#reading-comprehension — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #reading-comprehension, aggregated by home.social.
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“Spring Rain” by Sara Teasdale
Sara Teasdale (1884-1933) was an American poet, celebrated for her works that explored themes such as love, beauty, nature, and mortality. Born in St. Louis, Missouri, she published her first collection of poems in 1907 as a member of “The Potters”—a group of young women authors. She quickly gained recognition for the clarity and simplicity of her writing. Notably, she won a Pullitzer prize in 1918 for the collection Love Songs. Sadly, her life was marked by severe personal struggles, including a lonely marriage, divorce, and declining health, ultimately leading to her tragic death by suicide. She is still remembered as an important voice of the early 20th-century American literature.
Sara TeasdaleIn this post we’ll get acquainted with her poem “Spring Rain”, first published in 1917. In many ways typical of her style of writing, the poem is simple yet deep, using imagery from the natural world to reflect on the poet’s emotions and memories. In the first stanza, the sounds of rain and thunder trigger a recollection of a past love; the rest of the poem takes us down the memory lane. You’ll notice that the poem itself is brief, just like a typical spring rain; and the weather described is stormy and intense—just like passionate young love.
I thought I had forgotten,
But it all came back again
To-night with the first spring thunder
In a rush of rain.
I remembered a darkened doorway
Where we stood while the storm swept by,
Thunder gripping the earth
And lightning scrawled on the sky.
The passing motor busses swayed,
For the street was a river of rain,
Lashed into little golden waves
In the lamp light's stain.
With the wild spring rain and thunder
My heart was wild and gay;
Your eyes said more to me that night
Than your lips would ever say...
I thought I had forgotten,
But it all came back again
To-night with the first spring thunder
In a rush of rain.RECOMMENDED RESOURCES
Love Songs by Sara Teasdale – free ebook, downloadable in various formats
Sara Teasdale’s biography – a Poetry Foundation page
COVER PHOTO CREDIT
Image by Levi Guzman via Unsplash
NOTES
I’m a freelance language tutor (English, Latin, Classical Greek), researcher, and a literary scholar currently based in Belgrade, Serbia.
If you wish to receive new content from my blog – as soon as it’s published – please enter your email address in the subscribe box below.
To support my work, you can send me a donation via PayPal. It would be greatly appreciated!
#AmericanLiterature #EnglishLiterature #literature #love #memory #poem #poetry #readingComprehension #SaraTeasdale #spring -
Free ebook: “Departure” by Sherwood Anderson
Dear all,
It’s the spring equinox and the time for another quarterly ebook. This time it’s a short story by Sherwood Anderson (1876-1941), American novelist and short story writer best known for his book ” Winesburg, Ohio: A Group of Tales of Ohio Small Town Life.”
Departure comes from that same collection of stories. It’s about a young man leaving his small hometown to begin a new life in a big city. As he’s leaving, thoughts about the familiar people and places fill him with melancholy. It’s a bittersweet story that I hope you will enjoy!
To get your PDF copy with vocabulary notes, please click on the link below:
If you’d like to access more ebooks, visit the English Library section of this website.
NOTES
I’m a freelance language tutor (English, Latin, Classical Greek), researcher, and a literary scholar currently based in Belgrade, Serbia.
If you wish to receive new content from my blog – as soon as it’s published – please enter your email address in the box below. You can also subscribe to my free monthly Newsletter and get a regular recap with additional content.
To support my work, you can send me a donation via PayPal. It would be greatly appreciated!
COVER PHOTO CREDIT
#AmericanLiterature #ebook #English #EnglishLiterature #EnglishVocabulary #freeDownload #freebie #learningEnglish #literature #readingComprehension #readingSkills #shortStory -
Reading’s Thin Line Between Difficult and Boring
https://web.brid.gy/r/https://www.educationnext.org/readings-thin-line-between-difficult-and-boring/
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Calling all #readers and #writers! Are your skills up to the challenge?
Suneung: #SouthKorea exam chief quits over 'insane' #English test https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3w792x0ggyo
#education #standardizedtesting #readingcomprehension #college
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If we don't want to say and do horrible things accidentally, reading comprehension is very important.
Especially on the Internet, where we could have nuance...
...if we ever chose to make any space whatsoever for it.
#AntiRacism #Racism #SocialJustice #ReadingComprehension #Nuance #OnlineDiscourse #Discourse
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Mailed a few people: “Please provide input for subject A in this document [link] and for subject B in this document [link] in our shared SwitchDrive folder” (Yes, everyone involved has access to it!)
Resulting in my inbox exploding with reply-to-alls mixing both subjects, commenting on some of the ideas mentioned, lengthy praising of each other, etc.
What’s wrong with people?
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‘Leave a Book, Take a Book’: Mini-library project encourages love for reading
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With the arrival of #spring, it’s time for another quarterly #ebook from the Grammaticus Free Library series: “Four Stories for Spring” by Ellen Robena Field.
