graphic of header for ecommunication food for thought

ISSN:1544-8312		Spring-Summer 2016
Judy Vorfeld, Publisher		Issue 98

Judy's Corner

1. Experience is a great teacher, and I have had over four years using a Caption Call telephone. It helps with my Low Register hearing disability. You manage the contacts and preferences from your page on the Caption Call website. One especially nice feature is saving conversations to view later.

These conversations are saved until you choose to delete them. Some reasons to save captioned calls include:

Saving an important conversation from a family member
Capturing price quotes
Saving doctor appointment times or instructions

2. The Modern Language Association, the authority on research and writing, introduced its groundbreaking eighth edition of the MLA Handbook earlier this year at the Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference and Bookfair, in Los Angeles. The handbook offers an innovative approach to documenting sources. No longer focused on a source's publication format, MLA style now emphasizes the elements common to most works and gives writers in all fields-from the sciences to the humanities-the tools to intuitively combine these elements.

3. AP Stylebook Editors lowercase "Internet" and "Web" in June 2016. You can get it online. If you're a journalist, it's well worth it.

4. I hope things are going well for you. I appreciate your taking time to browse through this newsletter, which is designed just for you. Here's one of my favorite quotes: "Every now and then a man's mind is stretched by a new idea or sensation, and never shrinks back to its former dimensions." O.W. Holmes

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Web link for this issue.

Grammar Tip - numbers

Here's what most people practice for general writing as opposed to scientific or technical writing:

Spell out numbers from 1 through 10 and use figures for numbers above 10 if you have text with many numbers. If there aren't many numbers, spell out all numbers under 101.
Use all figures when there is significant technical meaning (especially when using figures in tables, columns, etc.).
Very rarely spell out a number above 10 to de-emphasize the number or make it seem indefinite (example: hundreds of reasons...thousands of reasons...thanks a million...).
Always spell out a number if it's the first word in a sentence.

ARTS

Arts & Crafts for Kids

Langston Hughes Presents the History of Jazz in an Illustrated Children's Book (1955)

Corita Kent: An overshadowed pop art icon

The Austen Family Music Books This collection consists of eighteen printed and manuscript music books owned by members of the Austen family, including the writer Jane Austen, in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

An Artist at 100, Thinking Big but Starting Small

Caption Call is a revolutionary telephone for anyone who has difficulty hearing on the phone. Hearing loss affects millions of Americans for many different reasons such as age, illness, injury, loud working conditions, and military service. It does not, however, have to limit the quality of their phone conversations. CaptionCall makes it easy to communicate confidently with friends, family and colleagues by phone.

EDUCATION

Open Culture: Free cultural and educational media

40 maps that explain the Roman Empire

10 Best Educational Websites for Kids

The Digital Shift: Ten Websites Added to ALSC's "Great Websites for Kids"

Hands-on Math Activities for Kids

GRAMMAR

Common Errors In English: Professor Paul Brians

Daily Grammar

Daily Writing Tips: Get a daily grammar, spelling, punctuation or vocabulary tip.

Guide To Grammar And Style: Jack Lynch

Professor Charles Darling's Grammar Site

Grammarist

HISTORY

40 maps that explain the Roman Empire

The American Civil War - Then and Now

The History of the Frozen Banana Stand: The chocolate-covered dessert was the rock of the Bluth family empire. But where did the idea come from?

Sucker punch: destroyed images of 1930s rural America - in pictures: An archive of 175,000 images shows post-Depression America at its most desperate - especially the negatives killed off with an ominous hole-punch

SMALL BIZ & HOME OFFICE

World Legal Information InstituteFree, independent and non-profit access to worldwide law: 1743 databases from 123 jurisdictions via 14 Legal Information Institutes

Survey Monkey: Create Surveys, Get Answers

Drop the lengthy email threads, out-of-date spreadsheets, no-longer-so-sticky notes, and clunky software for managing your projects. Trello lets you see everything about your project in a single glance.

CS Lewis on Writing

TECHNOLOGY

Information is Beautiful - ideas, issues, knowledge, data - visualized!

MIT PRESS PODCASTS

CDC (The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) BLOGS

THE CONCORD CONSORTIUM: BRIDGES

FOR WRITERS, JOURNALISTS, RESEARCHERS, and PLAYWRIGHTS

Tales from the Terminal Room - A free newsletter for anyone who uses electronic media, and particularly the Internet, for locating information. Content includes reviews and comparisons of information sources; updates on business information resources; dealing with technical and access problems; and news of RBA's training courses and publications.

Investigative Resource Center: Put together by US-based investigative consultancy IRI, this site contains links to global open sources, searchable by category and region. Here you can find links to corporate and court records, government sites and national newspapers.

150 business jargon phrases with better options

World Atlas of Language Structures: a large database of structural (phonological, grammatical, lexical) properties of languages gathered from descriptive materials (such as reference grammars) by a team of 55 authors. The first version of WALS was published as a book with CD-ROM in 2005 by Oxford University Press.

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How to find Judy's websites

Editing & Writing Services (Biz site w/writing tips blog)
Office Support Services (Original biz site w/more personal blog & ezine)
Webgrammar for educators, writers, editors, researchers, librarians, etc.
Judy Vorfeld's personal website

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