“Funk Art: A term coined in the 1960s to describe a class of art that emerged in the San Francisco Bay area. It was often witty, sometimes deliberately distasteful, with a diversity of styles ranging from comic-strip derivations to William Wiley’s use of found objects. Funk artists looked to popular culture rather than traditional canons of fine art.”
Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.
Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of fine arts. This is a very short document: a one-sentence reading and two comprehension questions.
In other words, the barest of introductions to the idea of fine arts–but an introduction nonetheless.
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.
Here is a worksheet on using the nouns ethics and morale, and the adjective moral. As always, this worksheet, which consists of ten modified cloze exercises, comes from Paul Brians’ book Common Errors in English Usage, available–amazingly–in its entirety on the Washington State University website.
These words, and the concepts they represent, I submit, are things kids should know, understand, and be able to apply both in specific and general discourse.
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.
“Libertins: A sect of French freethinkers and skeptics of the 17th and 18th centuries, precursors of Voltaire and the encyclopedists. Advocates of total freedom of thought and conscience, the Libertins questioned the doctrines and morality of all received religion and were continually accused of atheism and immorality. The greatest religious thinkers of the day, including Bossuet and Pascal, denounced their views, and ultimately the Libertins’ own poor conduct discredited their name.”
Excerpted from: Murphy, Bruce, ed. Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia, Fourth Edition. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged philosophy/religion, readings/research
Here is a reading on the Third World along with its vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.
For the record, I disdain this term, which smacks of colonialism and in fact, as far as I am concerned, is a legacy of colonialism. The colonial powers expropriated wealth and labor from their colonies, then saddled them with a moniker that makes it sound like poverty and underdevelopment is somehow their own fault. If this reading didn’t point out this term’s problems, however blandly (“In addition, some artists and intellectuals adopted the term Third World to describe the common history of imperialism and decolonization shared by many countries in the group” and “Though some now regard the term as insensitive, it remains in use to describe impoverished parts of the globe….”), I probably wouldn’t publish it at all. That said, the reading does open a door to a critical discussion of colonialism and its atrocious legacy.
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.
“Those who educate children are more to be honored than those who produce them; for these only gave them life, those the art of living well.”
Aristotle (384-322 B.C.)
Excerpted from: Howe, Randy, ed. The Quotable Teacher. Guilford, CT: The Lyons Press, 2003.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged philosophy/religion
Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on folk music. This is a half-page worksheet with a relatively short reading and three comprehension questions.
The reading implies, but does not spell out, the concept of folkways. I never understood, in my years teaching both English and social studies, why folkways as a concept was never taught explicitly, thereby offering students the opportunity to instantiate or reify it in their own lives; many of the students I served in New York City were of families recently immigrated to the United States. Understanding folkways, and using that understanding to distinguish between folkways and mores strikes me as a key element of any academic domain at the secondary level that calls itself “social studies.”
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.
“learning style: An individual’s behavior, temperament, and attitude in a learning situation. Some of the best-known learning styles are visual, auditory, or kinesthetic. Some experts argue that it is important to match an individual’s learning style with the style of instruction to make learning easier. For example, an individual with a strong visual learning style should be taught to read with an emphasis on the shapes of words.
There are many different learning styles, but none are either ‘right’ or ‘wrong.’ Although a student may prefer one style over another, preferences develop like muscles: the more they are used, the stronger they become. Successful students have flexible and integrated learning styles. No one use one of the styles exclusively, and there is usually significant overlap in learning styles.
Visual learners relate most effectively to written information, notes, diagrams, and pictures. Typically they will be unhappy with a presentation where they cannot take detailed notes. To a degree, information does not exist for a visual learner unless it has been written down. This is why some visual learners take notes even when they have printed notes in front of them. Visual learners will tend to be most effective in written communication. They make up about 65 percent of the population.
Auditory learners related most effectively to the spoken word. They tend to listen to a lecture and then take notes afterward, or rely on printed notes. Because written information will often have little meaning until it is heard, it may help auditory learners to read written information out loud. Auditory learners may be sophisticated speakers, and may specialize in subjects like law or politics. Auditory learners make about 30 percent of the population.
Kinesthetic learners learn best through touch, movement, and space, and learn skills by imitation and practice. Kinesthetic learners can appear slow, because information is usually not presented in a style that suits their learning methods. Kinesthetic learners make around 5 percent of the population.”
Excerpted from: Turkington, Carol, and Joseph R. Harris, PhD. The Encyclopedia of Learning Disabilities. New York: Facts on File, 2006.
This week’s Text is a lesson plan on nations with the longest coastlines. You’ll need this reading with comprehension questions to teach this lesson. This is material for emerging reader, students with reading-related learning disorders, and English language learners.
This is a short and simple reading comprehension lesson with the usual twist on these lessons adapted from Barbara Ann Kipfer’s superb reference book, The Order of Things: students will deal with both numbers and words (often a challenging endeavor for some readers) in the reading in a relatively low-stakes environment. For more about these lessons, see the “About Posts & Texts” page, linked to below the masthead on this blog’s homepage.
That’s it for this week, Stay cool and stay safe,
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.
“Greek Revival: A form of neoclassicism especially identified with American architecture of about 1820-1860 for which the Greek temple was the primary design source.”
Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.
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