Category Archives: Worksheets

Classroom documents for student use. Most are structured and scaffolded, and most are pitched at a fundamental level in terms of the questions they ask and the work and understandings they require of students.

Common Errors in English Usage: Turn Into, Turn In To

Posted on July 1, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a worksheet on differentiating the use of turn into and turn in to. Like the other 100 or so of these I will post or already have posted, the text for this document is excerpted from Paul Brians’ handy usage guide, which he has posted online in its entirety–under this link–Common Errors in English Usage.

This is an area of usage that it will serve students very well, in life and work, to know. The worksheet is scaffolded, with five modified cloze exercises, then a blank field on which students may try their hands at extemporaneously writing sentences using these two verb phrases–or phrasal verbs, really.

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.

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Boethius

Posted on July 1, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a reading on Boethius along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

Like a good deal of the biographical material on philosophers, and expositions of philosophical concepts, from the Intellectual Devotional series, I wrote this for one student. Boethius was born in 477, the year after the Fall of Rome. He is best known for his book The Consolation of Philosophy. Did you know that the popular game show Wheel of Fortune is named for one of Boethius’s conception of fate? I didn’t either.

In any case, this reading is a cogent one-page biography of Boethius which doesn’t dumb down his ideas. Like almost everything you’ll find on Mark’s Text Terminal, these are Word documents, so easily manipulated and adapted for a variety of needs.

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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Cultural Literacy: Bond

Posted on June 30, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on bonds, the financial instrument, not the force that holds atoms and molecules together, nor the ineffable thing that grows between friends, lovers, and humans and their pets.

I worked for ten years in a economics-and-finance-themed high school in Manhattan’s financial district. The word bond, which is extravagantly polysemous, really confounded the students I served there. Over the years, I developed a range of materials to teach this word in all its meanings in all the parts of speech. So, be on the lookout for those documents on this blog.

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.

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Etiquette (n)

Posted on June 30, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a context clues worksheet on the noun etiquette. You can see its French lineage. It means “the conduct or procedure required by good breeding or prescribed by authority to be observed in social or official life.”

Sheesh. I’m kind of surprised to see the locution “good breeding” used in connection with anything but race horses anymore. Also, is is just me, or does this word possess an onomatopoeic quality? I’ve always thought it was a dainty word that characterized, well, dainty behavior.

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.

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Native Americans

Posted on June 29, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a reading on Native Americans and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

This reading is only four paragraphs. It uses the story of the Nez Perce Tribe, and especially Chief Joseph’s legendary speech–“Hear me, my chiefs!” I am tired. My heart is sick. From where the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever”–to tell the story of the destruction of the indigenous civilizations that inhabited North America prior to the arrival of the first European immigrants from England.

Given the disturbing, but unsurprising, discovery of mass graves at Canadian Indian Residential Schools, now is a very good time to take a look at what (if you happen to be of European descent, as I am) our forefathers wrought. It is not a pretty picture. But neither is ignoring these crimes. In any case, I think we are just seeing the first of the remains of this genocide.

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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Epoch (n)

Posted on June 29, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a context clues worksheet on the noun epoch. As I recall, I wrote this because the word kept popping up in a global studies class I co-taught in New York City some years ago. I wanted to make sure students fully understood the meaning of this word.

In any case, it remains in sufficiently common use in English that it is worth teaching for its own sake.

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.

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Cultural Literacy: Bull Market

Posted on June 29, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of a bull market. This is a half-page worksheet with three questions. The reading is one compound sentence on one line which nonetheless manages to contrast bear markets with bull markets. In other words, a succinct general introduction to the topic.

Enough, in other words, for students to understand the symbolism of the cast bronze sculpture Charging Bull on lower Broadway, right by Bowling Green Park, in Manhattan.

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.

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Causation

Posted on June 28, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a reading on causation along with its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. How much demand will you see for these documents? Well, that depends on your students.

In 16 years of teaching in New York City, I used this set of documents two or three times at the most. I wrote them for one particular student with a surpassing interest in philosophy, but little interest in anything else school offered him. In any case, this is a short reading that touches on the philosophical conundrum of causality. This might be a way to introduce students to the topic, then take them on a short analytical excursion through one of the most commonly committed logical fallacies, post hoc ergo propter hoc–“after this, therefore because of this.”

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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Word Root Exercise: Astro, Aster

Posted on June 28, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a worksheet on the Greek word roots astro and aster. They mean, as you have doubtlessly already inferred, star.

These are hard working roots in English, pushing into fruition words like asterisk, asteroid, astronaut, and astronomy.

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.

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Equivocal (adj)

Posted on June 28, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a context clues worksheet on the adjective equivocal. This is a word freighted with a number of closely related meanings: “subject to two or more interpretations and usually used to mislead or confuse <an ~ statement>”;  “uncertain as an indication or sign <~ evidence>”;  “of uncertain nature or classification <~ shapes>”; of uncertain disposition toward a person or thing <an ~ attitude>,” and “of doubtful advantage, genuineness, or moral rectitude.” Merriam-Webster offers obscure as a synonym–so you see the problem here.

You can probably see or hear the Latin roots equ and equi–i.e. equal in this word. In fact, using Latin word roots, one can easily see two of them work, equ and equi as above, along with voc–“to call, voice.” The word means equal voice, which certainly squares with obscure, particularly as the number of voices in an equivocal statement increases.

As I prepared to post this, I went looking for a context clues worksheet on the verb equivocate. To my surprise, I haven’t produced one yet. Since verbs are the workhorses of language, I try to lead with them where context clues worksheets are concerned. In this case, after looking at the definition of equivocate, “to use equivocal language esp. with intent to deceive” and “to avoid committing oneself in what one says,” I see why I started with the adjective. In any case, a worksheet on the verb is forthcoming.

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.

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