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.

Book of Answers: The Bible

“In what language was the Bible originally written? The Old Testament was written in Hebrew; it dates from the thirteenth to the first century B.C. The New Testament was written in Greek in the first century A.D.”

Excerpted from: Corey, Melinda, and George Ochoa. Literature: The New York Public Library Book of Answers. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993.

Word Root Exercise: Deca, Dec, Deka, Deci

This worksheet on the Latin roots deca, dec, deka, and deci can assist students in a number of ways I think. These mean, as you probably already recognized, ten; be aware though, that deci actually means tenth. In any case, this is a vocabulary builder, but contains words primarily from  mathematics, so it’s probably best used there to assist students in developing their own understanding and using words growing from these  roots.

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: Lycidas

“The diction is harsh, the rhymes uncertain, and the numbers unpleasing…Its form is that of a pastoral–easy, vulgar and therefore disgusting.”

Samuel Johnson, Lives of the English Poets 1779

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

Psychiatrists and Psychologists

Health care has been something of a hot potato in the United States for a very long time; and certainly the debate around what looks to me like a basic human right has grown extremely contentious with the passage of the Affordable Care Act. I want the students I serve to know something about health care. And as many young people today require the services of mental health professionals, they should know what they’re looking for and buying.

So here is a short reading on the difference between psychiatrists and psychologists and its attendant 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.

The Unbearable Lightness of Being

“(Czech title Nesmesitna lekhost byti). A novel (1984) of the magic realism school by Milan Kundera (b. 1929). The fates of two couples are played out against a background of communist rule in Czechoslovakia. In such circumstances, there is an unbearable foreboding even when the ‘sweet lightness of being’ rises ‘out of the depths of the future.’ A film version (1987) was directed by Philip Kaufman.”

Excerpted from: Crofton, Ian, ed. Brewer’s Curious Titles. London: Cassell, 2002.

Alfred North Whitehead on Necessity

“’Necessity if the mother of invention’ is a silly proverb. ‘Necessity is the mother of futile dodges’ is much nearer the truth.’”

Alfred North Whitehead

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Big Curmudgeon. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 2007.

Triskaidekaphobia (n)

When I was a kid, I loved weird, big words, because they allowed me the pleasure of pedantry. So this context clues worksheet on the noun triskaidekaphobia would have been right up my alley. It means “fear or avoidance of the number thirteen.”

If nothing else, this might be a fun way to introduce the concept of phobias.

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.

Term of Art: Action Verb

“A derived noun whose formation has the general meaning of ‘act or process of…’: e.g. construction (from construct + ion), with the basic meaning ‘process of constructing.’ Compare agent noun.

Excerpted from: Marshall, P.H., ed. The Oxford Concise Dictionary of Linguistics. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.

A Learning Support on Questions in the Classroom

Here’s a short reading I whipped up several years ago when I tired of having students preface inquiries with “I know this is a stupid question, but….” Wherever do kids get the idea that their questions are stupid? If you are a teacher who warns students against asking stupid questions, could you cease, uh, forthwith?

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.

Compliment (n) and Complement (n)

These five worksheets on the homophones compliment and complement are actually the first I ever wrote. You’ll notice that I set up the worksheets to use these words as nouns. Because it turns up as a term of art in any number of grammar and style manuals, I wanted students to learn the use of complement as a grammatical term. It’s used in all kinds of ways, even sometimes to describe a predicate, which I think is better called, simply, a predicate.

However, as a means of describing both the direct objects and the indirect objects of verbs, I think this is a very good word indeed. I’m fairly certain I placed all five of these worksheets as do-now exercises at various places in a thirteen-lesson unit on verbs. If you use them the same way, you may want to mention to students that both of these words can be used as verbs; both are used transitively.

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.