Category Archives: English Language Arts

This category contains domain-specific material–reading and writing expository prose, interpreting literature etc.–designed to meet the Common Core standards in English language arts while at the same time being flexible enough to meet the needs of diverse and idiosyncratic learners.

70 Cups of Poison

“The Seventy Cups of Poison are the various sorts of drugs, drinks, devilments and debaucheries available to man. The phrase appears in a description of a seventeenth-century parade in Istanbul: ‘comics, mimic, and mischievous boys of the town, who have exhausted seventy cups of the poison of life and misrule, crowd together day and night…they are divided into twelve companies, the first gypsy, the last Jewish, which included two hundred youths all tumblers, jugglers, fire-eaters, ball players, and cup bearers.’”

Excerpted from: Rogerson, Barnaby. Rogerson’s Book of Numbers: The Culture of Numbers–from 1,001 Nights to the Seven Wonders of the World. New York: Picador, 2013.

Real Numbers

Here is a reading on real numbers along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. I want to state unequivocally that not only am I not a math teacher, I was a terrible math student. I consider my lack of understanding of the fundamentals of mathematics–by which I mean, I suppose, algebra, geometry, and trigonometry–something a personal failing. And while I have always found Fran Leibowitz’s indictment of algebra (“In real life, I assure you, there is no such thing as algebra”) humorous, it is pretty thin gruel when I attempt to take some comfort in my own ignorance of the subject.

At a couple of points in my otherwise comfortably math-free teaching career, I have been called upon to teach math (which for me means arithmetic, or even basic numeracy) to small classes of special needs students. Hence the origins of these documents.

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

Derogatory

“Derogatory: Disparaging and offensive, a term often used in dictionaries (usually abbreviated to derog) to label expressions that intentionally offend or disparage: skinny when used instead of thin; American English ass-hole for someone considered stupid, mean, or nasty.”

Excerpted from: McArthur, Tom. The Oxford Concise Companion to the English Language. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.

A Learning Support on Using a Comma to Set off a Quotation

Here is a learning support on using a comma to set off a quotation. This is the seventh of fifteen forthcoming learning supports on quotations. (You can find an excursus on this choice of publishing practice here.)

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

Mark Twain on Civilization

“Civilization is a limitless multiplication of unnecessary necessities.”

Mark Twain

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Portable Curmudgeon. New York: Plume, 1992.

Cultural Literacy: Steve Jobs

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Steve Jobs. This is a half-page worksheet with a two-sentence reading and three comprehension questions. It is the barest of introductions to the late tech entrepreneur. In fact, I would hazard a guess that students already know more about Mr. Jobs than this worksheet reports.

Nonetheless, I have tagged this document as high interest material? Why? Well, with two feature films about him, the first in 2013, and the second in 2015, written by the estimable Aaron Sorkin and based on the biography of Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson, it is clear that in addition to his skills as a tech entrepreneur, Mr. Jobs has become a pop culture icon. I expect he will continue to be of interest for years to come.

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

Rotten Reviews: On Robert Frost

“If it were thought that anything I wrote was influenced by Robert Frost, I would take that particular work of mine, shred it, and flush it down the toilet, hoping not to clog the pipes.”

James Dickey

Excerpted from: Barnard, Andre, and Bill Henderson, eds. Pushcart’s Complete Rotten Reviews and Rejections. Wainscott, NY: Pushcart Press, 1998.   

A Learning Support on Using a Comma to Indicate Direct Address

Here is a learning support on using a comma to indicate direct address. This is the sixth of a total of fifteen of these documents on commas. (You can find an excursus on this choice of publishing practice here.)

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

Write It Right: Combine for Combination

“Combine for Combination. The word, in this sense, has something of the meaning of conspiracy, but there is no justification for it as a noun, in any sense.”

Excerpted from: Bierce, Ambrose. Write it Right: A Little Blacklist of Literary Faults. Mineola, NY: Dover, 2010.

Allocate (vt)

Here is a context clues worksheet on the transitive verb allocate. It means both “to apportion for a specific purpose or to particular persons or things, distribute” and “to set apart or earmark, designate.” Because I was working in an economics-and-finance-themed high school when I prepared this, I suspect I meant students to understand and use it in the sense of allocating capital.

This verb is always used transitively, and never intransitively, so don’t forget your direct object: you must allocate something.

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.