Tag Archives: learning supports

A Learning Support on Roman Gods and Goddesses

Here is a learning support on the primary Roman deities. If you teach anything related to classical mythology, you might find this useful.

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 Internet

Here is a reading on the birth and growth of the Internet with a comprehension worksheet to accompany it. For the right student, I suspect, this will be some relatively high interest material. In fact, it might work well with this material on the ARPAnet, which was the precursor to Internet we all use today.

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.

Book of Answers: Cotton and Increase Mather

How was Cotton Mather related to Increase Mather? Increase (1639-1723) was the father of Cotton (1663-1728). Both were clergymen, theologians, and prolific writers in Puritan New England.

Excerpted from: Corey, Melinda, and George Ochoa. Literature: The New York Public Library Book of Answers. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993.

A Learning Support on Restrictive and Non-Restrictive Clauses

Here’s a learning support for differentiating between restrictive and non-restrictive clauses that I use when I teach this particular element of good style in writing.

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.

William Empson on Ambiguity

“The intentional or unintentional expression of a word or idea that implies more than one meaning and usually leaves uncertainty in the reader. William Empson, in his Seven Types of Ambiguity (1930), outlined and defined seven different kinds of verbal nuance. He maintained that language functioning with artistic complexity connotes as much and often more than it denotes.”

Excerpted from: Murphy, Bruce, ed. Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia, Fourth Edition. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.

A Learning Support for Three Commonly Misused Homophones

Several years ago, when I had just started dealing with the problem of homophone confusion among the students I serve, I whipped up this basic learning support on three of the most commonly misused homophones, to wit, two, too and to; your and you’re; and there their, and they’re. I need to emphasize the modifier basic here, because this is about as basic as it gets. Over time I will post more sophisticated versions of this.

In fact, I almost just tossed this. But since I have 13 GB of storage on this website, and only a little over 2 GB of accumulated material (which is nonetheless about 14,000 documents), I figure I can afford to duplicate a few things, and place a few things that haven’t exactly reached the peak of their development. In fact, that’s exactly what you have 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.

The Weekly Text, June 22, 2018: A Lesson Plan on Using Adverbs to Modify Verbs

Today’s Text is a complete lesson plan on using adverbs to modify adverbs. I start this lesson with this short exercise on the idiom “money burning a hole in one’s pocket.” Should this lesson go into a second day, here is a second short exercise, this one a on the homophones pore, poor, and pour. The mainstay of this lesson is this scaffolded worksheet on using adverbs to modify adverbs. Depending on the students you’re serving, they may need this learning support, which is a word bank to use with the cloze exercises on the worksheet. Finally, here is the teacher’s copy-answer key of the worksheet.

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.

The Canterbury Tales

“A poem of some 17,000 lines by Geoffrey Chaucer (c. 1343-1400). It was probably begun around 1387 and worked on into the 1390s, but apparently not completed. It was one of the first pieces of literature to be printed in England, in 1477 by William Caxton. The tales do not come from Canterbury but are, within the fictional framework of the work, told by various pilgrims en route to the shrine of St. Thomas a Becket at Canterbury—one of the most popular pilgrimage destinations in the Middle Ages. There is some uncertainty as to what order Chaucer intended the stories to be in, but the following is how they appear in the authoritative Riverside edition, following the Ellesmere manuscript:

• General Prologue
• The Knight’s Tale
• The Miller’s Tale
• The Reeve’s Tale (a reeve was a manorial steward)
• The Cook’s Tale
• The Man of Law’s Tale
• The Wife of Bath’s Tale
• The Friar’s Tale
• The Summoner’s Tale (a summoner summoned delinquents to appear before an ecclesiastical courts
• The Clerk’s Tale (a clerk was an ecclesiastical student)
• The Merchant’s Tale
• The Squire’s Tale
• The Franklin’s Tale (a franklin was a landowner of free but not noble birth, probably ranking below the gentry.
• The Physician’s Tale
• The Pardoner’s Tale (pardoner’s sold papal indulgences, a much abused practice)
• The Shipman’s Tale (a shipman was a ship’s master)
• The Prioress’s Tale
• Chaucer’s Tale of Sir Thopas
• Chaucer’s Tale of Melibeus
• The Monk’s Tale
• The Nun’s Priest’s Tale
• The Second Nun’s Tale
• The Canon Yeoman’s Tale
• The Manciple’s Tale (a manciple was a servant who bought provision for a college or in of court)
• The Parson’s Tale
• Chaucer’s Retracion

It seems that Chaucer’s original idea was to have many more stories since in the General Prologue the host proposes that each of the 30 or so pilgrims tells four tales each.
A film version (1971) by Pier Paolo Pasolini (1922-1975), focusing on the bawdier tales, was not well received.”

Excerpted from: Crofton, Ian, ed. Brewer’s Curious Titles. London: Cassell, 2002.

The Weekly Text, June 8, 2018: A Lesson Plan on Using Adverbs to Modify Adjectives

This week’s Text is a complete lesson plan on using adverbs to modify adjectives.

I begin this lesson with this short Cultural Literacy exercise on the idiomatic expression If the shoe fits, wear it. I like to keep a second do-now ready in the event that this lesson, for whatever reason, runs into a second day, so here is a second Cultural Literacy on the concept of avatar. This structured, scaffolded worksheet on adverbs modifying adjectives is the mainstay of this lesson, and you will probably want the teacher’s copy of it as well. Finally, here is a learning support in the form of a word bank that will help your students identify the best words to use in the cloze exercises in the first section of the worksheet.

That’s it. See you next week, if not before.

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.

The Weekly Text, April 27, 2018: A Lesson Plan on Using the Personal Pronoun in the Possessive Case

It’s Friday again, so it’s time for another Weekly Text.  This week I offer a complete lesson plan on using the personal pronoun in the possessive case. I begin this lesson with this short exercise on the homophones to, too, and two; in the event the lesson runs into a second day, I keep this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the rhetorical question in reserve. The mainstay of this lesson is this structured, scaffolded worksheet on using the personal pronoun in the possessive case. Here, also, is the teacher’s copy of the worksheet to help you get through the lesson. Finally, here is a learning support on pronouns and case that both your and your students might find useful for this lesson–and elsewhere.

That’s it. It finally feels like spring here, so it’s one of the best times of year her in the Big Apple. On second thought, though, aren’t all the seasons marvelous here?

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.