Here is a context clues worksheet on the adjective infallible. It comes from a solid Latin noun, fallibilis, and means, essentially, “incapable of error.”
Fat chance, but what do I know?
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 fraud. When I found this straggler in the warehouse, I wondered why I wouldn’t have composed a companion document on, at the very least, fraudulent, if not the transitive verb defraud.
As it happens, I did write one on the former, but not the latter. Given the state of society and culture, defraud is a word students ought to have in their vocabulary. So, if you’re interested, be on the lookout for one in these pages.
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 etiquette. You can see its French lineage. It means “the conduct or procedure required by good breeding or prescribed by authority to be observed in social or official life.”
Sheesh. I’m kind of surprised to see the locution “good breeding” used in connection with anything but race horses anymore. Also, is is just me, or does this word possess an onomatopoeic quality? I’ve always thought it was a dainty word that characterized, well, dainty behavior.
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 epoch. As I recall, I wrote this because the word kept popping up in a global studies class I co-taught in New York City some years ago. I wanted to make sure students fully understood the meaning of this word.
In any case, it remains in sufficiently common use in English that it is worth teaching for its own sake.
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 equity. This is a word, I think, that we want our students to know both in theory and practice–now and forever.
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, in as short an order as possible are three context clues worksheets on the noun doctrine, the adjective doctrinal, and the adjective doctrinaire. Why three? Honestly, I don’t remember. I can say with confidence that I wrote these in response to the regular use, particularly in social studies texts, of the noun doctrine. As you probably know, it’s difficult to talk about the Roman Catholic Church, for example, and its role in European politics and statecraft, without encountering one or all three of these words. In any case, doctrine means, variously: “something that is taught b : a principle or position or the body of principles in a branch of knowledge or system of belief : DOGMA c : a principle of law established through past decisions d : a statement of fundamental government policy esp. in international relations e : a military principle or set of strategies”
You probably already know that in order to teach or otherwise inculcate doctrine, you indoctrinate someone.
It’s also worth mentioning that while I have written the worksheet on doctrinaire for its use as an adjective, the word also can be used as a noun, in which case it means “one who attempts to put into effect an abstract doctrine or theory with little or no regard for practical difficulties.” I don’t know if I’ve ever seen it used that way, but if the lexicographers at Merriam-Webster say it is, then I believe them. As far as doctrinal goes, as an adjective, it means “of, relating to, or preoccupied with doctrine.”
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.
Here are a pair of context clues worksheets, one on the noun confederate, and the other on the noun confederation. These are obviously key words for any instruction on the Civil War in the United States between 1861 and 1865.
It’s well worth mentioning that confederate also has use in English as an adjective and a verb. These words carry a strong Latin pedigree, the verb confoederatus, “to unite by league.” This word isn’t commonly used in English, or at least American English, perhaps because it carries the taint of the rebellion in the United States to protect the Southern planters’ prerogative to commodify human beings and hold them in servitude.
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.
Here is a context clues worksheet on the noun contraband. You probably know that this solid word of Latin origin means, both as a noun and an adjective (it doesn’t morph as an adjective, but stays in its noun form, contraband), “illegal or prohibited traffic in goods : SMUGGLING” and “goods or merchandise whose importation, exportation, or possession is forbidden; also : smuggled goods.”
What you may not know, and what may surprise you, is that even in the latest edition of Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary (the lexicon of choice at Mark’s Text Terminal), contraband continues to carry the meaning “a slave who during the American Civil War escaped to or was brought within the Union lines.” In other words, this definition provides a lucid (and, arguably, lurid) glance into the mentality that reduced human beings with darker skin, but with human consciousness and agency nonetheless, to commodities. As such, this otherwise modest definition opens the door for a critical look at slavery and white supremacy in the United States.
What is an essential question here? Well, I might start with “How and why did people become ‘goods’ in the American mind?” But there are all kinds of those questions in this definition.
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 codify, which is only used transitively, so don’t forget your direct object–you must codify something.
Merriam-Webster defines this verb quite simply: “to reduce to a code.” I wrote this worksheet because this word kept showing up in social studies texts in the years in which I was teaching global studies. What students will need to understand (and this is an opportunity to awaken prior knowledge and put it to use, particularly if your global studies curriculum includes, as it should, material on the Code of Hammurabi) is that the word code defines “a systematic statement of a body of laws especially: one given statutory force” and “a system of principles or rules.” Put another way, the verb codify connotes “to make into law.”
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’s one more post before I take a vacation from this blog for a few days, to wit, a context clues worksheet on the noun cartel. It’s a word that shows up in social studies classes, particularly those United States history classes that deal with 1970s global oil markets and their effect on the American economy.
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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