“Who coined the term ‘willing suspension of disbelief’? Samuel Taylor Coleridge in his critical treatise Biographia Literaria (1817). Coleridge used the term to refer to the ‘poetic faith’ of a reader in accepting imaginary elements in a literary work.”
Excerpted from: Corey, Melinda, and George Ochoa. Literature: The New York Public Library Book of Answers. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993.
Here is an English usage on the adjective sick and the transitive verb sic. Sick needs little elaboration; sic, on the other hand, does, which the reading passage clarifies by pointing up its common use as a transitive verb, generally used in the imperative form when saying to one’s dog, “Sic ’em Rollo!”
However, comprehensively and helpfully, the reading passage in this document explains the use of the Latinism sic, which means thus. If you read, you’ve encountered this (usually in italic type and often with an exclamation point for added ridicule) after a quote that contains errors of fact or lapses in style. Merriam-Webster’s defines the adverb sic as “intentionally so written — used after a printed word or passage to indicate that it is intended exactly as printed or to indicate that it exactly reproduces an original <said he seed [~] it all>.” I think if I were teaching this document to more advanced learners, I would take the time to make sure they understood sic as an editorial annotation so that they might use it in their own 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.
“expository writing: A term that refers to informational writing typically given during the first year of college to prepare first-year students for academic writing. Generally, entering first-year students will take at least one semester of expository writing. Some colleges require a two-semester sequence of expository writing courses.
In some cases, students with writing problems may be required to complete developmental or basic writing courses before they can enter the expository writing course.
Expository writing includes description, comparison/contrast, definition, classification, argument, process analysis, and cause-and-effect. These types of writing or rhetorical strategies may be taught using models and examples, and as ends in themselves, or as strategies to use within informational essays that include a number of different patterns.
In general, the goal of teaching these types of writing patterns is to provide a foundation for the kinds of text-based writing required in specific academic disciplines.
Expository writing may be contrasted with expressive writing or the personal essay, in which students are allowed to focus on their own experience, perceptions, and memories. Much more than expressive writing, expository writing may pose problems for individuals with learning disability who may find it difficult to organize ideas, support main ideas with details, or apply paragraph and essay structures.”
Excerpted from: Turkington, Carol, and Joseph R. Harris, PhD. The Encyclopedia of Learning Disabilities. New York: Facts on File, 2006.
On this Monday morning, it’s the Word of the Day at Merriam-Webster; to my surprise, having worked for ten years in an economic-and-finance-themed high school in Lower Manhattan, I somehow hadn’t written a context clues on the adjective lucrative. By any standard, this is a very commonly used word in the the English language, thus one students should know by the time they leave high school.
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.
“academic freedom: The freedom of educators to teach and to conduct research without fear of political reprisal, as well as the freedom of students to learn without fear of indoctrination or intimidation. Academic freedom for scholars involves both rights and responsibilities. Professors who assert their rights and freedoms have a responsibility to base their conclusions on competent scholarship and to present them in a dignified manner. Although they may express their own opinions, they are duty-bound to set forth the contrasting opinions of other scholars and to introduce their students to the best published sources on the topics at issue. In other words, professors may express their own views, but they must do so in a spirit of impartial scholarly inquiry, without imposing them on their students. Correlatively, students have the right to study under the guidance of qualified and unbiased faculty and to express their views without fear of any form of retribution.”
Excerpted from: Ravitch, Diane. EdSpeak: A Glossary of Education Terms, Phrases, Buzzwords, and Jargon. Alexandria, VA: ASCD, 2007.
On a sunny, cold December morning, here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on iambic pentameter. By the time young people reach their college English classes (if not their advanced English classes in high school), this is a term of art and a concept they should understand and be able to recognize and discuss with facility. This is, after all, the most commonly used poetic meter in English.
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.
“accent: A variety of speech differing phonetically from other varieties: thus, as in ordinary usage, ‘a Southern accent.’ ‘Scottish accent,’ ‘Scottish accents.’ Normally restricted by linguists to cases where the differences are at most in phonology: further differences, e.g. in syntax, are said to be between dialects.”
Excerpted from: Matthews, P.H., ed. The Oxford Concise Dictionary of Linguistics. New York: Oxford University Press, 2014.
“Bretton Woods: Town in New Hampshire, USA, where representatives of 28 nations attended a financial conference called by Pres. Roosevelt in July 1944 to organize a system of international monetary cooperation in order to prevent financial crashes like those in the interwar period which triggered the 1930s depression. It was agreed that participants would establish a World Bank to provide credit for countries that required finance for major projects. An International Monetary Fund (IMF was also set up for the purpose of operating cash reserves available to members facing balance of payments deficits).”
Excerpted from: Cook, Chris. Dictionary of Historical Terms. New York: Gramercy, 1998.
“Essay (French essai, “attempt”): a composition, usually in prose (Pope’s Moral Essays in verse are an exception), which may only be a few hundred words (like Bacon’s Essays) or book length (like Locke’s Essay Concerning Human Understanding) and which discusses, formally or informally, a topic or a variety of topics. It is one of the most flexible and adaptable of all literary forms….”
Excerpted from: Cuddon, J.A. The Penguin Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory. New York: Penguin, 1992.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Because it’s Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day today, and because it is used in educated discourse with sufficient frequency, here is a context clues worksheet on the noun bailiwick. The context clues on this document are a bit dense; it’s hard to avoid that when dealing with abstract nouns like this one, which means “the sphere in which has one superior knowledge or authority: a special domain.” This is exactly the kind of word that challenges certain struggling learners, so beware of that.
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.
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