Tag Archives: diction/grammar/style/usage

Cultural Literacy: Fifth Amendment

Last but not least on this distinctly autumnal day, here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. This amendment most famously protects defendants against self-incrimination–i.e. they can “take the Fifth” when asked a question whose answer may incriminate them in a crime. The Fifth Amendment also prohibits double jeopardy and mandates due process of law.

This knowledge will help prepare students to what I expect will be heavy use in the coming months of this shield against self-incrimination.

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.

Word Root Exercise: Avi-

Here is a worksheet on the Latin word root avi, which means bird. So now you know why the place where the birds live at the zoo is called an aviary.

What do birds spend a lot of their time doing? Flying. That’s why this root also appears in a flight-related noun like aviator. This is a very productive root in English for certain kinds of technical terms in flight, like avionics and aviation.

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

Write it Right: At Auction for by Auction

“At auction for by Auction. ‘The goods were sold at auction.’”

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

Inordinate (adj)

Like many Words of the Day from Merriam-Webster lately, I almost let this one go past; but here, owing to the fact that it is a commonly used word, here is a context clues worksheet on the adjective inordinate. It’s used in the most common sense it turns up in conversation, i.e. “exceeding reasonable limits” and “immoderate.”

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.

Circadian Rhythms

For just over ten years, I served in a school without windows in any of the classrooms. In fact, that school has been in the news recently for deficiencies in its reopening plan.

Students, as they will (and I thank them for it), often questioned and commented about the building–it really was dismal–and wanted to discuss it at times. I used this reading on circadian rhythms and its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet as a way of capitalizing on students’ desire to know why their school possessed the architectural charm of a maximum security prison.

In any case, the reading doesn’t necessarily answer any questions. It does present opportunities to ask critical questions about allocation of public resources, investment in communities, and whether or not one needs to see daylight to operate on a circadian cycle.

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: Bread and Circuses

After last night, I can’t think of a better time to post this Cultural Literacy the concept of bread and circuses. The term comes from ancient Rome, as I suspect most people know; it was meant, originally, as a plaint against the declining heroism of the Roman people, who were willing to exchange the Roman Republic for the Roman Empire–to forego the work of maintaining a republic for the spectacle, noise, and distraction of the empire’s conquests and programs–free bread among them–designed to control the populace.

In the context of current American politics, I suppose a teacher could contextualize this to describe how Americans were willing to sacrifice intellect and reason for emotion and nonsense.

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 Lesson Plan on the Chronology of Space Flights from The Order of Things

Here’s a lesson on the chronological order of international space flights and the list as reading and comprehension questions that constitute the lesson’s work. This lesson derives, as does every lesson on this blog under the header The Order of Things, from Barbara Ann Kipfer’s book of the same name.

Incidentally, I’ve just finished writing all the lessons and worksheets for the unit they comprise. There are 50 lessons in all, and I’ll soon post supporting documents for the unit, including a user’s manual for the worksheets and the unit plan itself.

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.

Term of Art: Predicate

“Predicate: The verb and its related words in a clause or sentence. The predicate expresses what the subject does, experiences, or is. Birds fly. The partygoers celebrated wildly for a long time.”

Excerpted from: Strunk, William Jr., and E.B. White. The Elements of Style, Fourth Edition. New York: Longman, 2000.

Abstain (vi)

OK, last but not least this morning, here is a context clues worksheet on the verb abstain, which is in fact Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day today. It is only used intransitively, and it is a word students probably ought to know and be able to use.

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: Populism

If there was ever a time where students ought to be receiving rigorous instruction in civic and politics, it’s now. And I don’t mean to say that this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the political philosophy of populism is the solution to any deficit in civics instruction, but it’s a start, especially for struggling learners and emergent readers.

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.