"How to Poison the Earth"

A how-to article usually explains something that people want to do. Linnea Saukko satirizes this form by applying it to something that people are unintentionally doing and that should be stopped.

Here are all the word lists to support the reading of Grade 11 Unit 3's texts from SpringBoard's Common Core ELA series: Media in a Democracy, Daily Me, The Newspaper Is Dying, Facebook Photos Sting, Abolish high school football, Facing Consequences, Time to raise the bar, New Michigan Graduation Requirements, Why I Hate Cell Phones, Editorial Cartoons, Let's Hear It for the Cheerleaders, Girl Moved to Tears, In Depth, but Shallowly, Advice to Youth, The War Prayer, Gambling in Schools, How to Poison the Earth
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. substance
    a particular kind of matter with uniform properties
    we should generate as much waste as possible from substances such as uranium-238, which has a half-life (the time it takes for half of the substance to decay) of one million years
  2. toxic
    of or relating to or caused by a poison
    or plutonium, which has a half-life of only 0.5 million years but is so toxic that if distributed evenly, ten pounds of it could kill every person on the earth
  3. persistent
    never-ceasing
    Of course, we must include persistent toxic chemicals such as polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) and dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) to make sure we have enough toxins to poison the earth from the core to the outer atmosphere.
  4. penetrate
    pass into or through, often by overcoming resistance
    Deep-well injection involves drilling a hole that is a few thousand feet deep and injecting toxic substances at extremely high pressures so they will penetrate deep into the earth.
  5. seep
    pass gradually or leak or as if through small openings
    The toxins from landfills, dumps, and lagoons slowly seep into the earth, guaranteeing that contamination will last a long time.
  6. contaminate
    make radioactive by adding radioactive material
    Surface water is very important to contaminate because it will transport the poisons to places that cannot be contaminated directly.
  7. neutralize
    make ineffective by counterbalancing the effect of
    The ocean is very hard to contaminate because it has such a large volume and a natural buffering capacity that tends to neutralize some of the contamination.
  8. combustion
    a reaction of a substance with oxygen to give heat and light
    Combustion and evaporation are major mechanisms for doing this.
  9. disperse
    distribute loosely
    We must continuously pollute because the wind will disperse the toxins while rain washes them from the air.
  10. generate
    produce, as energy
    Just be sure to generate as many poisonous substances as possible and be sure they are distributed in, on, and around the entire earth at a greater rate than it can cleanse itself.
Created on Sat Nov 15 23:58:35 EST 2014 (updated Sun Nov 16 00:33:53 EST 2014)

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