Fall 2026 Homework!
Scroll down to the date you are preparing for.
Never skip class because you didn't have time for homework.
Write me a note if a written assignment was too difficult or took longer than 35 minutes.
Homework for Friday, October 2: Study Unit six. Do WB p. 87. If you can, finish the Unit 6 workbook pages. Also, Study class vocabulary. If you haven't studied irregular past tense verbs, study 80 Irregular Verbs. If you don't know them, study verb tenses.
10-1-26 Today, we reviewed the prepositions at, on, & in and had a little quiz on them. We wrote about our lives. (SB 85) I introduced indefinite pronouns. Everyone, No-one and someone take singular verbs just like he, she, or it. Use a plural verb just like they for some.
Everyone has a book. No one has a pet rat. Someone has a big pink sweater. Does anyone have a black car? Some have cars. Some don't have cars. Someone takes the bus.
Homework for Thursday, October1: fill out two timelines -- one with important events in your personal life and the other a job or skill history. (If you don't have a job history, talk about things you can do. When did you learn how to do them? (If you don't want a job, look at yesterday's instructions) Red group -- please do SB 90 & 92 and WB p. 86.
If you have time, check that Tuesday's WB 82-3 are done and do WB 84-85
Also, Study class vocabulary. If you haven't studied irregular past tense verbs, study 80 Irregular Verbs. If you don't know them, study verb tenses. We have reading vocabulary: red & blue, Red , OR green & blue
Today, Green/blue group did SB 90 & 92 and WB p. 86 while red group read about Felu Kuti's Grammy award. Red & Blue group also read about Alberto Santos Dumont and Lionel Messi. Green group read about a librarian who adopted a homeless cat.
Homework for Wednesday, September 29 Do p. 79 & 81 in the workbook. I also gave out timelines. For Thursday, I want you to fill out two timelines -- one with important events in your personal life and the other a job or skill history. **If you don't want a job because you want to be a homemaker, write when you learned skills that are good for homemaking. (My mother taught me how to clean a kitchen when I was six years old. She taught me how to dust the furniture when I was 7 years old. I learned to cook pasta and make biscuits in 1980. I made my first dress in 1981. I did the family dishes in 1981. I learned to plan meals in 1993. ) Study class vocabulary. If you haven't studied irregular past tense verbs, study 80 Irregular Verbs. If you don't know them, study verb tenses.. We will probably have a quiz soon.
9-29 We wrote sentences about important events in our classmate's lives. We went over last week's homework on p. 78. I talked about the spelling rule for study-studied. If the base verb ends in a consonant-y- change the y to i before the ed. (fry-fried, carry-carried, copy-copied, worry-worried.) If the base verb ends vowel -- y, keep the y. (play-played, enjoy-enjoyed, annoy-annoyed)
We played team telephone and Quizlet Live. We did p. 84 in the student book. I went over the grammar on SB p. 82. Time phrases can be first or last. They shouldn't be in the middle of a sentences. If you place them at the beginning of the sentences, write a comma between the phrase and the rest of the sentence.
Homework for Tuesday, September 28: Do p. 82 & 83 in the workbook. Study class vocabulary. If you haven't studied irregular past tense verbs, study 80 Irregular Verbs. If you don't know them, study verb tenses..
9-27 Today we practiced material from last week. We went over the color vowel chart. We talked about our weekends and practiced pronouncing regular verbs. We talked about milestones using SB p. 87. We read SB 86. We did Quizlet live in teams. We went over WB p. 80. We did a German online quiz, but it was wrong because it wanted "at the weekend" and "at Christmas". In Virginia, we say "on the weekend" and "on Christmas". It correctly introduced "at the beginning" and "at the end." We often say "at the end of the week." We also did a Kahoot with at, on, in. We did SB p. 80. We filled in lyrics to "Lean on Me."
Homework for Monday, September 27: Do p. 80 in the workbook. Write one sentence for me -- I admire (person's name) because ___________.
Study class vocabulary. If you haven't studied irregular past tense verbs, study 80 Irregular Verbs. If you don't know them, study verb tenses.. Study your reading vocabulary: red & blue, OR green & blue
9-25 Today, we talked about the upcoming weekend using will probably _____(base form) We practiced using prepositions of time found in the student book on p. 83. We reviewed the pronunciation rules for a final ed. We read about Bill Withers. The biography was pretty difficult for many students, especially people who didn't recognize the irregular past form verbs. There were too many new words. If you weren't here, practice the class vocabulary.
