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: Euphrates River

This Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Euphrates River is a full-page document with a two-sentence (one of them a longish compound) reading and five comprehension questions. Incidentally, the second sentence in the reading goes thus: “It was important in the development of many great civilizations in ancient Mesopotamia.” Yes it was. It was also important, given the development of agriculture along its banks, to the advancement of our species as a whole–for better or worse, that is.

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, 13 May 2022, Asian Pacific American Heritage Month Week II: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on Shiite and Sunni Muslims

For the second week of Asian Pacific American Heritage Month 2022, here is a reading on Shiites and Sunnis in Islam with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

If you have followed the United States’ war on Iraq, you have undoubtedly heard of the strained relations, between these two branches of Islam, which have occasionally broken out into violent, internecine conflicts. In just about every respect, the tensions between these two communities of belief are standard religious conflicts; they resemble the European wars of religion that broke out during the Protestant Reformation. You can see elements of the Sunni-Shia schism in the Iran-Saudi Arabia proxy war, which has devastated Yemen.

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: Mao Zedong

This Cultural Literacy worksheet on Mao Zedong is a full-page document: it contains a seven-sentence reading with seven comprehension questions. In other words, it is suitable for a variety of functions in a social studies (yeesh to that term, as always) classroom. This worksheet, like virtually every posted document on this website, is formatted in Microsoft Word. That means it is open to your editorial hand, should it not quite address your curricular requirements or the needs of your students.

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 May 2021, Asian Pacific American Heritage Month Week I: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on Confucianism

May is Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month (which I have shortened, for typographical purposes, as above, to Asian Pacific American Heritage Month; I hope I offend no one with this stylistic liberty). As usual Mark’s Text Terminal will observe the month with a series of document posts and quotes relating to the history of Asian and Pacific Islander Americans as well as Asia and the Pacific Islands themselves.

So, let’s kick off the month with this reading on Confucianism along with its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

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.

Albert Einstein

Finally this morning, here is a reading on Albert Einstein with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. Enough said.

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.

Word Root Exercise: Sol

Here is a worksheet on the Latin word root sol. It means, of course, sun. This productive root in English (and all the Romance languages as well) bearing solar, but also solarium, circumsolar, and lunisolar.

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: Academic Freedom

As state legislatures around the United States (and I am most definitely looking at you, Florida) pass “right-to-remain-ignorant” laws and impose them on educational institutions, now seems like the perfect moment to post this Cultural Literacy worksheet on academic freedom. This is a half-page worksheet with a once-sentence–a longish compound, nota bene–reading 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.

Common English Verbs Followed by Gerunds: Admit

Here is a worksheet on using gerunds with the verb admit. This is a scaffolded worksheet to help students develop an understanding of how to deploy a gerund with the verb admit. If you want to know more about these materials, please see the About Posts & Texts Page, accessible from the home page of this site.

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.

Rainbows

This cool, overcast, and rainy day in New York City seems like a perfect time to post this reading on rainbows and its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. It’s straightforward stuff, so I suppose there is really not much more to say about it.

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.

Simile

“Simile: (Latin neuter of similis ‘like’) A figure of speech in which one thing is likened to another, in such a way as to clarify and enhance an image. It is an explicit comparison (as opposed to the metaphor, q.v., where the comparison is implicit) recognizable by the use of the words ‘like’ or ‘as.’ It is equally common in prose and verse and is a figurative device of great antiquity. The following example comes from Graham Greene’s Stamboul Train:

‘The great blast furnaces of Liege rose along the line like ancient castles burning in a border raid.’

And this instance in verse from Ted Hughes’ poem February:

‘The wolf with its belly stitched full of big pebbles;

Nibelung wolves barbed like black pine forest

Across a red sky, over blue snow…’

See also EPIC SIMILE.”

Excerpted from: Cuddon, J.A. The Penguin Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory. New York: Penguin, 1992.