Tag Archives: context clues

It’s Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day today, so here is a context clues worksheet on the adjective moot. It means, as an adjective, “open to question,” “debatable,” “subjected to discussion,” “disputed,” “deprived of practical significance,” and “made abstract or purely academic.”

This worksheet attempts to elicit from students, from the context, the latter two meanings. Moot, for me at least, was a very tough word to place in context that students are likely to possess the prior knowledge to understand, and therefore to infer the meaning. You’ll find, I think, that the context hews closely to the final definition above, but will probably move students to say “something that isn’t going to happen.”

If ever you felt like commenting on something on Mark’s Text Terminal, I would be interested to hear what you think of this. I would be especially interested to hear if you’ve written stronger context for this word. Nota bene, incidentally, that moot is also used as a verb to mean “to bring up for discussion,” “broach,” and “debate,” (with an archaic definition of “to discuss from a legal standpoint”); moot is also a noun meaning, of all things, “a deliberative assembly primarily for the administration of justice; especially one held by the freemen of an Anglo-Saxon community” (with an obsolete meaning of “argument” and “discussion”).

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.

Here is a context clues worksheet on the noun phalanx. It means “a body of heavily armed infantry in ancient Greece formed in close deep ranks and files; broadly, a body of troops in close array,” “a massed arrangement of persons, animals, or things,” and “an organized body of persons.”

The context for this document frames the latter two definitions. This is not a commonly used word, but it does turn up in various places–often in a constructions (as Merriam-Webster’s has it) like “a phalanx of lawyers.”

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.

Here is a context clues worksheet on the verb perpetrate. It means “to bring about or carry out (as a crime or deception),” “commit,” and “to produce, perform, or execute (something likened to a crime).”

You use this verb only transitively, so don’t forget your direct object: what did your perpetrator perpetrate? A crime? A pun? A fashion faux pas? Your call, but just be sure for the sake of good grammar and elegance of style that you make that call.

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.

It’s Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day today, so here is a context clues worksheet on the verb berate. It means “to scold or condemn vehemently and at length.” You only use this verb transitively, so don’t forget your direct object: you must berate someone or something–but really only someone.

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.

It’s Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day today, so here is a context clues worksheet on bivouac as a verb. It’s used intransitively to mean “to make a bivouac, camp” and “to take shelter often temporarily”; transitively it means “to provide temporary quarters for (they were bivouacked in the gym during the storm).”

The word is also used as a noun to mean “a usually temporary encampment under little or no shelter,” “encampment usually for a night,” and “a temporary or casual shelter or lodging.”

Why use bivouac as a verb (or a noun for that matter?) rather than the simpler, arguably stouter camp? I don’t know that I would, but it is a matter of diction and style. Bivouac as either a verb or a noun is not a high-frequency word in English. This worksheet, perhaps, could be used as an assessment to test students’ ability to engage in the high-powered comprehension strategy of inferring meaning from context. If you use a lot of context clues-related material in your classroom, throwing in a word like bivouac from time to time does strike me as a quick means of assessment. What do you think?

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.

It’s the Word of the Day at Merriam-Webster today, so here is a context clues worksheet on the adjective urbane. It means “notably polite or polished in manner.” You probably won’t be surprised to hear that Merriam-Webster offers suave as a synonym.

This is not, I guess, a frequently used word in English. But it does show up in educated discourse, particularly in periodicals and newspapers. In any event, whether one teaches urbane or suave, the concept of “notably polite or polished in manner” is one students ought to have a word to represent.

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.