Homework for Friday, September 25: Do Workbook p. 78-79. Study class vocabulary. If you haven't studied irregular past tense verbs, study 80 Irregular Verbs. If you don't know them, study verb tenses.. Study your reading vocabulary: red & blue, OR green & blue
9-23 We welcomed a new student named Christian. I introduced negative questions for confirmation rather than information. Answer a negative question as if the "n't" isn't there. We played Quizlet Live. We did a dictation to conversation. We did 82-83 in the student book. We practiced pronouncing the ed in regular past tense verbs. If a verb ends in d or t, the ed sounds like /id/ (wanted, needed, painted, landed) If you use your voice on the last sound before the ed, the ed sounds like/d./ Listened, closed, wagged, waged, played, rubbed, partied, etc. If the final sound before the ed doesn't use your voice, the ed sounds like /t/ washed, watched, walked, stopped, kissed.
Homework for Thursday, September 24: Write six sentences about your life events. Study class vocabulary. If you haven't studied irregular past tense verbs, study 80 Irregular Verbs. If you don't know them, study verb tenses.. Study your reading vocabulary: red & blue, green & blue
9-23 Today, we had reading groups and worked with my volunteer, Mary Ann. We'll often read and talk on Wednesdays. While we're not using our textbook, it's often our most important day. A great reading test doesn't guarantee promotion, but you can't go to or survive in high intermediate without really good reading and speaking. Reading and speaking take practice.
I introduced the color vowel chart, a program by Karen Taylor and S. Thompson that I use for pronunciation. What's color vowel and how do we use it? Karen Taylor demonstrates all the sounds with "color vowel yoga." We read about Garett Morgan, a man who loved to solve problems and invented the yellow part of a traffic light, a hood to protect firefighters from smoke and dust, an improved sewing machine, and hair gel.
We went over a paper that listed common life events or milestones. Some of us practiced reading out loud with jazz chants.
Homework for Wednesday, September 23 2026 Do page 76 in the workbook. Think about the three most important events in your life. What were they? When did they happen? Study class vocabulary. If you haven't studied irregular past tense verbs, study 80 Irregular Verbs. If you don't know them, study verb tenses..
9-22 Today we used past tense verbs to talk about last weekend. We did chores, we ran errands, we went grocery shopping. One student went to a wedding, someone went to a birthday party, someone took her children to their football games, and two people went to Costco. We wrote about our classmate's weekend. We reviewed some and any. Use some after an affirmative verb and any after a negative verb. You can use either one for questions, but any is more formal and often preferred by old people and grammar tests. Young people use some more often. Some can also mean a portion of, and any can mean you can choose. We did an online quiz to practice. We reviewed using present continuous (be ___ing) for NOW and simple present (base form or he/she/it base form + S) with never.
When you add S to a word that ends with an S sound, write ES. guess-guesses, kiss-kisses, wash-washes, watch-watches, buzz-buzzes.
We started Unit 6. We did the first two pages. We wrote about the picture as a student dictation and we did the listening as a class.
NO CLASS MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 21!!
Homework for Tuesday, September 22, 2026: Do the worksheet. Study verb tenses. Study class vocabulary. If the Kahoots were difficult, try them again. The links are below. (What's a verb tense?) Think about the important events in your life. Which ones do you like to talk about?
9-18 We're going to have a three-day weekend. Adjectives and nouns that describe following nouns are ALWAYS SINGULAR, even when it's really crazy like three-day. We talked about our upcoming weekend and wrote sentences in future with will/future with going to/ and simple present tenses. We did a Kahoot to practice base verbs and present continuous. We did a Kahoot to practice distinguishing between present continuous and simple present. One tricky question used the non-action verb, see. I say, "I see you" even when the time is now. If I use "see" in present continuous the meaning is dating. I'm seeing Jack. He's a very nice man. Non-action (or stative) verbs are verbs that don't use continuous for now. They often involve ownership, the 5 senses, opinions, and emotions. Some verbs are stative with one meaning, but normal with another. (When have is about food or experience, it's normal. I'm having chicken for dinner. He's having beans and rice. We're having lunch right now. When have means ownership, it's stative -- don't use continuous. I have my car right now. I have a house. She has her homework in her hand right now. I have a stomachache at the moment.) Emotions are changing with the language. McDonalds copywrote "I'm loving it!" back when native speakers always said, "I love it." Now native speakers often use love and hate in present continuous.
