Tag Archives: diction/grammar/style/usage

Term of Art: Heuristic

“Heuristic (adjective): Serving as the discovery of truth or furthering investigation, as in the case of a useful and stimulating (if not logical or conclusive) method, presentation, or argument, and especially one used by a student to learn for himself. Adverb: heuristically; noun: heuristic.

‘My coarse distinctions between two kinds of fiction are useful heuristically, but they give a damaging impression of clear boundaries and a misleading impression of two armed camps.’ Annie Dillard, Living by Fiction”

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

Word Root Exercise: Gastr/o

Moving right along on this chilly afternoon, here is a worksheet on the Greek root gastr/o. It means, as you probably already inferred, stomach. It’s a very productive root in the English language, particularly for people entering the health sciences and culinary arts professions.

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: The Kansas-Nebraska Act

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which in a short paragraph, and with your expert teaching, will illustrate for your students how the kidnapping, subjugation, forced labor, and murder of persons of African descent is intimately bound up with the economic growth and development of the United States.

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.

Prime Numbers

OK, here is a short reading on prime numbers along with the vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet that accompanies 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.

Consul (n)

If you happen to be teaching a unit or lesson an ancient Rome, this context clues worksheet on the noun consul might be helpful, particularly concerning Julius Caesar’s activities in the that city in and around 44 BC.

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: Emancipation Proclamation

This Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Emancipation Proclamation does a very nice job of including the fundamental political cynicism behind the document as a political gesture and an act of liberation. In so doing (and you will see that there is plenty of room to expand this worksheet, which you can easily do because, like just about everything else published on Mark’s Text Terminal, it is in Microsoft Word), it opens a lot of room to ask big questions about the document itself, as well as others like it.

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.

Conglomerate (n)

When I worked at an economics-and-finance-themed high school in Lower Manhattan, this context clues worksheet on the noun conglomerate was de rigueur. I’m hard pressed to imagine it isn’t a word high school students ought to 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.

Term of Art: Antagonist

“Antagonist: In drama or fiction, the antagonist opposes the hero or protagonist (q.v.). In Othello, Iago is the antagonist to the Moor. In The Mayor of Casterbridge, Farfrae is antagonist to Henchard.”

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

A Lesson Plan on Personality Disorders

Here, on a snowy Tuesday morning, is a lesson plan on personality disorders. The work for this lesson consists of this short reading along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

And here are slightly longer versions of these documents if you want them.

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: Langston Hughes

Last but not least on this fine afternoon, here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Langston Hughes if you need it. He is another figure in Black History who bears extended scrutiny, so this worksheet really serves as the sparest of introductions to him.

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.