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.

Timestyle, Time-ese

Posted on March 8, 2016 | Leave a comment

I’ve always enjoyed this squib from David Grambs’ The Random House Dictionary for Readers and Writers (New York: Random House, 1990) which appears, alas, to be out of print.

“Timestyle, Time-ese n. The characteristically heady and melodramatically compressed prose style of Time magazine, with particular reference to its zesty verbs, marshaled characterizing adjectives and hyphenated compound words, clever coinages and puns, and above all (formerly) the frequent use of verbs  at the beginnings of sentences and hence inverted syntax.

Brain child of joke-making, china-dog-collecting, cordovan-shoe-wearing Briton Hadden more than Time co-founding, beetle-browed, baggy-britched Henry Luce was Timestyle. Wrote Wolcottt Gibbs in a New Yorker profile of Luce: ‘Backwards ran sentences until reeled the mind. Where it will end, knows God!’ Ended has inversion since Godwent Luce.'” –John B. Bremner, Words on Words

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The Weekly Text, March 4, 2016: Two Worksheets on the Latin Word Roots Mat, Matri, Mater, and Patr, Patri, Pater

Posted on March 4, 2016 | Leave a comment

Next week is another round of parent-teacher conferences, so I am busily preparing for them–amid the usual work adjusting readings for students, developing new materials for them, etc. I’ll keep this week’s text short and basic, and spare you the exposition.

It’s been awhile since I’ve posted a word root worksheet, so here are two: the first one is Latin word roots mat, matri, and mater which I am confident you know means mother; the second one is for the Latin word roots patr, patri and pater, which means not just father, but also fatherland. If you’re not familiar already with these worksheets, which I use for vocabulary building with the struggling readers I serve, than you might need to consult the Word Root Worksheets Users’ Manual.

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.

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The Weekly Text, February 26, 2016, Black History Month Week III: Documents on Melvin B. Tolson and His Involvement with the Communist Party

Posted on February 26, 2016 | Leave a comment

One of the subtexts in The Great Debaters is Melvin B. Tolson’s political organizing, specifically his commitment to helping African American sharecroppers and workers achieve something like social and economic equity in the Jim Crow South. In the film, Mr. Tolson (again, Denzel Washington plays him) is seen meeting with African American farmers, which is soon broken up by the KKK. The redneck sheriff, played with drawling, ignorant, aplomb by John Heard, holds Mr. Tolson’s political and social activism over his head, and the viewer understands that Melvin B. Tolson is probably a communist.

Anyone who had read the novel Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison or, more specific and literal to the subject, Richard Wright’s memoir Black Boy, has some background knowledge on the relationship between African Americans and the Communist Party, particularly in the 1930s.

Here, in the last of three Weekly Texts for Black History Month, is a reading on the allure of the Communist Party USA for African Americans, particularly in the 1930s. I understand that in certain school districts, this reading may well be forbidden fruit. That being so does not, I think, diminish the importance of understanding this part of our American past. I would think for educators teaching units on either Invisible Man or Black Boy. this reading would be de rigueur.

And that’s what I have to offer for Black History Month, 2016. As always, if you used any of this material, I hope you found it helpful; I would, again, as always, be grateful to hear from you about what worked or didn’t in your use of these readings.

Until next week….

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.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Essays/Readings, Independent Practice, Social Sciences, The Weekly Text, Worksheets

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The Weekly Text, February 12, 2016, Black History Month Week II: Two Readings on Melvin B. Tolson and James L. Farmer Jr.

Posted on February 12, 2016 | Leave a comment

The Weekly Text for this week follows last week’s on readings related to Denzel Washington’s film The Great Debaters. This is the second of three entries on this unit; because I will not post a Weekly Text for February 19th (we have President’s Day Week off for a mid-winter break), I’ll post two readings here this week.