It contains four short stories, with the accompanying vocabulary notes and illustrations designed primarily for English language learners (levels B1 and above).
https://grammaticus.blog/2025/03/19/free-ebook-four-stories-for-spring/
#learningenglish #childrensbooks #shortstories #reading #readingcomprehension #americanliterature
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Free ebook: “Four Stories for Spring” by Ellen Robena Field
Dear friends and followers of the Grammaticus blog,
With the arrival of spring, it’s time for another quarterly ebook from the Grammaticus Free Library series: “Four Stories for Spring.”
The author of these stories is Ellen Robena Field (1869–1957), a children’s writer and educator from Bangor, Maine. Nowadays sadly overlooked, she is best known for her collection of short stories “Buttercup Gold and Other Stories”, originally published by the Bangor Kindergarten Association in 1894.
The ebook here available contains four spring-themed stories from that collection, with the accompanying vocabulary notes and illustrations designed primarily for English language learners (levels B1 and above).
To download your PDF copy, click on the link below. To browse all the previous Grammaticus Free Library titles, visit the Library section of this website.
NOTE
If you wish to receive new content from the Grammaticus blog in your inbox, please enter your email address in the box below. You can also subscribe to my free monthly Newsletter.
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#AmericanLiterature #childrenSLiterature #ebook #EllenRobenaField #EnglishLiterature #EnglishVocabulary #freeDownload #freebie #learningEnglish #literature #readingComprehension #readingSkills #shortStories
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🤔 Oh, Chester Lam! 🎉 Thank you for enlightening us on the groundbreaking revelation that Intel’s Arc #B580 does, in fact, not defy basic geometry. A stunning exposé on how reading comprehension is still a crucial skill for tech journalists! 📚🤦♂️
https://chipsandcheese.com/p/raytracing-on-intels-arc-b580 #IntelArc #readingcomprehension #techjournalism #geometrictruths #ChesterLam #HackerNews #ngated -
[P] So...
News: Assassin's Creed: Shadows has leaked physical copies early, they've been seen on sale at retail outlets and warehouses.
Resounding Response from Gamers: The pirates win AGAIN. SIGH. Stupid pirates always getting to play before paying customers!Errrr... about that.
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I had so much trouble parsing this subject line.
Like, why is the ABC sending me emails about a person whose username is Jerky Sales expressing their approval of a social media item entitled ‘flowers for men’
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Didn't quite realized I had volunteered to chair the thing I agreed to do, but there it is, in the middle of the fourth paragraph of the email from April. Sigh. Looks like the next two weeks just got busier #ProfLife #ReadingComprehension #PastMeWasAnIdiotAndImNotSoSureAboutPresentMe
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this is your brain on words…
Boost Your Brain: Scientists Develop New Method To Improve Your Reading Efficiency #neuroscience #ReadingComprehension #psychology https://scitechdaily.com/boost-your-brain-scientists-develop-new-method-to-improve-your-reading-efficiency/
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“If Sasha needs 10 minutes to saw through a wooden plank twice, how long does it take Sasha to saw the plank into 3 pieces (assume everything else stays the same)?”
#learnmath #mathskillsThe purpose of a question like that is not to test your skill at calculating. Instead, it tests your reading abilities:
- can you grasp the language?
- did you fall for the trick question?
- do you understand how the trick works, so you can avoid falling for it next time?
#readingcomprehension matters. -
@[email protected] Can you people get some #readingcomprehension please.
I never said anything about preventing #Tor users from accessing Mastodon. Not even logging-in to their account (so they can sign-up from a "clearnet" IP and then login via Tor afterwards, just like how it's done in #liberachat #IRC). All I'm saying is, if your instance has open registrations without any form of manual vetting or approval before activating the account, then you should prevent #Tor users from just being able to register an account in your instance so your instance isn't just an easy target for spammers to use.
And yes, block the #VPN users too from registering an account. That's what #Misskey's flagship instance at misskey.io already do to prevent non-Japanese users from creating an account there.
Read-only, not 403'ing everything. :seija_coffee: -
My favourite wintertime books
The temperature is dropping and it’s getting colder and colder outside. What better way to spend a quiet winter evening than with a nice, warm drink and a cosy yet thrilling read!
In this post I’ll share with you some of my favourite books with a dreamy wintertime setting. For the past few years we haven’t had much snow in my neck of the woods, but there’s plenty of it in these titles! And I think there’s something for everyone in my selection – both fiction and non-fiction. So, scroll down and find something for yourself.
(A brief note for my current students – you can borrow all of these titles from my in-house library.)
Without further ado, let’s get cracking!
Five Go Adventuring Again
MYSTERY / ADVENTURE / CHILDREN’S
On the odd chance you are not familiar with the Famous Five book series by Enid Blyton, have a look at my article written on the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the very first release.
Five Go Adventuring Again is the second book in the series. Originally published in 1943, it’s written in a simple way typical of Blyton’s early works, which makes it suitable for English language learners – levels pre-intermediate (B1) and above. Set during Christmas holidays, the kids get themselves involved in a holiday adventure, as they discover secret passages, mysterious maps and deal with suspicious strangers.
