•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
b) The City of Masts
c) The Queen of Seas
8. Have you heard about “Great White
Way”?
a) Khreshchatyk Street;
b) Broadway Street ;
c) Baker Street.
9. What is Black Diamond?
a) A nickname of petroleum;
b) Jewel;
c) A nickname for coal.
10. What is The City of the Seven Hills?
a) A nickname of Syracuse;
b) A nickname for Rome;
c) A nickname of Broadway.
98,3%-items
1,7%-nicknames
Percentage of nicknames in the dictionary
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
Geographic objects
30%
Epidemic
Periods of time
20%
Sky objects
Port
10%
To become a broad-minded person and have
no problems with communicating in Englishspeaking countries students should study
linguistics and foreign culture. There is a
question: “Is it possible to learn about American
names and nicknames at school?”
• With this purpose we analyzed the school
text books.
• We found out the following information:
•
Percentage of nicknames
Name
Number
%
Items
235
98,3%
Nicknames
4
1,7 %
Club
Road
0%
Geographic
objects
1
78,30%
Epidemic
0,90%
Periods of time
3,60%
Sky objects
0,90%
Port
3,60%
Club
0,90%
Road
3,60%
Theatre
4,50%
Park
2,70%
Palace
Theatre
Park
Palace
1%
We examined a dictionary of names and
nicknames. The percentage of the usage of
geographic objects in this dictionary is the
highest-78,3%. The usage of nicknames of
theatres-4,5%; nicknames of time periods,
ports and roads-3,6%; nicknames of palaces,
parks, clubs, sky objects & epidemics is the
lowest (about 1%).
The research paper gives the possibility
of application the data in the process of
teaching-learning English in different
educational establishment with the purpose
of better understanding and mastering the
modern spoken language
Prepared by
Pidkova Tetiana
A student of Grade 10
Terebovlia
Educational Complex
The actuality of the scientific research
determines the necessity of examination of names
and nicknames of people, places and things in the
aspect of culture-oriented linguistics.
The research object – personal nicknames,
also nicknames of places and things for the purpose
of culture-oriented linguistics. American English
was chosen because nowadays it is considered to be
widespread in the world.
Realization of the set objective foresees the
fulfillment of the following tasks: 1) to analyze
educational and scientific literature on the research
problem; 2) to determine the main term of the work
“nickname”; 3) to elicit the significance of
nicknames in everyday life of society; 4) to study
classification of nicknames; 5) to view the examples
that prove the importance of nicknames; 6) to
conclude and analyze the results of a survey; 7) to
systematize findings.
In the course of our research we have tried
to find out about where the nicknames come from,
not just personal nicknames, but the nicknames of
cities, streets, different objects and more.
Nickname - a familiar, invented given name
for a person or thing used instead of the actual name
of the person or thing; a kind of byname that
describes a person by his characteristic.
In our research we indicated that the
problem of our work is that the programme of
learning of English language for Ukrainian
secondary schools does not touch upon the subject
“Names and nicknames of English speaking
countries” in greater detail. To make sure that the
problem exists, we conducted a survey.
Pupils of Grades 9-11 (50 pupils) were
asked to choose the correct answer (a, b, c) to ten
questions.
80
1 question
2 question
3 question
4 question
5 question
6 question
7 question
8 question
9 question
10 question
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0
Кв. 1
According to the survey approximately 42 %
of students answered the first question correctly;
about 38% gave the right answer for the second
question; 69%-for the third; 65% - for the fourth; the
fifth question was the easiest – almost 74% of
students knew the correct answer; 23 % answered
the sixth question; the seventh question turned out to
be the most difficult - just 18 % of students
answered it; the last two questions got the equal
percentage of students who knew the right answer –
approximately28%.
The following answers were suggested:
a) I have never heard about it;
b) I have heard a little about it;
c) I know this nickname really well.
Results of a survey
80%
70%
60%
54%
50%
40%
31%
30%
20%
10%
0%
15%
I have never heard
about it
I have heard a little
about it
I know this
nickname really
well
•
According to the survey the percentage of
pupils who know the meaning
•
of the nicknames is 15%, the percentage of
pupils who heard
•
a little about American and British nicknames
is 31% and the percentage
•
of pupils who have never heard about the
following nicknames is the highest - 54%.
•
The results of this survey confirm the existence
of the problem
•
and necessity of learning names and nicknames
at school.
•
In this respect we worked out some tasks
•
that can be very useful for learning nicknames.
•
1.What/Who is called “Dog Star”?
•
a) A nickname of area in London;
•
b) A name for the star Sirius;
•
c) A nickname of a dog.
•
2. A world-known nickname of New York:
•
a) A Big Apple
•
b) A City of Dreams
•
c) A Wonderland
•
3. How do the French call the Channel which
connects Great Britain and France?
•
a) A Great Way b) La-Manche
•
c) The Channel of Love
•
4. What is a nickname for Great Britain ?
•
a) A Foggy Albion
•
b) A Country of Seven Hills
•
c) The Country of Three Seas
•
5. A nickname of the Planet Mars is..
•
a) Yellow Planet b) Red Planet
•
c) Brown Planet
•
6. Have you ever heard about City of Lilies?
•
a) Amsterdam
•
b) Paris
•
c) Florence
•
7. A nickname given to London,
•
when it was the world’s leading port?
•
a) The City of Ships