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.

Credential (n)

At this moment, in this nation, we currently bear witness people without any brief or expertise in a given subject nonetheless speaking with grotesquely misplaced confidence in their own genius. There is a word for this: bloviating. There is also a term of art to describe it: epistemic trespassing.

In any case, now seems like just about the perfect moment to publish this context clues worksheet on the noun credential. Please do keep in mind that the Latin word root cred means believe. When someone possesses a credential from a reputable (credible, if you like) educational institution, that means they are someone we can believe, rather than a political hack with a big mouth and few brains. If you are interested in going a bit further with this with your students, here is a worksheet on the Latin word root cred itself.

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.

Magic Realism

“Magic Realism: Deriving from the metaphysical period of Giorgio de Chirico (see METAPHYSICAL ART) and related to surrealism, magic realism translates everyday experiences into disturbing images by curious juxtapositions of sharply painted elements. Balthus and Peter Blume are magic realists. Also called precise realism, sharp focus realism.”

Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.

A Lesson Plan on the Crime and Puzzlement Case “The Cruise of the Good Ship Contessa”

Moving right along, here is a lesson plan on the Crime and Puzzlement case “The Good Ship Contessa.”

I open this lesson with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on perhaps the best-known of Aesop’s Fables, “The Boy Who Cried Wolf.” Here is the scan of the illustrations and questions with which to conduct the investigation of this case. Finally, here is the typescript of the answer key.

If you find typos in these documents, 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.

Cultural Literacy: Encryption

Because this Cultural Literacy worksheet on encryption has tended to qualify as high-interest material, I have tagged it as such. Keeping secrets, it turns out, is of particular fascination to adolescents.

Who knew?!

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.

A Participial Phrase at the Beginning of a Sentence Must Refer to the Grammatical Subject.

[If you want this as a learning support in Microsoft Word, it’s under that hyperlink.]

“11. A participial phrase at the beginning of a sentence must refer to the grammatical subject.

Walking slowly down the road, he saw a woman accompanied by two children.

The word walking refers to the subject of the sentence, not to the woman. To make it refer to the woman, the writer must recast the sentence.

He saw a woman, accompanied by two children, walking slowly down the road.

Participial phrases preceded by a conjunction or by a preposition, nouns in apposition, adjectives, and adjective phrases come under the same rule if they begin the sentence.

On arriving in Chicago, his friends met him at the station.

On arriving in Chicago, he was met at the station by his friends.

A soldier of proved valor, they entrusted him with the defense of the city.

A soldier of proved valor, he was entrusted with the defense of the city.

Young and inexperienced, the task seemed easy to me.

Young and inexperienced, I thought the task was easy.

Without a friend to counsel him, the temptation proved irresistible.

Without a friend to counsel him, he found the temptation irresistible.

Sentences violating Rule 11 are often ludicrous:

Being in a dilapidated condition, I was able to buy the house very cheap.

Wondering irresolutely what to do next, the clock struck twelve.”

Excerpted from: Strunk, William Jr., and E.B. White. The Elements of Style, Fourth Edition. New York: Longman, 2000.

A Lesson Plan on Using the Predicate Pronoun

Here is a lesson plan on using the predicate pronoun.

I open this lesson with this Everyday Edit worksheet on Anne Frank (and you can help yourself to a yearlong supply of these worksheets courtesy of the good people at Education World). Here is a learning support on pronouns to assist students in developing their own understanding of these words and their use in declarative sentences. This scaffolded worksheet is the center of this lesson; here is the teacher’s copy of the worksheet.

If you find typos in these documents, 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.

Autoimmune Disease

Given current history, now seems like a good time to post this reading on autoimmune disease and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

If you find typos in these documents, 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.

Vignette

“Vignette: An ornament of leaves and tendrils; the flourishes around a capital letter in a manuscript; a small decoration or embellishment found in beginning or ending sections of a book or manuscript; a small picture or illustration not enclosed by a definite border but shading off into the surrounding page.”

Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.

Word Root Exercise: Ocul-

OK, finally for today, here is a worksheet on the Latin word root ocul. It means, you will all but certainly be unsurprised to hear, eye. This is a very productive root in English, and is at the basis of words students really must know.

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.

Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi’s Advice to Teachers

“Endeavor, first, to broaden your children’s sympathies and, by satisfying their daily needs, to bring love and kindness into such unceasing contact with their impressions and their activity, that these sentiments may be engrafted in their hearts.”

Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827) as Quoted in The Teacher and the Taught (1963)

Excerpted from: Howe, Randy, ed. The Quotable Teacher. Guilford, CT: The Lyons Press, 2003.