Regardless of how old you may be, you’re never too old for a Famous Five book! You can check out the e-book, accessible via archive.org with a free account.
The Secret History
MURDER MYSTERY / DARK ACADEMIA / CAMPUS NOVEL
Donna Tartt’s first book, The Secret History, has been a best-seller for over thirty years. First published in 1992, it follows a group of students at a small, elite New England college. Budding classicists who are the main characters have complicated personal histories and relationships, and are all somehow connected with the disappearance and murder of a fellow student.
If you’re intrigued, a while ago I posted a review of this novel (I had only the best things to say), and you can read it by clicking here.
The Sittaford Mystery
MURDER MYSTERY / DETECTIVE STORY
If you’re into thrillers and murder mysteries of a more cosy variety, Agatha Christie’s novels featuring Miss Marple are just the ticket!
The Sittaford Mystery is set in a small Dartmoor village in the middle of a very snowy winter. A group of people meets for a spiritualist seance at a residence of one of the prominent locals – but instead of table-turning, there’s a seemingly inexplicable murder!
If you like the book, check out the television adaptation of this story, part of the ITV’s Agatha Christie’s Marple series starring Geraldine McEwan. (If you can’t find it elsewhere, it’s currently available on YouTube, here and here.)
The Tenderness of Wolves
MURDER MYSTERY / DRAMA
I remember when I first read Stef Penney’s 2006 novel The Tenderness of Wolves, I loved every single thing about it! Penney’s writing style (extremely skillful for a debut novel!); the deep winter setting; small and remote rural places in Canada; the suspense… It was just breathtaking. You won’t be able to put it down!
The book is difficult to define in terms of genre, but it’s definitely much more than your typical murder mystery. I wish there was a film adaptation, but thus far there is only the BBC Radio 4 drama series originally broadcast in 2007. (Sadly, it doesn’t seem to be available on the BBC Sounds platform at the time of writing. Let me know if you manage to find it elsewhere!)
Peace Like a River
DRAMA
Leif Enger’s 2001 novel Peace Like a River is set in the early 1950s and follows the lives of the Land family from the small town of Roofing. Their initially calm existence gets disturbed by the actions of two local bullies, and from there things unintentionally go into a downward spiral for everyone.
In spite of dealing with difficult subjects, the striking thing about this book is its gentleness and grace. There’s a lot of Biblical and Christian symbolism in it, starting with the title itself (a line from the hymn “It is well with my soul”). It’s very well written and simply heartwarming.
It’s been a while since I last read this book, and I can’t guarantee that it’s actually set in winter at all – but I always feel like reading it on a cold winter’s day. So think of it as an honourable mention here.
Wilderness Seasons
NON-FICTION / ADVENTURE / NATURE WRITING
The only non-fiction title in this selection is a delectable little book written by Ian and Sally Wilson. Its full title is Wilderness Seasons: Life and Adventure in Canada’s North. First published in 1987, it’s the Wilsons’ true account of their own personal adventure.
Having decided to leave the city, they moved to a remote homestead – hundreds of kilometres from the nearest settlement, and accessible only by a small plane. Wonderfully inspiring, the book describes the four seasons in their little piece of heaven (so not all of it is winter-themed).
I’ve always harboured similar fantasies, and reading this book was incredibly satisfying. I remember getting it at a book swapping event over a decade ago. And as a special treat, the book came with the authors’ signatures. I treasure it to this day.
Please post in the comments section below and share about your wintertime favourites. I’d love to read about them!
COVER IMAGE CREDITS
Photo by Paola Chaaya via Unsplash
NOTES
I’m a freelance language tutor (English, Latin, Classical Greek), researcher, and a literary scholar currently based in Belgrade, Serbia.
If you wish to receive new content from my blog – as soon as it’s published – please enter your email address in the box below. You can also subscribe to my free monthly Newsletter and get a regular recap with additional content.
To support my work, you can send me a donation via PayPal. It would be greatly appreciated!
#AmericanLiterature #books #Canada #CanadianLiterature #Christmas #EnglishLiterature #learningEnglish #reading #readingComprehension #readingSkills #recommendations #tips #winter
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Long shot here. Could anyone point me to research showing that we *believe* we read better than we actually do?
(IE thinking that we are grasping the full meaning or context we aren't, perhaps between we read faster on screens and skim more.)
I’m sure I’ve read about this, but now I need a reference, it escapes me.
I don’t think Maryanne Wolf mentioned this specifically in “Reader, Come Home”.
Patricia Alexander found that students incorrectly judged their comprehension as better online than in print. But that’s not quite the same as thinking their overall reading comprehension is better than it is.
Any leads would be great, or if you feel like giving this a boost to help spread the net, I’d appreciate it.
#ReadingSkills #ReadingComprehension #OnlineReading #OnscreenReading
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Good morning.
I’m sorry to announce #ReadingComprehension and #NewsLiteracy are dead.
#Journalists, you can go home now.