A

Teacher Strategy 275

redneck truck driver can hoot and holler with pleasure when he looks at a
pretty girl.
On the other hand, deriving and creating Teacher enjoyment from
systems such as mathematics and grammar is definitely an acquired taste.
This is because the connections between the individual items are not
obvious, but must rather be learned. There is no inherent reason why two
upside-down visual „hooks‟ should be equivalent to a messy visual
„triangle.‟ But this is exactly what we are saying when we state that „2‟ +
„2‟ = „4.‟ Similarly, those who try to learn a foreign language know the
struggle that is involved in assimilating the order behind the complexity of
words that is encountered. In some systems, such as mathematics, this
layer of mental cloudiness is relatively thin. If enough facts are learned,
one eventually breaks through into the clear sky and bright sunshine of
order as all of the connections begin to fit together. In other systems, such
as the English language, it seems that the clouds go on forever—no matter
how high one goes, the sun of order remains partially hidden by a haze of
unresolved complexity.A

A This is why I appreciate Hebrew. As part of the Semitic family of

languages, the complexity of individual words is tied together by the
underlying order of a „root system.‟ Also, being a resurrected language, it
was brought up-to-date by a process which increased this inherent order,
and it has not yet experienced the rotting effects of haphazard borrowing
and centuries of bad usage.