Tag Archives: diction/grammar/style/usage

Mea Culpa (n)

Because it was Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day yesterday, and because it is arguably a term–and definitely a concept–students should understand, here is a context clues worksheet on the noun mea culpa. As it sounds, it is a Latin phrase and is an acknowledgement of one’s fault or error. Another way of thinking about is to remember that if you do something wrong, you are culpable for your action and its consequence.

If you find typos in  and 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: Forecasted

“Forecasted: For this abominable word we are indebted to the weather bureau–at least it was not sent upon us until that affliction was with us. Let us hope that it may some day be losted from the language.”

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

The Great Gatsby

Several students in the school in which I serve expressed interest in the literature of the Jazz Age and Gatsby in particular, so here is a short reading on The Great Gatsby along with the vocabulary building and comprehension worksheet that attends 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.

Pedant (n), Pedantic (adj)

OK, one more thing on this very chilly Monday morning, to wit these two context clues worksheets on noun pedant and the adjective pedantic. A pedant is someone who “makes a show of knowledge,” so someone is pedantic when they are making a show of knowledge.

It’s worth mentioning that both of these words connote that the knowledge that the pedant shows off is often “one who is unimaginative or who unduly emphasizes minutiae in the presentation or use of knowledge.”

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: Allen Ginsberg

From my sophomore year of high school on, I was quite taken with The Beat Generation. In the event that you have any students with a similar interest (I still stumble across one every so often), this cultural literacy worksheet on the late, great Allen Ginsberg might be a place for them to start in the pursuit an inquiry into the Beats.

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, January 11, 2019: A Reading and Comprehension Worksheet on Confectioner and Philanthropist Milton Hershey

This week’s Text is a reading on reading on chocolate tycoon and philanthropist Milton Hershey along with its comprehension worksheet. As this reading can explain to you and your students, Hershey was an interesting guy.

Several years ago “60 Minutes” ran a feature, which I cannot find on the Internet, on the possible sale of the Hershey Company. It was controversial because the philanthropies Milton Hershey contrived, particularly the Milton Hershey School, directly benefit from the company’s profits, and would lose that support in the event the company was sold. As far as I can tell (short of spending hours of research on this, which I really cannot afford to do at the moment), this issue remains unresolved.

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.

Paradigm (n)

Alright, here is another one of Merriam-Webster’s Words of the Day rendered as a context clues worksheet on the noun paradigm. This word, means “a philosophical and theoretical framework of a scientific school or discipline within which theories, laws, and generalizations and the experiments performed in support of them are formulated; broadly : a philosophical or theoretical framework of any kind.”

Needless to say, this is a very important word and concept for learning and for categorizing knowledge. Students, especially college-bound students, really must know this word by the time they don their mortarboards and walk across the stage at graduation.

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.

Populace (n) and Populous (adj)

Here are five worksheets on the homophones populace and populous. These are vocabulary builders as well as usage guides. I guess there is not much more to say about them then that.

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.

Venal (adj)

It was Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day yesterday, so here today is a context clues worksheet on the adjective venal. This would be a good instrument to use to introduce a lesson on, say, the Protestant Reformation. You might use the noun–venality–as well; who knows?

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.

Independent Practice: Charles Martel

Here’s another document on a figure from the early medieval period, to wit this independent practice worksheet on Charles Martel. I’m not sure why I wrote this, but I suspect it was a response to a student’s interest in this relatively important, but little-known figure in global history.

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.