Tag Archives: building vocabulary/conceptual knowledge

Slur

Posted on October 19, 2021 | Leave a comment

“Slur (noun): A disparaging remark or insinuation; insult, aspersion, or sleight; derogation or stigma; a sliding over without due consideration or attention; in utterance, a blurring or omitting or sounds, thereby running syllables or words together. Verb: slur.

‘This slurring of words into a refined cadence until they cease to be words at all is due partly to the Englishman’s disinclination to move his lips. Evidently the lips and teeth are held stationary for the most part, open just wide enough to let in air for breathing )many Englishmen must breathe through their mouths, otherwise they would not breathe at all) with an occasional sharp pursing of the lips on a syllable which does not call for pursing the lips.’

Robert Benchley, ‘The King’s English: Not Murder but Suicide.’”

Excerpted from: Grambs, David. The Random House Dictionary for Writers and Readers. New York: Random House, 1990.

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Temperance (n), Temperate (adj)

Posted on October 19, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a context clues worksheet on the noun temperance. I’m fairly confident I wrote this for a United States history class to help students understand the word as an adjective in the historical term Temperance Movement. You will note in these sentences that I tried to write context that also defines temperance to mean “habitual moderation in the indulgence of the appetites or passions.”

And here also is another context clues worksheet on the adjective temperate. This is a moderately complicated word whose essential meaning is “marked by moderation, “keeping or held within limits,” and “not extreme or excessive.” It’s worth remembering that this adjective attaches to nouns dealing with everything from drinking alcohol (as above), to climates, to one’s habits.

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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Common Errors in English Usage: Gone, Went (v)

Posted on October 17, 2021 | Leave a comment

OK, last but not least on this cool Sunday morning, here is an English usage worksheet on understanding the difference between gone and went and how to use, respectively, this past participle and simple past tense of the verb go. This is a full-page worksheet with a short reading and ten modified cloze exercises. But, as it is formatted in Microsoft Word, it is yours to modify as you wish.

Like all the documents under the above header, this one is based on text from Paul Brians’ excellent book Common Errors in English Usage, which he has posted on the Washington State University website for free.

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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Summary (n)

Posted on October 17, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here are two context clues worksheets on the noun summary. Why I produced two of them, I can’t say. I need not belabor the importance of this noun in the vocabulary of high school students, so I won’t. Incidentally, since I haven’t mentioned it lately, these documents, like almost everything on Mark’s Text Terminal, are formatted in Microsoft Word. Thus they are easily exportable into a word processor of your preference, and you may edit them for the needs of your students.

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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Write It Right: Coat for Coating

Posted on October 17, 2021 | Leave a comment

“Coat for Coating. ‘A coat of paint, or varnish.’ If we coat something we produce a coating, not a coat.”

Excerpted from: Bierce, Ambrose. Write it Right: A Little Blacklist of Literary Faults. Mineola, NY: Dover, 2010.

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Word Root Exercise: Crypt/o

Posted on October 17, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here is a worksheet on the Greek word root crypt-o. It means, as you probably already know, “secret” and “hidden.” In fact, given the need for the encryption on the digital devices that are now ubiquitous and even omnipresent in the lives of most people, this is a word root very much in common parlance in English.

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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Leave It to Beaver

Posted on October 15, 2021 | Leave a comment

OK, for some reason, here is a reading on “Leave It to Beaver” along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. I haven’t the faintest idea why I produced these documents on this late-1950s and early 1960s television show. A friend of mine extolled its virtues in the past; the one episode I saw nauseated me–a sitcom vision of a placid, indeed complacent, ultra-White America produced during the depths of Jim Crow–and I never watched another episode.

So again, I can’t imagine why I wrote this worksheet other than, perhaps, to help students understand how often popular media, particularly fictional narratives, are at variance with reality.

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, 15 October 2021, Hispanic Heritage Month 2021 Week V: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on Cesar Chavez

Posted on October 15, 2021 | Leave a comment

This week’s Text, for the final Friday of Hispanic Heritage Month 2021, is a reading on Cesar Chavez along with its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. The reading comes from one of the Intellectual Devotional books; there is another reading and comprehension worksheet from one of those volumes. Entries on him appeared in two of them–Biographies and American History–and both are now available on this blog.

In fact, to use the boilerplate for this circumstance on Mark’s Text Terminal, these documents join a growing body of material on Mr. Chavez, one of the heroes of my youth.

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, 8 October 2021, Hispanic Heritage Month 2021 Week IV: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on Los Angeles

Posted on October 8, 2021 | Leave a comment

Here on the fourth Friday of Hispanic Heritage Month 2021, is a reading on Los Angeles along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

This second-largest city in the United States, known in the vernacular by its initialism, L.A., was founded as a city in 1781, but claimed as Spanish territory by Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo in 1542. The city became Mexican territory in 1821 after the Mexican War of Independence. Then, in 1848 (a momentous year in world history, to say the least), after the Mexican-American War, following the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, the United States purchased the territory that became the state of California two years later, in 1850.

The city is a rich producer and repository of Chicano culture. This is the municipality, after all, that played a role in giving the world the nonpareil Los Lobos.

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, 1 October 2021, Hispanic Heritage Month 2021 Week III: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on Don Quixote

Posted on September 24, 2021 | Leave a comment

For the third Friday of Hispanic Heritage Month 2021, here is a reading on Don Quixote with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. I don’t know if you’ve read Miguel de Cervantes’ magisterial novel–I finally read it during the pandemic, and now want to read it again–but I must extol the virtues and richness of this landmark of world literature.

Otherwise, I have nothing to say, and I certainly wouldn’t presume to editorialize upon or criticize this novel. If that’s what you seek, I recommend Harold Bloom or someone of his ilk. It goes without saying, I assume, that a lot of ink has been spilled in seeking a deeper understanding of Don Quixote.

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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