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.

Term of Art: Tenure

“tenure: A legal guarantee that a teacher cannot be removed from his or her position without cause and that any removal will be done in accordance with due process. Teaches in public schools usually gain tenure if they have served satisfactorily for three to five years. Tenure was created to protect teachers from capricious administrators and to preserve their academic freedom.”

Excerpted from: Ravitch, Diane. EdSpeak: A Glossary of Education Terms, Phrases, Buzzwords, and Jargon. Alexandria, VA: ASCD, 2007.

Pi

OK, moving along to a subject that I really cannot teach (mathematics), here is a reading on pi along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. I guess that’s pretty much all there is to say about that.

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.

Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi

“Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi: (1746-1827) Swiss educational reformer. Between 1805 and 1825 he directed the Yverdon Institute (near Neuchatel), which drew pupils and educators (including Friedrich Froebel) from all over Europe. His teaching method emphasized group rather than individual recitation and focused on such participatory activities as drawing, writing, singing, physical exercise, model making, collecting, mapmaking, and field trips. Among his ideas, considered radically innovative at the time, were making allowances for individual differences, grouping students by ability rather than age, and encouraging formal teacher training.”

Excerpted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.

Word Root Exercise: Vers, Vert

OK, if you can use it, here is a worksheet on the Latin word roots vers and vert. They mean turn. So you probably won’t be surprised to hear that these roots turn up in commonly used English words such as adverse, divert, extrovert, and revert, since all involve a turning of some sort. I think a nifty assessment for this worksheet would be to ask students if they can think of any words that spring from this root–e.g. reverse, obverse, subvert, etc–that are not included in the worksheet.

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.

Lunette

“Lunette: A window or painting of semicircular shape.”

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

Cultural Literacy: Assimilation

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on assimilation, used to mean the process by which immigrants internalize and, well, assimilate, the social and cultural mores of the nation to which they have immigrated (without, one hopes, losing the social and cultural mores of the nation from which they have emigrated; for if they do, where we will get the wonderful varieties of ethnic food that have entered the American diet since my childhood?).

Anyway, this is a half-page worksheet with a reading of one compound sentence and two comprehension questions.

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: Cunning for Amusing

“Cunning for Amusing. Usually said of a child, or pet. This is pure Americanese, as is its synonym, ‘cute.’”

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

Entitle (vt)

Here is a context clues worksheet on the verb entitle, which is used only transitively. The context clues in the sentences in this document guide students toward inferring a meaning of “to furnish with proper grounds for seeking or claiming 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.

Bon Mot

“Bon Mot  A clever, well-phrased observation or remark; witticism. Pl. bons mots, bon mots.

‘The literary Jews also sprinkled their prose with Yiddish bon mots in lieu of the Latin that the Southerners favored.’ Richard Kostalanetz, Literary Politics in America”

Excerpted from: Grambs, David. The Random House Dictionary for Writers and Readers. New York: Random House, 1990.

Common English Verbs Followed by Gerunds: Imagine

Finally today, here is a worksheet on the verb imagine when a gerund follows it. I imagine retiring in a cool and green place.

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.