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.

Cultural Literacy: Robespierre

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Maximilien Robespierre, one of the avatars of the French Revolution whose name has gathered increasing notoriety even in my relatively short lifetime. This is a full-page worksheet with a four-sentence reading and six comprehension questions. It is a basic, if tepid, introduction to a controversial historical figure. As such, it might be better augmented or used in tandem or combination with other documents. Since it is a Microsoft Word document (as are most things on Mark’s Text Terminal), you can adapt it to your needs.

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: Paraphrase

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the paraphrase as a means of recording information. This is a half-page worksheet with a two-sentence reading and two comprehension questions. I wrote this when I was serving in a school where students who had never had paraphrasing adequately explained to them were nonetheless asked to paraphrase passages from textbooks.

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.

Devious (adj)

Given the state of ethical life in the United States, I’d like to thing that this context clues worksheet on the adjective devious would bring the word into more frequent usage. It means, as the context clues in this document point toward, “not straightforward,” “cunning,” and “deceptive.” Since there is a lot of this going around, we should supply students a word to use to describe it.

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.

Reproduction

OK, science and health teachers, here is a reading on reproduction along with its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. As is generally true of the readings from the Intellectual Devotional series, this one-page reading is a remarkably thorough introduction to reproduction in the plant and animal kingdoms.

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.

Common Errors in English Usage: If I Was/I Were

Once again, from the pages of Paul Brians’ usage manual Common Errors in English Usage (to which he allows access at no charge at the Washington State University website, here is a worksheet on if I was and if I were. In other words (as you have no doubt already deduced), this document aims to help students make sense of the subjunctive mood.

This is a full-page worksheet with Professor Brians’ five-sentence reading, then my own lengthy instructions on the sentence analysis work that I conceived of as the principle work of this exercise. In any case, this is a Microsoft Word document, so you may manipulate it for your needs.

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.

Word Root Exercise: Iso-

Here is a worksheet on the Greek word root iso-. It means equal and same. It’s at the root of a number of frequently used words in mathematics and the sciences; the two words I recognize from the list on this document (which were chosen, as the book from which they were drawn emphasizes, because of the frequency with which they appear on college admissions tests like the SAT) are isosceles and isotope.

Otherwise, as you will quickly perceive, the words on this worksheet are not high-frequency words in everyday 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.

Cultural Literacy: Nobel Prizes

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Nobel Prizes. This is a full-page worksheet with a reading of three compound sentences and six comprehension questions. Unless students need a deeper dive into a specific prize category or laureate, I submit that this is a complete introduction to the topic of this global honor.

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.

Bromide (n)

Here is a context clues worksheet on the noun bromide. It means both “a commonplace or tiresome person : BORE” and  “a commonplace or hackneyed statement or notion.” The context clues supplied in this document are keyed to the second definition.

And while I stipulate that this isn’t a high-frequency word in English, it is nonetheless a very useful word, especially given the state of our contemporary economic, political, and social 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.

Earth Art

“Earth Art: An umbrella term for related movements originating in the mid-1960s in which substances like dirt, rocks, snow, and grass are embraced as the artist’s media. Works range in size from gallery pieces to large tracts of land, such as Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty (1970), which jutted 1,500 feet into the Great Salt Lake. As with many site-specific works, these may be known to the public primarily through photographic documentation. Amalgams from the 1980s have resulted in new trends termed eco-feminism, eco-Dada, and environmental protest art. Compare Environment Art.”

Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.

Word Root Exercise: Heli/o

Here is a worksheet on the Greek word root heli/o. It means, simply, sun. Like many Greek roots, this one forms the basis of a number of scientific words like heliograph, heliotrope, and helium. I understand these are not exactly high-frequency words in English, but these words, if the book that animated this series of worksheets is accurate, will show up on the SAT and other gatekeeping instruments for post-secondary institutions and graduate programs.

In any case, it’s hard to imagine a global studies or world history course (or whatever your school district calls it) that wouldn’t mention heliocentrism.

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.