Category Archives: Independent Practice

This is material either specifically designed for or appropriate to use for what is more commonly known as “homework.”

Word Root Exercise: Ana

OK, on a cool Monday morning in Salisbury, Massachusetts, here is a worksheet on the Greek root ana-. It means up, back, again, against, and throughout. This is a very productive root in English; it produces such high-frequency words as analogy, analyze, and anatomy.

These are unquestionably words students must know before graduating high school. But so, I would argue, are a couple of others that grow from this root, to wit, anagram and anathema.

.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: Franchise

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the business concept of a franchise. This is a half-page worksheet with a relatively dense three-sentence reading and three comprehension questions. Surprisingly, in so brief a reading, all the relevant bases are covered in the relationship between a franchisor and a franchisee. So this is a thorough general introduction (I worked in a business- and finance-themed high school in Lower Manhattan for ten years, so I’m sure I wrote this for use in one or more classes), but there is plenty of room to expand this document, which is easily done since it is formatted in Microsoft Word.

I don’t want to belabor the point, but this worksheet as nothing to do with the the word franchise in the meaning for which it has recently been ubiquitous in the news (because of state legislatures across the United States seeking to restrict it), to wit, “a constitutional or statutory right or privilege; especially the right to vote.” In fact, if you click through on the link above in this paragraph, it will take you to Merriam-Webster’s extensive definition of this  polysemous word. Did you know it also has use as a verb, i.e. “to grant a franchise to”?

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.

Kim Philby

Here is a reading on Kim Philby along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. I have always found Philby a fascinating figure.

But so are the rest of the so-called Cambridge Five. Without them, one wonders, would John LeCarre (real name David Cornwell) have become a novelist? Betrayal of one’s country and fellows was a preoccupation of LeCarre’s. These guys–Philby, Anthony Blunt, Guy Burgess, John Cairncross, and Donald Maclean–most certainly betrayed Great Britain.

This is another reading from the Intellectual Devotional series whose typescripts and ancillary worksheet I developed during the COVID19 pandemic. As of this writing, I haven’t used these documents in the classroom. Nonetheless, I have tagged them as high-interest materials because I am confident that for the right student(s), they will be.

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.

Common Errors in English Usage: Fiance (n), Fiancee (n)

Here is a worksheet on sorting out the use of the nouns fiance and fiancee. It’s quite simple: they are, respectively, a male and female noun.

As with all of the documents under this title, Paul Brians’ book Common Errors in English Usage, which he has generously made available on the Washington State University website. This is a full-page worksheet with a simple one-sentence reading and ten modified cloze exercise. You may do what you wish with this essentially open-source, Microsoft Word document.

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.

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Here is a reading on Dwight D. Eisenhower along with its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. 

This is a good general introductory biography of Ike; it includes information about his military service and his political career, including his firm support for enforcing the Brown v. Board of Education decision. What it doesn’t mention, and which it may serve as a convenient jumping-off point for, is his famous farewell address, in which he coined the term “Military-Industrial Complex.”

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: Free Will

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of free will. This is a half-page worksheet with a two-sentence reading and three comprehension questions.

In other words, it barely introduces, and in no way does justice to, one of the big, big questions in philosophy and religion. But as an adjunct to a fictional allegory on protagonists with circumscribed lives? This might be a useful document. In any case, it is formatted (like most of the things you’ll find on this blog) in Microsoft Word, so it is open source and therefore yours to do with as you need or wish.

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.

Glasnost

Here is a reading on Glasnost along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. As I was a Russian and Soviet Studies student at both the undergraduate and graduate level, I can tell you that this one-page reading, from the Intellectual Devotional series, does justice to the topic.

Incidentally, the Russian word root glas means “voice.” So, while one popular definition of glasnost is “openness,” it also means, as this definition from Merriam-Webster’s connotes, the freedom to use one’s voice to discuss previously circumscribed or forbidden topics.

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.

Common Errors in English Usage: Fatal (adj), Fateful (adj)

Here is a usage worksheet on distinguishing between the adjectives fatal and fateful. This document contains a short passage of text explaining the definitions and usage rules of these two adjectives, followed by ten teacher-authored modified cloze exercises.

As usual, this document is based on text adapted from Paul Brians’ excellent book Common Errors in English Usage. As I’ve mentioned repeatedly in posts featuring these documents, Professor Brians, emeritus of Washington State University, has posted the book on that institution’s website, should you want a look at it.

As for the words themselves, well, they mean, essentially, deadly and destined. Enough said.

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, 6 August 2021: A Lesson Plan on the Crime and Puzzlement Case “Gambol”

This week’s Text is a lesson plan on the Crime and Puzzlement case “Gambol.” To open this lesson I use this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Latinism carpe diem (“seize the day”). This is a half-page worksheet with a two-sentence reading and three questions.

To conduct your investigation into this crime, you’ll need this PDF of the illustration and questions that serve as the evidence of it. To bring the miscreant in this case to the bar of justice, you’ll need this typescript of the answer key.

Incidentally the first time I ever heard another person use the word gambol, it was the legendary Dummerston, Vermont farmer Dwight Miller, while tending one March afternoon to lambs recently born on his farm. Gambol, as a verb (used intransitively only) and a noun, mean, respectively, “to skip about in play” and “a skipping or leaping about in play.” If you’ve ever seen the way lambs move around when they’re excited, this word describes it. I wonder if a context clues worksheet on this word would serve better as a do-now exercise for this lesson.

Addendum, August 8, 2021: Here is a context clues worksheet on the verb gambol (as above) if you think it would make a better do-now for this lesson.

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.

Word Root Exercise: A, An

Here is a worksheet on the Greek roots a and an. They mean not and without. These are, of course, one of those exceedingly common prefixes in English that students learn early on in phonics instruction.

They yield, on this document, important science words (they commonly appear on the SAT, if the author of the dictionary from which I drew them can be trusted) like anaerobe and abiotic, as well as frequently used words in everyday discourse like anonymous, asocial, and apathy. Of course you can do anything you want with this page as it is formatted in Microsoft Word for ease of differentiation and adaptation.

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.