The first is a reading on Melvin B. Tolson, the peripatetic (although he was associated with Wiley College and other post-secondary institutions in the Southwestern United States, he went to Columbia to pursue a graduate degree in 1930-31, was present at the end of the Harlem Renaissance, and counted Langston Hughes among his close friends) poet and political organizer who coached the legendary Wiley Debate Team of 1935.

Following the article on Mr. Tolson, there is a reading on one of his mentees, the legendary civil rights activist, James L. Farmer, Jr. Mr. Farmer’s list of accomplishments is substantial. He was a great American whose efforts made this nation a more just and decent place.

If these are useful to you, I’d be much obliged if you’d leave a comment explaining how or why.

Until February 26th….

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.

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The Weekly Text, February 5, 2016, Black History Month Week I: A Reading on Historically Black Colleges and Universities

Posted on February 5, 2016 | Leave a comment

February is Black History Month. Initiated by Carter G. Woodson in 1926, Black History Month is justly a staple in school curricula in the United States. Far, far be it from me to second-guess Dr. Woodson or any of the proponents of Black History Month, but I have never been entirely at ease with the concept of one month of the year set aside for the study of the myriad and vital contributions Americans of African descent have made to our nation, because I think it is insufficient. It seems to me, when studying the history of the United States from the colonial period to yesterday, every month ought to be Black History Month. African Americans are an integral part of the history of the United States, and the U.S. History curriculum really ought to reflect that.

At the same time, I appreciate the opportunity to teach material that isn’t part of the standard curriculum. For the next four weeks, I’ll post reading assignments from a unit I developed to attend the film The Great Debaters, directed by and starring Denzel Washington. After watching the movie for the first time, it struck me that it would serve nicely as the foundation of a unit on both Black History and using prior knowledge to understand new material. I outlined a unit plan, fleshed it out, and began using it to great success. I’ve yet to present it to a class that wasn’t immediately interested in and engaged by the material–it has been that successful with the students I serve. The fundamental educative goal for this unit is to provide students with prior knowledge of the personalities and events–to wit, the 1935 Wiley College Debate Team led by Melvin B. Tolson–by way of reading comprehension worksheets and discussion in class. The first five lessons of the unit work to prepare students for a viewing of the film.

So, here, in the first of three Weekly Texts on The Great Debaters, is the first reading from the unit, on Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

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.

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The Weekly Text, January 29, 2016: Two Learning Supports on Transition Words

Posted on January 29, 2016 | Leave a comment

Yesterday was the final day of New York State’s biannual exercise in standardized testing, the Regents Examinations.  I’ve had time to revise a structured research paper unit on the Holocaust I developed a few years ago to introduce struggling students to methods for undertaking such a project. I found two learning supports for using transition words in expository prose amid this unit (I hadn’t looked at it in a couple of years), which are distinct only in their layout.

The second one, in outline form, might well be useful in a lesson or short unit on outlining. I’m pondering how I might work with it that way. If you see something effective in it for work on outlining, perhaps this structured outlining blank will be of some value to you.

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.

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The Weekly Text, January 22, 2016: Two Context Clues Worksheets on the Adjective Empirical and the Noun Empiricism

Posted on January 22, 2016 | Leave a comment

Here, as I mentioned last week, are two context clues worksheets on the words empirical and empiricism. These sat on my work table for months before I finally summoned the will to use them a couple of weeks ago in two of my classes. I avoided them because I’d erroneously assumed that these words, or the concepts they represent, were simply too abstract for the struggling and often disengaged learners I serve.

Once I started leading the students through them, however,  I realized we were in one of those  serendipitous “teachable moments.” To our surprise. a series of Socratic exchanges quickly yielded–on both worksheets, which we completed, interestingly, on two non-successive days–definitions that were within two or three words of those in Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition (which, incidentally, is the dictionary I use to guide me when I write sentences for these kinds of context clues worksheets). We all, I think, found this gratifying.

Immediately after these classes, when I’d realized what had happened, I grabbed my notebook and wrote down the sequence of questions I asked to guide students through these two exercises. I shaped them into typescript; I’ve included them at the bottom of the two worksheets linked to above.

