Tag Archives: questioning/inquiry

Boston Tea Party

Slowly but surely I am figuring out the new Block Editor on WordPress. So, let me try to add this reading on the Boston Tea Party and the vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet that accompanies it. I imagine these materials will find a home someplace in a United States history course. 

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: Incumbent

Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of the incumbent in public office. An election year seems like a good season to post this short exercise.

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: Ideology

For all the years I taught social studies classes, I used this Cultural Literacy worksheet on ideology, which is one of those overarching concepts that students can use to categorize capitalism, communism, or socialism–or any of the other ideologies we want students to recognize and understand. This is really a word students should know, and know how to use conceptually. This is one of the most basic terms of art in social studies–any social studies class.

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 Order of Tooth Arrival and Growth from The Order of Things

From Barbara Ann Kipfer’s The Order of Things, here is a lesson plan on the arrival and growth of teeth. You’ll need the reading with comprehension questions to complete this short reading and writing exercise, which, like all 50 of these lessons that I will eventually post here, is intended to help struggling learners experience mastery and therefore build self-confidence and competence in school.

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.

Slinky

For the bulk of my teaching career thus far, I worked at a economics-and-finance-themed high school in Lower Manhattan. Students, naturally, sat for a required course in entrepreneurship. One of the expectations of that class was that students would come up with an idea for a business, then draft a business plan. The teachers for this course were excellent. One student won a national competition and was honored with a visit to President Obama in the Oval Office.

Many of the students I served struggled with beginning their work for this course. I wrote up this reading on the Slinky, a favorite childhood toy of people of a certain age, and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. I wanted students to understand that sometimes inventors, innovators, and entrepreneurs stumble into ideas, and that students could pretty easily do the same–but they should not miss the opportunities of this kind of stumbling presents–often unclearly.

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: Faction

Here’s another word students, I submit, should know now, so I therefore submit, also, this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of a faction. Given the extent to which politics in the United States, has become factionalized (I’m talking to you, Qanon nutcases, among others), and the fact that the federal government in this nation is arguably in the hands of a faction, it is imperative that students understand this word and the concept it represents.

Fortunately, the definition is strong and objective at the same time.

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.

Isadora Duncan

For a student with certain interests, broadly, arts and culture, but narrowly, dance, bohemianism, and women’s history, this reading on Isadora Duncan and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet have turned out to be high-interest materials.

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: Consent of the Governed

If there was a better time to post this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of the consent of the governed, I can’t imagine when that would be. Don’t forget that this conception of political power and governance comes to us from John Locke. It is at the center of the grievances aired in the Declaration of Independence and epitomizes the political philosophy behind both the Declaration and the United States ConstitutionLiberalism.

Liberalism arrives in English almost intact from the Latin liberalis, meaning “suitable for a freeman.” It is also the stem of a portmanteau I wouldn’t mind seeing disappear from the vernacular, “libtard.” Users of this noun appear quite pleased with themselves when they use it; they shouldn’t be.

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.

Empire State Building

It’s pouring rain and I want to drive over to the other side of this state to visit friends. So, I’ll write one more post before taking my chances with the mountain roads between here and there. So, here, especially for my erstwhile colleagues in New York, is a reading on the Empire State Building and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

One thing to consider when teaching students about this building is that it went up in record time at the very beginning of the Great Depression. I think there is something interesting about that, but translating it into conceptual terms has so far evaded me.

What say you?

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.

Yankee Stadium

Alright baseball fans, this hasn’t been an exciting season, has it. With chagrin, I admit that I have barely paid attention.

It’s not much, but here is a reading on Yankee Stadium and its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet that have tended to be of high interest to the students I’ve taught over the years.

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.