Tag Archives: building vocabulary/conceptual knowledge

Word Root Exercise: Deca, Dec, Deka, Deci

This worksheet on the Latin roots deca, dec, deka, and deci can assist students in a number of ways I think. These mean, as you probably already recognized, ten; be aware though, that deci actually means tenth. In any case, this is a vocabulary builder, but contains words primarily from  mathematics, so it’s probably best used there to assist students in developing their own understanding and using words growing from these  roots.

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.

Psychiatrists and Psychologists

Health care has been something of a hot potato in the United States for a very long time; and certainly the debate around what looks to me like a basic human right has grown extremely contentious with the passage of the Affordable Care Act. I want the students I serve to know something about health care. And as many young people today require the services of mental health professionals, they should know what they’re looking for and buying.

So here is a short reading on the difference between psychiatrists and psychologists 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.

Triskaidekaphobia (n)

When I was a kid, I loved weird, big words, because they allowed me the pleasure of pedantry. So this context clues worksheet on the noun triskaidekaphobia would have been right up my alley. It means “fear or avoidance of the number thirteen.”

If nothing else, this might be a fun way to introduce the concept of phobias.

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.

Compliment (n) and Complement (n)

These five worksheets on the homophones compliment and complement are actually the first I ever wrote. You’ll notice that I set up the worksheets to use these words as nouns. Because it turns up as a term of art in any number of grammar and style manuals, I wanted students to learn the use of complement as a grammatical term. It’s used in all kinds of ways, even sometimes to describe a predicate, which I think is better called, simply, a predicate.

However, as a means of describing both the direct objects and the indirect objects of verbs, I think this is a very good word indeed. I’m fairly certain I placed all five of these worksheets as do-now exercises at various places in a thirteen-lesson unit on verbs. If you use them the same way, you may want to mention to students that both of these words can be used as verbs; both are used transitively.

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: Log/o

On a rainy morning, here is a worksheet on the Greek word root log/o. It means word, discourse, and doctrine. Logos was a big concept in the ancient Greek world. You can hear it, of course, at the basis of the English word logic.

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.

Charlemagne

There’s already a short independent practice worksheet on Charlemagne in these pages. He is a major figure in world history, so here is a slightly longer reading on Charlemagne and a vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet to accompany it.

If you find typos in this 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.

Vox Populi (noun phrase)

While I doubt you have much call for it, here, nonetheless, is a context clues worksheet on the Latinism vox populi. It’s a noun phrase meaning, just as it sounds, “voice of the people.”

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.

The Weekly Text, April 5, 2019: A Lesson Plan on the Concept and Act of Simplifying in Mathematics

Several years ago, the school administration under which I then served tasked me with developing math and science vocabulary in a group of struggling students. I wrote a unit on the fly, and then never used it because that fall I was summoned to jury duty (a stint which ended up lasting two months) in Bronx County.

This complete lesson plan on the word simplify and the concept of simplifying is one of the fruits of my labor. As I say, I never had a chance to actually deliver this lesson in the classroom. In any case, I envisioned starting the lesson with this extended context clues worksheet on the transitive verb simplify. The center of this lesson is this worksheet on simplifying numbers that a math teacher and I collaborated on to develop–he actually ended up teaching this lesson in my absence, and so provided some revisions after he’d had a crack at it. Finally, here is a learning support with definitions of the verbs simplify and solve.

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.

Usury (n)

Here, on a fine spring morning, is a context clues worksheet on the noun usury.

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.

Friction

In response to student demand, I have begun producing some new materials for basic science literacy. To that end, here is a reading on friction 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.