Category Archives: The Weekly Text

The Weekly Text is a primary feature at Mark’s Text Terminal. This category will include a variety of classroom materials in English Language Arts and social studies, most often in the form of complete lesson plans (see above) in those domains. The Weekly Text is posted on Fridays.

The Weekly Text, October 18, 2019, Hispanic Heritage Month 2019 Week V: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on Pueblo Civilization

Posted on October 18, 2019 | Leave a comment

This week’s Text, in the ongoing observation of Hispanic Heritage Month 2019 at Mark’s Text Terminal, is a reading on Pueblo Civilization and the vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet that accompanies it.

As I am wont to do, I debated with myself the relevance of Pueblo Civilization to Hispanic Heritage. I’m confident that these first nation peoples were part of the same ethnic group as the Mayans–who of course became a subject population to the Spanish Empire. In any case, if anyone with the bona fides to do so could weigh in on this, I would of course be grateful.

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.

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The Weekly Text, October 4, 2019, Hispanic Heritage Month 2019 Week III: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on the War of the Philippines Insurrection

Posted on October 4, 2019 | Leave a comment

When I prepare materials for Hispanic Heritage Month (of which, alas, as I previously mentioned in these pages, I currently suffer a shortage), I tend to perceive the materials along a narrow range of topics, related almost solely to people and events in the Americas. As this web page from Catholic Relief Services observes, “Hispanics and Latinos are not necessarily the same. Hispanics are descended from Spanish speaking populations. Latinos are people of Latin American descent.” I’m no expert on this. If you are, I’d be greatly obliged if you could weigh in on this topic.

What I do know about the Hispanic World derives both from my own education and my travels across South America. For me, the most salient characteristic of the Hispanic world is that it was, in its entirety, subject to imperial exploitation and expropriation. Therefore, one of the unfortunate products of the Spanish presence in the new world is that legacy.

In any case, I think under the definitions limned above (again, if you have scholarly knowledge of this, I would be extremely grateful for some clarification of this issue), I can safely post, as part of Mark’s Text Terminal’s observance of Hispanic Heritage Month 2019, this reading on the War of Philippines Insurrection and 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.

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Posted in Essays/Readings, Independent Practice, Social Sciences, The Weekly Text, Worksheets

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The Weekly Text, September 27, 2019, Hispanic Heritage Month 2019 Week II: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on Augusto Pinochet

Posted on September 27, 2019 | Leave a comment

This week’s Text, in Mark’s Text Terminal’s ongoing observance of National Hispanic Heritage Month 2019, is a reading on Augusto Pinochet and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. Pinochet–along with Trujillo, the Somoza family, and in general a disturbingly long list of despots–is one of the great villains of Hispanic History. When I was in high school, Pinochet was kind of our version of the bogeyman.

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.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Essays/Readings, Independent Practice, Social Sciences, The Weekly Text, Worksheets

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The Weekly Text, September 20, 2019, Hispanic Heritage Month 2019 Week I: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on the Bay of Pigs Affair

Posted on September 20, 2019 | Leave a comment

Last Monday, September 15, marked the beginning of Hispanic Heritage Month 2019. Last year at this time I knew I was running out of materials to properly observe the Month Over the summer I struggled to assemble materials to publish. Unfortunately, finding a new job, moving, and the typical vagaries of life intervened; the section of the warehouse at Mark’s Text Terminal where the appropriate materials are stored is nearly bereft of goods. So I begin the month belatedly and with a regrettable deficit, which embarrasses me.

In any case, to kick off Hispanic Heritage Month for 2109, here is a reading on the Bay of Pigs invasion and the vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet that attends it. These cover both Hispanic history and United States history. These documents have served, along with others, in my classroom, to start students thinking critically about the wages of imperialism.

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.

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The Weekly Text, September 13, 2019: A Lesson Plan on the Crime and Puzzlement Case “Dropout”

Posted on September 13, 2019 | Leave a comment

As I’ve mentioned elsewhere on this blog, the lessons I prepared to attend the Crime and Puzzlement books are quite frequently downloaded. Because I am exhausted from trying to get the school year started, and therefore bereft of imagination and initiative, I offer, as this week’s Text, a lesson plan on the Crime and Puzzlement case “Dropout.”

I use this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the expression “Sword of Damocles” to open the lesson after a class change. You’ll need this PDF of the illustration and questions that drive this lesson to teach it. Finally, here is the answer key typescript; it’s in word if you need to differentiate it for your students.

And that makes ten posts for this week, so I’m done here for the moment. I hope your school year is off to a good start.

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.

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The Weekly Text, September 6, 2019: A Lesson Plan on Using Interrogative Pronouns

Posted on September 6, 2019 | Leave a comment

This week’s Text is a complete lesson plan on the interrogative. pronoun. I begin this lesson with this worksheet on the homophones you’re and your. Should classroom events stall this lesson, here is a second short exercise, this on a Cultural Literacy worksheet on plagiarism. Finally, here is the structured, scaffolded worksheet on the interrogative pronoun that is the mainstay 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.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Independent Practice, Lesson Plans, The Weekly Text, Worksheets

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The Weekly Text, August 30, 2019: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on the Joint Stock Company

Posted on August 30, 2019 | Leave a comment

For my erstwhile colleagues at the High School of Economics & Finance in Lower Manhattan, I offer as this week’s Text this reading on the joint-stock company and its role in colonizing North America, along with its 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.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Independent Practice, Social Sciences, The Weekly Text, Worksheets

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The Weekly Text, August 23, 2019: Five Worksheets on Differentiating the Use of the Homophones Feat and Feet

Posted on August 23, 2019 | Leave a comment

Here are five worksheets on the homophones feat and feet to suffice for this week’s Text. I’m pretty busy in a new job trying to get the school year started.

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.

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The Weekly Text, August 16, 2019: Five Context Clues Worksheets on Succeed (vi/vt), Success (n), Succession (n), Successive (adj), and Successor (n)

Posted on August 15, 2019 | Leave a comment

Over the years, I have become increasingly concerned with the trouble polysemous words have caused the students under my instruction. English is such a wild mutt of a language that it’s not difficult in the least to see why it causes its learners such problems. In some cases, one needs the skills of a linguist to decode dense strands of polysemy.

While not one of the most difficult words in English, success does morph its definition as it morphs into different parts of speech. Students I have served in the past generally have trouble with sequencing and chronologies, so the idea of succession does not come easily to them. This makes understanding of the chronology, structure, and sequence of say, a royal dynasty, difficult to convey in social studies classes.

I wrote this suite of five context clues worksheets on succeed (verb), success (noun), succession (noun), successive (adjective), and successor (noun) in an attempt to help students get a grasp of this family of words. These worksheets might be best presented in one lesson–I don’t know. I’ve tended to place them with units where the words are used, but I am not at all confident that students made the associations between them necessary to understand them.

So I would be particularly interested in hearing how you used them, if you did.

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.

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The Weekly Text, 9 August 2019: A Lesson Plan on the Latin Word Root Cent

Posted on August 9, 2019 | Leave a comment

This week’s Text, delivered from Vermont, the only place to be in this month, is a complete lesson plan on the Latin word root cent–which means, you will instantly recognize, and your students will before long, hundred. I use this context clues worksheet on the noun myriad to open this lesson–it gives students a hint about where to look for the meaning of cent. Finally, here is the scaffolded worksheet that is the mainstay of this lesson. It includes cognates, so if you’re working with Spanish-speaking students–or students who speak any or the other Romance languages–they will find words they already know in that list.

You are, I hope, enjoying your summer.

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.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Independent Practice, Lesson Plans, The Weekly Text, Worksheets

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