Category Archives: Social Sciences

You’ll find domain-specific material designed to meet Common Core Standards in social studies, along with adapted and differentiated materials that deal with a broad array of conceptual knowledge in the social sciences. See the Taxonomies page for more about this category.

The Grapes of Wrath

Alright, here is a reading on John Steinbeck’s novel The Grapes of Wrath along with its vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. I just want to mention Sanora Babb’s novel Whose Names Are Unknown, which tells a similar story; in fact, John Steinbeck may well have helped himself to her notes when writing The Grapes of Wrath.

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.

The Devil’s Dictionary: Demagogue

Demagogue, n. A political opponent.” 

Excerpted from: Bierce, Ambrose. David E. Schultz and S.J. Joshi, eds. The Unabridged Devil’s Dictionary. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 2000. 

Cultural Literacy: Lunatic Fringe

I don’t necessarily mean to editorialize with this post, but if there is a better time to post this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of a lunatic fringe I’m not sure when that would be.

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, August 21, 2020: A Lesson Plan on the Latin Word Roots Man, Mani, and Manu

This week’s Text is a lesson plan on the Latin word roots man, mani and manu, all three of which mean hand. Even a cursory glance at these three words divulge their productivity in the English language: manicure, manufacture, and manual all come immediately to mind.

I open this lesson with this context clues worksheet on the noun digit in its meaning as “any of the divisions in which the limbs of most vertebrates terminate, which are typically five in number but may be reduced (as in the horse), and which typically have a series of phalanges bearing a nail, claw, or hoof at the tip — compare FINGER 1, TOE.” I wanted this do-now exercise to hint for students what the word roots in this lesson might mean.

And, at last, here is the worksheet that is the primary work 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.

Harvard

Anyone I’ve known who has dealt with the institution reported to me that its cachet is hypertrophied, but since it remains a brand in higher education around the globe, here is a reading on Harvard University and its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. As for the school’s cachet, I have no experience there (other than walking around on its leafy, mellow campus), so I can’t speak to, well anything about it.

Nota bene that this is a short history of the university and its role in the development of colleges and universities in the United States.

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.

Term of Art: Teacher Talk

“Teacher Talk: A semi-technical term in educational research and applied linguistics for the characteristic (often simplified) style of speech of teachers. In general terms, this may be prompted by the social setting of the classroom, with repetition, rephrasing for the sake of clarity, and patterns of stereotyped interaction with learners, such as question, response, and evaluation. For teachers of English as a foreign language, speech may be slower and clearer than is usual, avoiding and minimizing elided usages such as must’ve/musta and ‘sno good y’-know, repeating the same thing in several ways, and using expressions particularly associated with education, classrooms, and textbooks.”

Excerpted from: McArthur, Tom. The Oxford Concise Companion to the English Language. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.

Common Errors in English Usage: Subject to and Subjected to

As I think these are two locutions high school students should understand and be able to use properly before they graduate, here is an English usage worksheet on differentiating the use of subject to and subjected to in declarative sentences and expository prose.

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 Algonquin Wits: Ring Lardner on Calvin Coolidge

President Coolidge’s inimitable deadpan personality became a cherished target for the Round Tablers’ wit. After his first meeting with Coolidge, Lardner reported to the group that he had told the president a humorous anecdote, adding, ‘He laughed until you could hear a pin drop.’”

Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.

A Lesson Plan on the Crime and Puzzlement Case “Buried Gold”

It was 52 degrees at 5:00 this morning here in southwestern Vermont, which sure felt like an harbinger of fall. It’s warming up slowly. I feel like, as I did in my late teens and early twenties, that I should be preparing to begin a six-week apple harvest. I can’t imagine, at my age, what picking 120 bushels of apples a day would do to my body and mind.

Ok, that said, here is a lesson plan on the Crime and Puzzlement case “Buried Gold.” I open this lesson with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the proverb “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” This is often attributed to Shakespeare; in fact, it comes from the pen of the Restoration dramatist William Congreve from his play The Mourning BrideI actually posted this short exercise with a parts of speech lesson elsewhere on this blog, so be on the lookout.

Here is the scan with the illustration, reading, and questions that you’ll need to conduct your investigation and therefore teach this lesson. And here, at last, is the typescript of the answer key so you can solve your case and bring the offender to the bar of justice–so to speak.

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.

Thorstein Veblen on the Esteem of One’s Peers

“In order to gain and hold the esteem of men it is not sufficient merely to possess wealth or power. The wealth or power must be put in evidence, for esteem is awarded only on evidence.”

Thorstein Veblen

The Theory of the Leisure Class ch. 3 (1899)

Excerpted from: Schapiro, Fred, ed. The Yale Book of Quotations. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2006.