An Exploration of the Interior of Language for Academically Motivated Secondary Students 
Volume II 
*Extensively tested in grades 8-12 
* Appropriate for academically motivated grades 6-7 as well. 
*Excellent for preparing students for SAT's and PSAT's 
Here is a vocabulary building curriculum like no other. It is a system which heavily uses ETYMOLOGY not memorization. Words are presented as a system of thinking, a way of building, analyzing, spelling, pronouncing, using and choosing words. The beauty of this approach is that the student fully knows far more than the list of words encountered in this course; he or she knows the tens of thousands of words which are not listed, but which are expressions of the system. 
This vocabulary study is intended as a weekly effort, built on a cumulative basis. Every test reinforces every list. Through constant review, ever increasing familiarity is built. This is a tremendously wonderful undertaking that combines learning and fun for the students. 
There are 30 lessons in each book. In Book One there are 500 stems, both Greek and Latin, followed by 250 words made of those stems. (The term "stems" includes all word pieces: prefixes, suffixes, and roots.) Each lesson's makeup includes: a Stems List; a Sentence Page which is designed to show how example words should be used; an Analogies Page which promotes thinking and prepares students for PSAT's and SAT's; Mystery Spelling and Mystery Questions pages designed to be enjoyable activities to show and to practice that it is not just the word one studies that one knows; a Notes Page or Stem Close-up Page that takes a closer look at the list of stems and highlights special points or adds information; an Ideas Page that expands the brain's contact with the stems through activities of synthesis, divergence, analysis, evaluation, intuition, emotion and esthetics; an Inventions Page that gives the student the opportunity to create words just as scientists, writers and others do; and Flip Side Tests which give the definition and ask the term. Volume I covers lessons 1-30; Volume 2 covers lessons 31-60, and Volume 3 covers lessons 61-90. 
We are very proud of this complex, demanding, erudite and witty curriculum. Schools and districts which have tried it are expanding their use of it and looking for ways to expand its use into lower grades. South Carolina had the lowest SAT scores in the country, and that state has embraced The Word Within the Word at the high school level and then pushed it into the junior highs. Now, many are attempting to bring the curriculum into fifth and sixth grades. There is wide-spread pleasure in the way the curriculum imposes a discipline in the classroom because of its structure and its intellectual demands. While the curriculum allows for humor in its content, it makes students work to keep us with the weekly demands. Word Within The Word makes the costly, time consuming, quick-fix/quick-forget tutorials of junior and senior high school years things of the past. Word Within the Word provides internalized, maximum, meaningful, impact at the time the students take PSAT's and SAT's.

Word Within the Word Student Book 2

Thompson, Michael Clay

Reference

Royal Fireworks Pr

An Exploration of the Interior of Language for Academically Motivated Secondary Students 
Volumes III 
*Extensively tested in grades 8-12 
* Appropriate for academically motivated grades 6-7 as well. 
*Excellent for preparing students for SAT's and PSAT's 
Here is a vocabulary building curriculum like no other. It is a system which heavily uses ETYMOLOGY not memorization. Words are presented as a system of thinking, a way of building, analyzing, spelling, pronouncing, using and choosing words. The beauty of this approach is that the student fully knows far more than the list of words encountered in this course; he or she knows the tens of thousands of words which are not listed, but which are expressions of the system. 
This vocabulary study is intended as a weekly effort, built on a cumulative basis. Every test reinforces every list. Through constant review, ever increasing familiarity is built. This is a tremendously wonderful undertaking that combines learning and fun for the students. 
There are 30 lessons in each book. In Book One there are 500 stems, both Greek and Latin, followed by 250 words made of those stems. (The term "stems" includes all word pieces: prefixes, suffixes, and roots.) Each lesson's makeup includes: a Stems List; a Sentence Page which is designed to show how example words should be used; an Analogies Page which promotes thinking and prepares students for PSAT's and SAT's; Mystery Spelling and Mystery Questions pages designed to be enjoyable activities to show and to practice that it is not just the word one studies that one knows; a Notes Page or Stem Close-up Page that takes a closer look at the list of stems and highlights special points or adds information; an Ideas Page that expands the brain's contact with the stems through activities of synthesis, divergence, analysis, evaluation, intuition, emotion and esthetics; an Inventions Page that gives the student the opportunity to create words just as scientists, writers and others do; and Flip Side Tests which give the definition and ask the term. Volume I covers lessons 1-30; Volume 2 covers lessons 31-60, and Volume 3 covers lessons 61-90. 
We are very proud of this complex, demanding, erudite and witty curriculum. Schools and districts which have tried it are expanding their use of it and looking for ways to expand its use into lower grades. South Carolina had the lowest SAT scores in the country, and that state has embraced The Word Within the Word at the high school level and then pushed it into the junior highs. Now, many are attempting to bring the curriculum into fifth and sixth grades. There is wide-spread pleasure in the way the curriculum imposes a discipline in the classroom because of its structure and its intellectual demands. While the curriculum allows for humor in its content, it makes students work to keep us with the weekly demands. Word Within The Word makes the costly, time consuming, quick-fix/quick-forget tutorials of junior and senior high school years things of the past. Word Within the Word provides internalized, maximum, meaningful, impact at the time the students take PSAT's and SAT's.

