Tag Archives: diction/grammar/style/usage

Communism

As it seems to have returned to its prominent place in the bundle of American political anxieties, now seems like a good time to post this reading on communism and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

In my ill-fated career as a doctoral candidate, one of the more interesting seminars I took was on the “Hegel-to Marx Problem.” Needless to say, I read quite a bit of Marx and Engels for that class, as well, later, on my own. I bring this up because I want to comment that for a one-page reading, the documents in this post introduce communism thoroughly and objectively. It’s good stuff if you need 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.

Cultural Literacy: Republic

Now seems like a good time to post this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the republic as form of government. This is a full-page worksheet, so it might be useful as an independent practice (i.e. homework) assignment. There is, like most if not all of the Cultural Literacy worksheets on this blog, plenty of room to expand this document; and, as are the lion’s share of documents here, this one is in Microsoft Word, so it is easily exportable, transferable, and reviseable.

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, November 13, 2020: A Lesson Plan on the Crime and Puzzlement Case “Seeing Double”

This week’s Text is a lesson plan on the Crime and Puzzlement case “Seeing Double.” Judging from my download statistics, these are always a crowd pleaser.

I open this lesson with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the idiom “Have. an ax to grind,” (which might also be usefully employed when introducing students to the methods of writing a research paper–especially scholarly disinterest). This PDF of the illustration and questions is the evidence you’ll need to conduct this investigation. Finally, here is the typescript of the answer key so that you may bring the culprit to the bar of justice.

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.

United Nations

Now seems like a perfect time to post this reading on the United Nations and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. Every person on this planet would benefit, I not so humbly submit, to consider themselves members of the United Nations–all species on earth would similarly benefit, I think.

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: Bet for Betted

“Bet for Betted. The verb to bet forms its preterite regularly, as do wet, wed, knit, quit, and others that are regularly misconjugated. It seems that we clip our short words more than we do our long.”

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

Obelisk (n)

It’s not a word in particularly common use in English even if one of our most recognizable pieces of public art and architecture–the Washington Monument–is indeed such a monument. In any case, here is a context clues worksheet on the noun obelisk. If you’re teaching about ancient Egypt (where it came up when I taught global studies, which is, I assume, why I wrote this in the first place), this might be a useful document.

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.

Ad Hoc

“Ad Hoc (ad hok) To this matter: for this specific instance or purpose; in this case; immediate; provisional.

‘Polly’s motivating force was love; she wanted a world in which everybody else whether they liked it or not, but she set this overflowing feminine cup in motion with a thoroughly masculine arsenal of charts, graphs, quorums, task forces, ad hocs, tunnel vision, and lists.’ Florence King, When Sisterhood Was in Flower”

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

A Short Exercise on the Greek Word Root Icon/o

Last but not least on a rainy Thursday afternoon, here is a short worksheet on the Greek word root icon/o–it means image. But you already knew that because of the word icon itself is so commonly used in the English language.

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.

Common Errors in English Usage: Sensual (adj), Sensuous (adj)

The minute I started writing this English usage worksheet on the adjectives sensual and sensuous worksheet I worried that I had waded into dangerous waters–and I expect I don’t need to explain why. In any case, these are a couple of frequently used words in English, do it’s up to us to find, uh, a suitable way to present them. As you will see, sensual, which as the worksheet’s reading tells students, …”often has a slightly racy or even judgmental tone lacking in ‘sensuous,’” caused me some problems when writing cloze exercises for it.

As with just about everything else at Mark’s Text Terminal, this is a Microsoft Word document, so you can alter it to suit your circumstances and needs.

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.

Term of Art: Essay

“Essay (French essai, “attempt”): a composition, usually in prose (Pope’s Moral Essays in verse are an exception), which may only be a few hundred words (like Bacon’s Essays) or book length (like Locke’s Essay Concerning Human Understanding) and which discusses, formally or informally, a topic or a variety of topics. It is one of the most flexible and adaptable of all literary forms….”

Excerpted from: Cuddon, J.A. The Penguin Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory. New York: Penguin, 1992.