Category Archives: Independent Practice

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

Cultural Literacy: Algebra

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on algebra if you can use it.

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: Phyll/o

OK, closing out the afternoon and the first semester of this school year, here is a worksheet on the Greek root phyll/o. It means leaf, and is very productive, particularly in the sciences, in the English language. You can find it, for example, in a commonly used noun in biology: chlorophyll.

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.

A Lesson Plan on the Crime and Puzzlement Case “The Peek-a-Boo Girl”

Because I’ve been in the folder preparing some of them for a new job I am about to start, I’ll post this lesson plan on the Crime and Puzzlement case “The Peek-a-Boo Girl.”

I open this lesson with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Harlem Renaissance. This scan of the illustration and questions drives the lesson. Finally, here is the typescript of the answer key.

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.

Johnny Cash

For a student with certain interests, e.g. the kid I had in mind when I put this together, this reading on the late, great Johnny Cash and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet are high-interest materials.

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.

Historical Term: Rastafarianism

Rastafarianism: Movement originating in the West Indies which takes its name from Ras (a term of respect in Africa) Tafari Makonnen (1892-1975) crowned Emperor of Ethiopia with the title Haile Selassie in 1930. Haile Selassie has a mystical role in the cult as has Ethiopia itself: as the one part of African that was never colonized, it is seen as the spiritual home of the black man. Life in the West Indies or in Britain is seen as time in Babylon by analogy with the sufferings of the Israelites as slaves in exile.”

Excerpted from: Cook, Chris. Dictionary of Historical Terms. New York: Gramercy, 1998.

A Lesson Plan on Birth Control

OK, moving right along, here is a lesson plan on birth control. You’ll need its short reading and its vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet to conduct the lesson. If you want slightly longer versions of the reading and worksheet, they’re under that hyperlink.

These materials have been of high interest to the high school students I’ve served over the years.

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 Short Lesson on the Neolithic Period

OK, here is a lesson plan on the Neolithic Period of human history. I open this lesson with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on carbon which serves to familiarize students with that element in preparation for a lesson on carbon dating organic material to establish its age. If this lesson goes into a second day, you might want this context clues worksheet on the noun mayhem. Finally, here is the short reading and comprehension worksheet at the center of this lesson.

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.

Thomas Edison

Moving right along on my lunch break, here is a short reading on Thomas Edison and its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet if 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.

Common Errors in English Usage: Complementary and Complimentary

Here’s an English usage worksheets on the adjectives and homophones complementary and complimentary if you need your students to know, understand, and differentiate these two words.

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: Acid Rain

You don’t hear much about it anymore–perhaps because we have much bigger, more threatening environmental catastrophes on our civilizational plate–but if you can use it, here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on acid rain.

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.