Tag Archives: diction/grammar/style/usage

Common English Verbs Followed by an Object and an Infinitive: Help

Here is a worksheet on the verb help as used with an object and an infinitive.

The teacher helped the student to postulate her argument for her research paper.

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.

Cultural Literacy: Imperative

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the imperative form of verbs. This is a half-page worksheet with a reading of one compound sentence separated by a colon–which makes it easier to read–and three comprehension questions.

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, 11 April 2025: A Lesson Plan on Poker from The Order of Things

This week’s Text is the last, for now, of 50 lessons that I adapted during the pandemic from Barbara Ann Kipfer’s comprehensive reference book The Order of Things.

So here is a lesson plan on poker, which, as I have reminded users of this blog when I posted each of these 50 lessons, is written for striving readers and/or students who struggle with interpreting and in general dealing with two symbolic systems–in this case numbers and letters–at the same time. This list as reading and comprehension questions serves as the worksheet for this lesson. It includes a relatively complicated list of denominations of poker chips and a hierarchy of winning hands from highest to lowest. As I write this, having never used this lesson, I find myself wondering if a few hands of poker would serve as a satisfying and edifying form of application for this exercise.

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.

Write It Right: Democracy for Democratic Party

“Democracy for Democratic Party. One could as properly call the Christian Church ‘the Christianity.’”

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

Common English Verbs Followed by an Object and an Infinitive: Force

Here is a worksheet on the verb force when used with an object and an infinitive.

The fire drill forced the students to exit their classroom.

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.

Cultural Literacy: If the Shoe Fits, Wear It

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the idiom “If the shoe fits, wear it.” This is a half-page worksheet with a reading of three sentences and three comprehension question. A solid explanation of this once-common idiom (if not still?) 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.

Corruption

“Corruption (noun): Change of an unfamiliar term or form to one more familiar, or departure form correct of standard word use; debased or unorthodox word form; perverted wording of a text or document. Adjective: corrupt; verb. Also BASTARDIZATION

‘His voice was polite again; he even chuckled. ‘After the first shock of seeing the Scrolls destroyed, we realized you’d actually given us a unique opportunity. All the texts are corrupt, you know, even these—copies of copies of copies, full of errata and lacunae—but we never could agree on a common reading, and of course the old Scrolls acquired a great spurious authority for sentimental reasons, even thought the contradict each other and themselves.’ John Barth, Giles Goat-Boy”

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

The Weekly Text, 4 April 2025: A Lesson Plan on the Greek Word Roots -Cracy and -Crat

This week’s Text is this lesson plan on the Greek word roots -cracy and -crat, which mean government, rule, and power. I open this lesson with this context clues worksheet on the verb administer, which I hope, perhaps naively or erroneously, points the way toward the meaning of these two very productive roots. We get aristocracy, democrat, meritocracy, and bureaucracy from these roots; all are included on this scaffolded worksheet, which is the gravamen of 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.

 

Cultural Literacy: Carry Nation

OK, for the final documents post of Women’s History Month 2025, here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Carry Nation, the once-famous temperance crusader. This is a half-page worksheet with a reading of two sentences and two comprehension questions.

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.

Cultural Literacy: Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Elizabeth Cady Stanton. This is a half-page worksheet with a reading of two sentences, the first a bit long, and three comprehension questions.

Incidentally, the reading on this document terminates with the imperative to “See Seneca Falls Convention” in parentheses.  You’ll find a Cultural Literacy worksheet on that event here.

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.