In this homographs lesson, students discover that some common words have some less common meanings. Students will work in teams to compete in a "Find that Meaning" competition using iPads and Visual Thesaurus word maps.  Continue reading...

Last month, I suggested a dozen or so "approachable" poems, which I've used successfully in my poetry-abhorring classroom. This column builds on that, as I share some of the ideas I've used to help my students write poetry in the classroom.  Continue reading...

In this week's worksheet, we celebrate George Washington's birthday with a Word Sort that helps students brush up on their parts of speech and some vocabulary associated with the holiday.  Continue reading...

Some years ago the Portuguese government signed an agreement with other Portuguese speaking countries about the way the language was to be written, and the slow process of making it happen started to be rolled out. I was quite amused recently to learn of the number of students of English in Portuguese schools who thought that the novo acordo ortográfico -- the new spelling agreement -- applied also to English.   Continue reading...

A penny saved is a penny earned, or so says Ben Franklin. As part of our classroom study on aphorisms and early American literature, we take a bit of a side trip into learning about almanacs. For most high schoolers, the mention of an almanac brings about a blank expression. Yet the 200+ year old Farmer's Almanac is still alive and kicking, although the hole (for hanging on the outhouse door) has disappeared.  Continue reading...

If you see a word that ends in the suffix -ism, you can be sure it's a noun. But if you are thinking of a noun as a "person, place or thing" and you consider "a thing" as a tangible object, then think again. A word ending in -ism usually represents something more abstract -- like an idea, theory, or doctrine. Use this week's worksheet to introduce students to some words ending in -ism that represent political beliefs.  Continue reading...