Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Michael Jordan. This is a half-page worksheet with a reading of two long compound sentences–which may need shortening for emergent and struggling readers–and three comprehension questions. Once again, just the basics.
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.
“Sarah (Lois) Vaughan: (1924-1990) U.S. singer, one of the most virtuosic and expressive in jazz. Born in Newark, New Jersey, Vaughan won an amateur contest at Harlem’s Apollo Theater in 1942 and joined Earl Hines’s big band as vocalist and second pianist the following year. Joining Billy Eckstine in 1944, she gained exposure to the new music of bebop, and later recorded with Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. Alternating between popular song and jazz, she worked as a soloist for the rest of her career. A vast range and wide vibrato in the service of her harmonic sensitivity enabled Vaughan to employ a seemingly instrumental approach when singing, often improvising as a jazz soloist.”
Excerpted/Adapted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.
Despite Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth’s diktat to cancel it for members of the United States Armed Forces, February remains Black History Month, and today begins its observance on Mark’s Text Terminal with this reading on the Scottsboro Boys along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.
As a middle school student, I would often take extended bathroom breaks so that I could visit the library to look at Time Magazine’s year-by-year Time Capsule books, which fascinated me. It was in one of these volumes that I first became aware of the case of the Scottsboro Boys. Even in the bland prose of Time Magazine, and even to my then relatively unschooled mind, this was obviously one of the most grotesque miscarriages of justice ever perpetrated in a country that is at this point known for such things–especially where and when Black people are concerned.
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.
Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Huguenots. This is a half-page worksheet with a reading of four sentences and three comprehension question.
And unless I miss my guess, most secondary educational institutions don’t take a deep enough dive into European history to spend too much time on the travails of French Protestants. I became interested in them when I learned that New Rochelle, New York, through which I have traveled frequently by train, was founded by Huguenots. Not only that, but as I researched this post, I discovered that New Paltz, New York (which I have never visited but heard good things about), was also founded by Huguenots.
So I wrote this, I suppose, mostly useless worksheet.
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.
“Carl (Clinton) and Mark Van Doren: (1885-1950, 1894-1972) U.S. writers and teachers. The Van Doren brothers were born in Hope, Illinois. Carl, who taught at Columbia University 1911-1930), edited the Cambridge History of American Literature (1917-21) and journals. His critical works include the biography Benjamin Franklin (1938, Pulitzer Prize). Mark taught at Columbia 1920-59. He published more than 20 volumes of verse, including Spring Thunder (1924) and Collected Poems (1922-38) (1939, Pulitzer Prize). He wrote three novels and several volumes of short stories and edited anthologies. His literary criticism includes work on John Dryden, William Shakespeare, and Nathanial Hawthorne as well as Introduction to Poetry (1951), which examines shorter classic poems of English and American literature.”
Excerpted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.
The Weekly Text for 17 January 2025 from Mark’s Text Terminal is this reading on Sears Roebuck along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.
Why? Because I have it, for one thing. But for people of a certain age in the country (that is, my age or older) remember that Sears, along with JC Penney, were in the retail firmament the rough equivalent of Amazon today. There was no Internet, so that comparison breaks down; but both retailers issued mail-order catalogues that arrived, at least in my household, fairly regularly throughout the year. The Sears Catalog, which began offering full lines of hard goods, began publication in 1893. By 1908, Sears actually offered home kits in its catalog–among the sewing machines, sporting goods, musical instruments, saddles, firearms, buggies, bicycles, baby carriages, and some clothing (all introduced in 1894), and Edison’s Graphophone (introduced in 1908). Growing up, all my school clothes came from Sears (there was a store at the corner of Ingersoll Street and East Washington Avenue, if memory serves, in my hometown of Madison, Wisconsin, where the city, last I knew, has its bus barn). The company’s Craftsman tool line (now owned by Stanley Black & Decker) was among the best available–and guaranteed for life. I owned quite a few of them, as did my uncle, who owned an auto parts store and was a freelance small aircraft designer and builder.
Sears filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on 15 October 2019. According to the Wikipedia page on the retailer, as of April 2024 there are 11 Sears stores–ten in the continental United States and one in Puerto Rico–remaining. Near where I now live, in Flatbush, Brooklyn, there is a remnant store–an art deco beauty–at the corner of Beverly Road and Flatbush Avenue; the building is empty, but New York City landmarked it in 2012, so it is protected.
So you can see that Sears Roebuck was an important part of the American retail landscape for a long time.
There is something to be learned about business cycles, branding, management, retail trends–and potentially a whole host of other topics in business education. There has been no small amount of ink spilled on what led to Sears’ downfall; just search “Why Sears went out of business.”
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.
“For years, Benchley the theater critic carried on a war with the notorious Broadway hit Abie’s Irish Rose. Near the close of the play’s record run Benchley posted a prize for the best critical comment on the show. Harpo Marx won the contest with his capsule critique: ‘No worse than a bad cold.’”
Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.
Posted in Quotes
Tagged drama/theater, humor, literary oddities, united states history
Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on Ellis Island. This is a half-page worksheet with a reading of three sentences–and beware that two of them are long compounds separated by commas that might be best separated into independent clauses for emergent and struggling readers–and three comprehension question. A relatively short, but cogent, introduction to this important place in United States 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.
Happy New Year! This week’s Text, after two weeks off for this blog for the holidays, is a reading on Robert Moses along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. Moses, you may know, was the so-called “Master Builder” of New York City.
If you’re interested in a critical, nuanced and not to mention thorough account if Moses’ impact on the Five Boroughs, I recommend–highly–Robert Caro’s magisterial biography of Moses, The Power Broker. Should you happen to be in New York City for the next month, The New York Historical has an exhibition on “Robert Caro’s The Power Broker at 50” at its museum at 170 Central Park West (at 77th Street).
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.
 | A Measurement Conver… on An Elegantly Simple Cooking Co… |
| A Measurement Conver… on The Weekly Text, October 25, 2… |
 | markstextterminal on Cree |
 | panzer046a139293db on Cree |
| markstextterminal on Cree |
Mark's Text Terminal 
You must be logged in to post a comment.