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.

A Short Exercise on the Greek Word Roots Dont and Odont/o

Here is a worksheet on the Greek word roots dont and odont/o. If you’ve ever worn braces or needed treatment for gum disease (i.e. with an orthodontist or periodontist), you will recognize right away that this productive root means both tooth and teeth.

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.

Assimilate (vt/vi)

Here is a context clues worksheet on the verb assimilate that you might find handy in teaching social studies. It’s used both transitively and intransitively. Beware, however (and you may want to consult Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary on this), when you use it transitively, with the prepositions to, into, and with, you will need to use caution as meaning can shift in those constructions.

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: Charlotte Bronte on Jane Austen

“Why do you like Miss Austen so very much? I am puzzled on that point…I should hardly like to live with her ladies and gentlemen, in their elegant but confined houses…Miss Austen is only shrewd and observant.”

Charlotte Bronte, letter to G.H. Lewes 1848

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

Cultural Literacy: Johannes Gutenberg

Since I’ve long thought he could receive focus in English Language Arts or social studies courses (I’ve tagged this post as both), if you teacher either subject, you might find this Cultural Literacy worksheet on Johannes Gutenberg useful.

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.

George Bernard Shaw on Duty

“When a stupid man is doing something he is ashamed of, he always declares that it is his duty.”

George Bernard Shaw

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

Recite (vt/vi)

Here is a context clues worksheet on the verb recite; it’s used both transitively and intransitively.

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.

Cultural Literacy: The Invisible Hand

As I’ve mentioned, probably ad nauseam at this point, I work in an economics and finance-themed high school in the financial district in Lower Manhattan. Wherever you work, however, if you teach high school social studies, or anything to do with early theories of capitalism, especially anything on Adam Smith, then you may well find this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the invisible hand useful.

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.

The Weekly Text, June 30, 2017: Two Context Clues on Rite (n) and Ritual (n)

The last day of school here in New York City was Wednesday the 28th, and not a moment too soon. As Joey Ramone once said, “Chewin’ out the rhythm on my bubble gum, the sun is out, and I want some” (The Ramones, “Rockaway Beach”).

So this week’s Text is a short one, to wit, these two context clues worksheets on the nouns rite and ritual. I hope you can use them.

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.

A Rotten Review and Rejection: Remembrance of Things Past by Marcel Proust

“The sense of effort lies heavy over the whole work. That the book has greatness and passages of beauty redeeming its ugliness none will deny. But the mind demands of literature something that it can approve as well as something that it can enjoy; and in ‘Cities of the Plain,’ so full of dignitaries, so devoid of dignity, this instinct finds little to satisfy its craving.”

Saturday Review of Literature reviewing volume five of Remembrance of Things Past

My dear fellow, I may perhaps be dead from the neck up, but rack my brains as I may I can’t see why a chap should need thirty pages to describe how he turns over in bed before going to sleep.”

Marc Humblot, French editor, rejection letter to Proust, 1912

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

Two Short Word Root Exercises: Hemi and Demi

Here is a worksheet on the Greek root hemi (it means half or partly) and another on another on the Latin word root demi (it means half or less than). These are short worksheets designed to open a class session–they are not full lesson-length 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.