We did a conversation game that mixed up simple present and present continuous.
Homework for Friday, September 18 Study class vocabulary. Do p. 5 in the workbook. Answer some questions from the blog. If you didn't ace today's Kahoot, try it again. Kahoot: Past or Present. Many people knew the irregular past verbs from p. 5 -- go-went, take-took, sleep-slept, buy-bought. If you don't know these, write sentences with them. You can also practice with a Kahoot to practice the irregular verbs on p. 5 that we didn't do in class.:
9-17 We played with past tense today! We did the listening on p. 5 with irregular past tense verbs. We did a Kahoot to practice past or present: Kahoot: Past or Present. We did my version of a Find-Someone-Who (usually you keep asking until you get a positive response. On mine, you just write the negative response.) We did not do the Kahoot to practice the irregular verbs on p. 5 because many students already knew them! Great job!! We wrote about ourselves.
Homework for Thursday, September 17, 2026: Study class vocabulary. Do p. 4 in the workbook. Answer some questions from the blog. (On the main page, I usually write some questions under the songs.) You can write a comment on the webpage (blog) or write on a paper to give me. Can you write about yourself?
9-16 Today we talked a lot. We practiced distinguishing between like, be like, and would like. We talked about hobbies and work. We did a dictation and talked about the answers with our classmates. We practiced using present continuous and simple present. We watched a video that demonstrated using present continuous and simple present interchangeably. They use simple present with frequency adverbs -- usually and never. We usually use simple present verbs with frequency adverbs: always, usually, often, sometimes, rarely, seldom, and never. (My mother never cooks dinner. I sometimes cook dinner. My husband often cooks dinner. My daughter and her husband usually cook dinner together.) Use present continuous for now. Maria is cooking dinner now. We described the picture in the student book on p. 2 and wrote sentences with partner dictation. I tried to get students to help each other use the class webpage. I often call the webpage our "blog."
Homework for September 16, 2026 Study class vocabulary. Do the worksheet. Page 1, page 2 (on the back) When want, like, or need are followed by a verb (action word), put to before the verb.
9-15 Today, we started class with multi-tense dialogs. (Do you/Are you/Did you) We reviewed definitions for verbs and nouns. We wrote examples of our favorite verbs and nouns. Whenever you learn grammar rules, work to remember the rule and make many examples. Don't expect grammar to be logical and easy to understand. (Some of my favorite verbs: read, talk, dance, eat, sleep. Favorite nouns include my husband, daughters, sons, chocolate, coffee, mountains, and the beach. We talked about things (nouns) we like and activities we like to do. After break some students took the reading test. We played a circle game that talked about preferences and practiced using "I do too" to agree with a positive statement. (He likes coffee, and I do too. She likes to sleep, and I do too. He likes to dance, and I do too.) We used "I don't either" to agree with a negative statement (She doesn't like fish and I don't either. He doesn't like to clean, and I don't either.) We read some easy chants out loud and practiced using a US English heartbeat rhythm. I introduced the idea of color vowel - a program I use for pronunciation. We did a fill-in-the-blank worksheet to "It's a Wonderful World."
Homework for September 15, 2026 Study class vocabulary. Do the paper that was on the chair. Write answers to the questions under the song (What is your name? When did you come to the USA? What are your goals for this class? How can I make this class excellent for you?) for Thursday.
9-14: Today we interviewed a classmate and wrote about them. I talked about the class. We read a story, answered comprehension questions, and practiced ordering by time. You wrote about a specific goal for this class and told me why you wanted to do that. While we prepared to write goals, I briefly mentioned that it's important to use base verbs after can or will. A base verb is an action word in its simple form. Do not add ing, s, or ed after can or will. She can speak Spanish. He can run very fast. She can write very well. We will work hard and maybe we'll have fun too. He will always come on time. We listened to a song and filled in missing words at the end of class.
