Of Yore

  In the faculty room, the seasoned teacher of English was frustrated by students' misuse of the words "affect" and "effect." 
   "It's simple," he declared.  "While the word effect can be both a noun and a verb, the word affect is always a verb."
    I ventured to say that the word affect can also be a noun.  He disagreed, rather vehemently, and strode to the bookshelf in the corner of the room, took down the Webster's, and looked up the uses.  The conversation came to a sudden end with his comment of a single word-----"G*#@DAMMIT!"
 
  The high school Social Studies teacher, who didn't teach spelling, noticed that for several years many of her tenth grade students were consistently misspelling the word Australia, inserting an extra i before the l. 
   The reason came to light when my son, who knew how to spell when he was in third grade, told me his teacher gave the class a hint as to how to spell Australia. She told them:"Remember, there's a TRAIL in Australia."
    As testament to the teacher's effectiveness, many of her students used her spelling mnemonics tip at least seven years later, and probably to this day.
   The good old days.