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.

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The Weekly Text, January 15, 2016: Two Glossaries on the Parts of Speech

Posted on January 15, 2016 | Leave a comment

It has been a hectic week, characteristic of January in this school, which is always a concatenation of testing and extracurricular activities. For this week’s text, I offer up a couple of learning supports. The first is a basic glossary of the parts of the speech. This version of this support contains simple descriptions of each of the parts of speech with a few spare examples of their use. The second is a supported glossary of the parts of speech which includes a fuller description of each part of speech, along with some sentences that demonstrate their use.

If you use these, as always, I’d very much like to hear how; moreover, I’d like to hear from you if you have any suggestions about how I might further develop or improve these learning supports–or how you have done so.

Earlier this week, I had a very interesting experience teaching the words empirical and empiricism, by way of context clues worksheets, to some of the struggling readers and learners whom I serve. In both of the classes in which I used these worksheets, students, secondary to my Socratic questioning, were able to infer the meanings of both of these highly abstract words. Next week or the week after, as time permits, I plan to post these worksheets with a blog post on the line of questioning I used to elicit the meanings of these words.

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.

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Sister Bernadette’s Barking Dog

Posted on December 22, 2015 | Leave a comment

Over the years, I’ve become aware of the art of diagramming sentences. This is one method of teaching composition at the basic level of the declarative sentence. I’ve wondered, and continued to wonder, if this might be a method  to help struggling students learn to compose grammatically complete and even stylish expository prose. Moreover, I wonder if the act of drawing the diagram could help students with motor skills issues get some practice with holding and using a pen or pencil. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I was and remain curious about whether diagramming sentences could help struggling learners attain a sense of achievement and the psychological satisfaction that attends it.

Kitty Burns Florey’s Sister Bernadette’s Barking Dog (New York: Harcourt, 2006) answered few of my questions, in terms of planning lessons, about diagramming sentences. However, it allowed me an afternoon of pleasant respite from a particularly dreary turn at jury duty. This is an elegant and highly readable cultural, educational and social history of sentence diagramming. Ms. Florey owns a wonderfully warm and and wry sense of humor. She offers a broad range of cultural references in her discussion. Do yourself a favor and be sure to read her touching afterward in the more recent editions of this fine book.

Ms. Florey’s history helpfully includes several discussions of the books that informed instruction in sentence diagramming in classrooms. One of them, Brainerd Kellogg and Alonzo Reed’s Higher Lessons in English: A Work on English Grammar and Composition is available as a freebie if you own an Amazon Kindle. There is, fortunately, a contemporary exponent of sentence diagramming, a man named Eugene Mouton. It looks like his books are the place to go if you want to learn to teach sentence diagramming.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Essays/Readings

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The Weekly Text, December 18, 2015: A Lesson Plan on Using Conjunctions

Posted on December 18, 2015 | Leave a comment

Here is the final Weekly Text of 2015. I plan to avoid, to the greatest extent possible over the holiday break, this computer screen. I’ve just completed the final piece of my cycle of units on the parts of speech, an eight-lesson unit on conjunctions (I’ve previously posted the learning support on the most commonly used conjunctions that you’ll very likely need to use the material on this post).

So,  here is the second lesson on conjunctions from this unit, which gives struggling students some structured and independent practice at using the coordinating conjunctions. While this Word document includes the lesson plan, first do-now exercise (a homophone worksheet which you may need the Homophone Worksheets Users’ Manual to use), a structured worksheet, and a teacher’s answer key, it does not include the second do-now worksheet, an Everyday Edit on Beethoven. Incidentally, if you like this Everyday Edit, you can find more of them at the Education World Everyday Edits page, where the folks who operate that site generously give them away as tear-offs.

That’s it! I wish you and yours a joyous holiday season. I’ll see you again in the New Year.

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.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Lesson Plans, The Weekly Text, Worksheets

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