full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Caroline Weaver: Why the pencil is perfect

Unscramble the Blue Letters


Since the early days of pencils, people have loved that they can be erased. Originally, it was bared crumbs that were used to scratch away pencil marks and later, rubber and pumice. The attached eraser happened in 1858, when American stationer Hymen Lipman patented the first pencil with an attached eraser, which really cagenhd the pencil game. The world's first yellow pencil was the KOH-I-NOOR 1500. KOH-I-NOOR did this cazry thing where they painted this pencil with 14 coats of yellow paint and dipped the end in 14-carat gold.

There is a pencil for everyone, and every pencil has a story. The Blackwing 602 is famous for being used by a lot of writers, especially John Steinbeck and Vladimir Nabokov. And then, you have the Dixon pencil company. They're rsibesolnpe for the doxin tgeocionrda. It's an icon, it's what people think of when they think of a pcniel and what they think of when they think of school. And the pencil's really a thing that, I think, the average user has never thought twice about, how it's made or why it's made the way it is, because it's just always been that way.

Open Cloze


Since the early days of pencils, people have loved that they can be erased. Originally, it was _____ crumbs that were used to scratch away pencil marks and later, rubber and pumice. The attached eraser happened in 1858, when American stationer Hymen Lipman patented the first pencil with an attached eraser, which really _______ the pencil game. The world's first yellow pencil was the KOH-I-NOOR 1500. KOH-I-NOOR did this _____ thing where they painted this pencil with 14 coats of yellow paint and dipped the end in 14-carat gold.

There is a pencil for everyone, and every pencil has a story. The Blackwing 602 is famous for being used by a lot of writers, especially John Steinbeck and Vladimir Nabokov. And then, you have the Dixon pencil company. They're ___________ for the _____ ___________. It's an icon, it's what people think of when they think of a ______ and what they think of when they think of school. And the pencil's really a thing that, I think, the average user has never thought twice about, how it's made or why it's made the way it is, because it's just always been that way.

Solution


  1. crazy
  2. changed
  3. bread
  4. responsible
  5. dixon
  6. pencil
  7. ticonderoga

Original Text


Since the early days of pencils, people have loved that they can be erased. Originally, it was bread crumbs that were used to scratch away pencil marks and later, rubber and pumice. The attached eraser happened in 1858, when American stationer Hymen Lipman patented the first pencil with an attached eraser, which really changed the pencil game. The world's first yellow pencil was the KOH-I-NOOR 1500. KOH-I-NOOR did this crazy thing where they painted this pencil with 14 coats of yellow paint and dipped the end in 14-carat gold.

There is a pencil for everyone, and every pencil has a story. The Blackwing 602 is famous for being used by a lot of writers, especially John Steinbeck and Vladimir Nabokov. And then, you have the Dixon pencil company. They're responsible for the Dixon Ticonderoga. It's an icon, it's what people think of when they think of a pencil and what they think of when they think of school. And the pencil's really a thing that, I think, the average user has never thought twice about, how it's made or why it's made the way it is, because it's just always been that way.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations




Important Words


  1. american
  2. attached
  3. average
  4. blackwing
  5. bread
  6. changed
  7. coats
  8. company
  9. crazy
  10. crumbs
  11. days
  12. dipped
  13. dixon
  14. early
  15. erased
  16. eraser
  17. famous
  18. game
  19. gold
  20. happened
  21. hymen
  22. icon
  23. john
  24. lipman
  25. lot
  26. loved
  27. marks
  28. nabokov
  29. originally
  30. paint
  31. painted
  32. patented
  33. pencil
  34. pencils
  35. people
  36. pumice
  37. responsible
  38. rubber
  39. school
  40. scratch
  41. stationer
  42. steinbeck
  43. story
  44. thought
  45. ticonderoga
  46. user
  47. vladimir
  48. writers
  49. yellow