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.

The Weekly Text, June 5, 2020: A Lesson Plan on the Verb To Be

This week’s Text is a lesson plan on the verb to be used in the present progressive tense. I open this lesson with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the idiom “Bone to Pick,” as in “I’ve got a bone to pick with you.” In the event the lesson spills over into a second day, here is a worksheet on the homophones prophet and profit.

You’ll need the worksheet at the center the lesson to do the work; you’ll probably also want (but you don’t necessarily need) this word bank as a learning support. Finally, here is the teacher’s copy of the 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.

Word Root Exercise: Quart

Here is a worksheet on the Latin word root quart. It means, you won’t be surprised to hear, fourth. It will also not surprise you to hear that this is a very productive root in English. Math teachers, this might be of some use to you, especially if you are working with English language learners.

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.

Censor (vt), Censorship (n)

OK, very quickly this morning, here are a pair of context clues worksheets on the verb censor and the noun censorship. The verb, incidentally, is only used transitively–you need a direct object, i.e. you need to censor something or someone.

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.

Edward Jenner and Smallpox

Last but not least this morning, especially considering that Edward Jenner was instrumental in refining the art and science of vaccinations, which makes him a man of his and our time, here is a reading on Edward Jenner and Smallpox 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.

A Lesson Plan on Rock Sizes from The Order of Things

Here is yet another lesson plan from Barbara Ann Kipfer’s book The Order of Things, this one on rock sizes. And here is list and comprehension worksheet that is the 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.

Aesop’s Fable: “The Farmer and the Fortune”

OK, here is a lesson plan Aesop’s fable “The Farmer and the Fortune.” Of course, you’ll need the reading and inquiry questions that constitute the 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.

Term of Art: Sacred, Sacred versus Profane Distinction (in a Time of Gaslighting this Dichotomy)

“Sacred, Sacred versus Profane Distinction: For Emile Durkheim and all subsequent sociologists of religion, the recognition of the absolute nature of the distinction between these two terms was and has been fundamental to their subdiscipline, both as a social fact and as something to be explained. Durkheim’s classic statement or the distinction is that ‘Sacred things are those which the [religious] interdictions protect and isolate; profane things, those to which these interdictions are applied and which must remain at a distance from the first’ (The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, 1912). Sacred phenomena are therefore considered extraordinary and set apart from everything else.”

Excerpted from: Marshall, Gordon, ed. Oxford Dictionary of Sociology. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.

The Generation of ’68

Finally–and again, after the abject horror of yesterday in the United States–I’ll post this reading on reading on The Generation of ’68 and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet without further comment.

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.

Bombast (n)

Regular readers of Mark’s Text Terminal know this isn’t a political blog. Still, after I read this nonsense yesterday, I went looking for something to post like this context clues worksheet on the noun bombast.

Don’t forget the adjective bombastic.

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: Beyond the Pale

Today seems like a perfect time to post this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the idiom beyond the pale. This one is, beyond this general introduction, a very tricky item, etymologically speaking.

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.