Do you know how to do it? asks whether the listener(s) are aware of a specific method already referred to.

Photo: Monic Melton

At Home

Where are you?

a. He’s in the living room.
b. I’m in the kitchen.
c. He’s in the kitchen.
d. I’m in the living room.
e. We’re at home.

Photo: Nasim Keshmiri

Answer And Explanation
d. I’m in the living room is not the answer, because no one is in the living room. The answer is b. I’m in the kitchen. The answer must begin with ‘I,’ because the question is where are you?’

He Never Bought The Farm

From Twitter

Neil Armstrong had a farm after NASA, so he never bought the farm during the Korean war, as a test pilot nor on either of his two space missions.

“He bought the farm” means:
a. to pay for a farm
b. to pay for the farm
c. to get a farm
d. not pay
e. none of the above.

Answer And Explanation
The answer is: e. none of the above. He bought the farm means to die and was originally coined by pilots who crashed into farms in test flights or in air battle.

Famed astronaut Neil A. Armstrong, the first man to set foot on the moon during the historic Apollo 11 space mission in July 1969, served for seven years as a research pilot at the NACA-NASA High-Speed Flight Station, now the Dryden Flight Research Center, at Edwards, California, before he entered the space program. Armstrong joined the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) at the Lewis Flight Propulsion Laboratory (later NASA’s Lewis Research Center, Cleveland, Ohio, and today the Glenn Research Center) in 1955. Later that year, he transferred to the High-Speed Flight Station at Edwards as an aeronautical research scientist and then as a pilot, a position he held until becoming an astronaut in 1962. He was one of nine NASA astronauts in the second class to be chosen. As a research pilot Armstrong served as project pilot on the F-100A and F-100C aircraft, F-101, and the F-104A. He also flew the X-1B, X-5, F-105, F-106, B-47, KC-135, and Paresev. He left Dryden with a total of over 2450 flying hours. He was a member of the USAF-NASA Dyna-Soar Pilot Consultant Group before the Dyna-Soar project was cancelled, and studied X-20 Dyna-Soar approaches and abort maneuvers through use of the F-102A and F5D jet aircraft. Armstrong was actively engaged in both piloting and engineering aspects of the X-15 program from its inception. He completed the first flight in the aircraft equipped with a new flow-direction sensor (ball nose) and the initial flight in an X-15 equipped with a self-adaptive flight control system. He worked closely with designers and engineers in development of the adaptive system, and made seven flights in the rocket plane from December 1960 until July 1962. During those fights he reached a peak altitude of 207,500 feet in the X-15-3, and a speed of 3,989 mph (Mach 5.74) in the X-15-1. Armstrong has a total of 8 days and 14 hours in space, including 2 hours and 48 minutes walking on the Moon. In March 1966 he was commander of the Gemini 8 or (more at https://www.nasa.gov/centers/armstrong/news/FactSheets/FS-111-AFRC.html)


Progress

From Twitter:
Student: How do I remember the pronunciation of words with the same spelling but different pronunciations when they’re nouns or verbs?

Teacher: Remember this: “I will proGRESS in my PROgress.” So, accent the suffix when it’s a ①; accent the prefix when its a ②.

Choices:
noun
verb

Answer And Explanation:
We accent the suffix when it is a ① verb and we accent the prefix when it is ② noun. The prefix is the beginning half of a word or number; the suffix is the ending half.

Photo: Neonbrand

”Corona Quiz”

Dear Followers, please answer:
Social Distancing means:
a. not meeting friends
b. not meeting friends and others
c. not meeting friends and others in person/staying at least 6 feet apart

# is important because:
a. We should avoid the sick.
b. We don’t know who is sick.

Left-hand Photo: Ben Garratt; Right-hand Photo: James Lee

Answers And Explanation
c. Social Distancing means: not meeting friends and others in person/staying at least 6 feet apart (the ‘staying 6 feet or 2 meters’ bit is the whole point; It doesn’t make sense to avoid seeing friends people most of the time, if when you do see them you stand close together!)
② b. We don’t know who is sick. We could be the sick one! IN fact, that is how we should act: as if we are all infected.

Get Him to Do It

I need a cosplay costume.
Can ya make one?
Not what I want.
Which is?
A Mercury spacesuit!
① Ryan Nagata (@ryannagata) do it!
We’re not buddies!
Pay him!
I’m not rich.
② him to do it with a favor!
Like?
Dunno.
him!
I’m not a gangster!

get
have
make

Photo of Scott Carpenter, NASA

Dr. Jomes

From Twitter:
Dr. Jomes and his father are archaeologists digging in Iraq.

Dr. Jomes: Look at this. This is a language I’ve never….
Dr. Jomes Sr.: Seen before!
Dr. Jomes: You can’t figure out any of it?
Dr. Jomes Sr: I can’t

Choices:
make tails or heads of it
sense of it
make heads or tails of it

Photo by  毛 祥

The answer and Explanation is make heads or tails of it, which is a common expression meaning figure it out/understand it. To learn why we say this, come to class.

ビギナーのレベル (Beginner)

From Twitter:

Student: This is what?
Teacher: No. Say: “What is this.”
Answer?: This is a book.
Teacher: So. _①_ is that?
Student: That is Sam.
Teacher: Right.
Student: Teacher, _②_ is my pen?
Teacher: Your Pen is here.

whose
who
where’s
when
where

Answers And Explanation
① what, because we switch the object (or where the name of the item or person would be) to subject’s position and replace it with ‘who,’ ‘what,’ ‘when,’ ‘where,’ or ‘how.’
② Where, because ‘where’ is the question word for locations.

Photo: Neponbrand

Corona City Hall

Tomomi: I ① the Kita Ku City Hall Children’s Center ② infected with #coronavirus, but that 4 or 5 days passed before the citizens ③ notified.

Cassy: Really? That’s criminally stupid. 
Tomomi: I think it’s just criminal.
Cassy: Well, it’s both.

Choose:
heard
were
hear
was
is

A Day in The Life of Yumi

From Twitter:

Yumi: I usually ① shopping in the morning. Then I often ② home, ③ tea, while I ④ to friends by phone. ⑤ a nice day. But the Corona virus scare ⑥ it such that I ⑦ to ⑧ home.

Carl: What do ya ⑩ now? 

Pick the best answer:
say
drink
do
go
stay
going
have
drink
makes
staying
talk
talking
it’s

Photo: David Vexler
Photo: Sarah Johnston

The Answers And Explanations:
Yumi: I usually go shopping in the morning. Then I often go home, [and] have/have tea, while I talk to friends by phone. It’s a nice day. But the Corona virus scare makes it such that I have to   stay home.

All these verbs are in the present tense, because they are to describe common daily situations that way) no ‘ed,’ no’ ‘ing,’ no ‘will.’ We know we need present tense verbs, because the speaker begins with ‘usually,’ and there is no other indication she is speaking about the past. The answer choices also only include present tense verbs or bare infinities or “base verbs.”