Word Within the Word Student Book 3

"Grammar is so lovely that even if it were useless, one would irresistibly explore it, as one explores chess, or architecture, or the spiral geometries of shells. It is a sort of magic aesthetic lens, through which we can view the delicate structures of ideas." - Michael Clay Thompson

The Magic Lens : A Spiral Tour Through the Human Ideas of Grammar (Student Ed, Vol. 2)

Teen & Young Adult

Education & Reference

The Magic Lens Volume 1 by Michael Clay Thompson

The Magic Lens: A Spiral Tough Through the Human Ideas of Grammar

Michael Clay Thompson has produced an excellent book for teachers and for secondary students in which he highlights people, ideas and books which have made a remarkable contribution to the life of the mind. Thompson carefully explains the importance and significance of each author, work or idea. More importantly, he conveys the intellectual excitement of each contribution. It is spirited and illuminating reading. 
* Thinkers answers a lot of questions. * Why should we pay any attention to Stephen Hawkins? * What is special about George Eliots Middlemarch? * Should we ask students to read Huck Finn despite its racist language? * Why would anyone care now about Vasaris Lives of the Artists? * What is so special about Walt Whitman? * Why read Scarlet Letter when there is a good movie? * What really does Carl Sagan have to offer us? * Why should we ask students to read the more than a century old lectures of A. C. Bradley about Shakespeares tragedies? * Is there anything to be said for reading Dostoeveskys depressing Crime and Punishment or Sylvia Plaths very depressing The Bell Jar? * Why would anyone care about Frederick Douglass? * Does Bill Gates of Microsoft have anything to offer us or is his book just corporate hype? * What is the importance of Swifts Gullivers Travels? * What are the major turning points in the history of the mind?

Thinkers

Literature & Fiction

History & Criticism

An extraordinary book! Michael Thompson spent more than a decade recording the words used in the great classics and the instances of their use. In this book he explores the language of the great classics of English literature. There are separate chapters for many of the most important words: countenance, profound, manifest, serene, sublime, prodigious, acute, clamor, exquisite, languor, grotesque, condescend, allude, odious, placid, incredulous, tremulous, visage, singular, venerate. The book ends with a list of the 100 most frequently used words in the classics.

Classic Words

Royal Fireworks Press

This is a systemic approach to the study of vocabulary, an approach that would not just "cover" the vocabulary but that would require the students to internalize it. Instead of trying to memorize a list of words, students are presented with a system of thinking: a way of building, analyzing, spelling, pronouncing, using, and choosing words.

Word Within the Word Volume 1: Home School Edition for Parents

The Word Within the Word, Vol. 1

Children's Books

2004 A World of Poetry -- Teacher (Paperback)(10.85"x8.4"x0.5") by Michael Clay Thompson ***ISBN-13: 9780880926614 ***192 Pages

A World of Poetry Teacher

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Books by Thompson, Michael Clay