Tag Archives: cultural literacy

A Lesson Plan on the Crime and Puzzlement Case “Buried Gold”

It was 52 degrees at 5:00 this morning here in southwestern Vermont, which sure felt like an harbinger of fall. It’s warming up slowly. I feel like, as I did in my late teens and early twenties, that I should be preparing to begin a six-week apple harvest. I can’t imagine, at my age, what picking 120 bushels of apples a day would do to my body and mind.

Ok, that said, here is a lesson plan on the Crime and Puzzlement case “Buried Gold.” I open this lesson with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the proverb “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” This is often attributed to Shakespeare; in fact, it comes from the pen of the Restoration dramatist William Congreve from his play The Mourning BrideI actually posted this short exercise with a parts of speech lesson elsewhere on this blog, so be on the lookout.

Here is the scan with the illustration, reading, and questions that you’ll need to conduct your investigation and therefore teach this lesson. And here, at last, is the typescript of the answer key so you can solve your case and bring the offender to the bar of justice–so to speak.

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.

Cultural Literacy: Jesuits

This Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Jesuits is a full-page document, so it would serve well as an independent practice–i.e. homework–assignment if you think kids should know about this order.

It might be worth keeping in mind the adjective jesuitical, meaning  “practicing casuistry or equivocation; using subtle or oversubtle reasoning; crafty; sly; intriguing.” This turns up in academic and scholarly prose, and might help students understand why the Jesuits animated the Counter-Reformation and are today regarded, in some circles and to some degree, with suspicion.

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.

A Documents-Based Questioning (DBQ) Lesson on The Popol Vuh

OK, we made it! This lesson plan on The Popol Vuh, the creation myth of the Quiche Maya, which brings us back to the first lesson in this unit on the Rig Veda, below. This is, then, the tenth of ten lessons (and the tenth of ten posts, therefore) in a global studies document-based questioning unit on reading, analyzing, and interpreting primary historical documents.

The short do-now exercises that I have for this lesson are arguable only tangentially related, but are useful parts of a general inventory of global studies work. These are two Cultural Literacy worksheets: the first is this half-page reading and writing exercise on colonialism and the second is this full-page worksheet on Pancho Villa, the Mexican revolutionary general.

And, lastly, here is the reading on The Popol Vuh with its accompanying comprehension questions to take teacher and students through the lesson.

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.

A Document-Based Questioning (DBQ) Lesson on the Magna Carta

As above and below, this DBQ lesson on the Magna Carta is the ninth of a ten-lesson global studies on reading, analyzing, and interpreting primary historical documents.

In my taxonomic system, I tagged this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concepts of checks and balances in government, but as a short document to get students settled at the beginning of the class period, this isn’t appropriate. It’s a full-page document that might be better used as independent practice (i.e. homework) as it solidly complements the reading from the Magna Carta.

This Cultural Literacy worksheet on the divine right of kings is a half-page exercise and a better fit to begin a class period. It also dovetails conceptually with the content of the Magna Carta.

And, of course, you and your students will need the reading from the Magna Carta with comprehension questions to teach and learn the lesson about political power from the Magna Carta.

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.

A Document-Based Questioning (DBQ) Lesson on the Fire in Rome, AD 64 from The Annals of Tacitus

OK, last but not least on this essentially perfect summer afternoon in southwestern Vermont,, here is a DBQ lesson on Tacitus’s account of the deadly fire that swept through Rome in 1864. Nero was emperor, and it is from this event that the expression “fiddling while Rome burns” originates. Nero was believed to have sung (“of the destruction of Troy”), not fiddled, as the city burned down around him.

This Cultural Literacy worksheet on the ancient Roman metaphor for decadence, “Bread and Circuses,” opens this lesson. For some reason, I included in this lesson’s folder this second Cultural Literacy worksheet, this one on the concept of a capital offense.

And here is the worksheet with the reading and comprehension questions that is the primary work of this lesson.

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.

A Document-Based Questioning (DBQ) Lesson on the Apology of Socrates

As above and below, this DBQ lesson on Apology of Socrates is the fifth of a ten-lesson global studies unit on document-based questions.

This lesson opens with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on allusion, and here is a second one on status quo in the event the lesson goes into a second day–or you just want the worksheet around to elucidate this Latinism so common in the English language.

You’ll need this reading and comprehension questions on Socrates’ Apology to conduct the essential work of this lesson.

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.

A Document-Based Questioning (DBQ) Lesson on Pericles’ Funeral Oration

Moving right along, and as above and below, this lesson plan on Pericles’ funeral oration as drawn from Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War, is number four of a ten-lesson unit of document-based questioning materials.

This lesson opens with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the epic as a poetic form and as a means of recording history; it the lesson goes into a second day–and that I included another on the Peloponnesian War suggests that I planned that it would–you can use that second Cultural Literacy worksheet. Like the first one on epics, the document on the Peloponnesian War is a half-page worksheet.

Finally, here is the reading and comprehension questions that is the primary work of this lesson.

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.

A Document-Based Questioning (DBQ) Lesson on the Analects of Confucius

As above and below, here is a DBQ lesson on the Analects of Confucius. The lesson opens with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Aesop’s Fable “The Boy Who Cried Wolf.” And here is the reading and comprehension questions that are the work of this lesson.

Also, if you are interested in going further with “The Boy Who Cried Wolf,” here is a lesson plan on it.

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.

A Document-Based Questioning (DBQ) Lesson on the 23rd Psalm

As above and below, here is a DBQ lesson on Psalm 23, taken from the King James Bible.

This lesson opens with this context clues worksheet on the noun psalm to assist students in developing their own understanding of this poetic–and musical–form. If you take the lesson into a second day (or if your students do!), here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of a motif. Finally, here is the reading and comprehension worksheet that is the primary work of this lesson.

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.

A Document-Based Questioning (DBQ) Lesson on the Rig Veda

Here is a DBQ lesson on the Hindu sacred text the Rig Veda, the first, as above and below, of a ten-lesson documents-based questions (DBQ) unit.

I open this lesson with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of symbols; in the event the lesson requires a second day to complete, then here is another on another on the epic as a poetic form. As I write this, I think perhaps the reading on epics probably ought to come first in the delivery of this lesson. Finally, here is the reading and comprehension worksheet that is the chief work of this lesson.

Incidentally, you might find this reading and comprehension worksheet on Hindu Epics complementary to this lesson.

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.