• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Kinney Brothers Publishing

Kinney Brothers Publishing

ESL Teaching & Publishing

  • Kinney Brothers Publishing
  • About
  • Contact
  • Press
  • Audio Stories

ESL grammar

Stories For Young Readers – Planning Ahead

02/03/2020 by admin

Kinney Brothers Publishing Stories For Young Readers

No matter the time of year, I get inquiries about the best way to purchase Kinney Brothers Publishing textbooks and downloadable resources.  You shouldn’t have to worry about getting the materials you need for your students.  We offer many options so you can make the best choices for your classes. Check out these posts if you’re looking for phonics or supplementary materials for your classes.

The Stories For Young Readers series is available in a variety of formats and sources. For online shoppers, this series available through Amazon.com worldwide! In Japan, the series is published by Independent Publishers International (I.P.I.) and available with a special discount through David Paul’s ETJ Book Service. For pdf and paperless downloads, visit Donald’s English Classroom!

The Stories For Young Readers series includes questions, grammatical explanations, exercises, and puzzles for beginning students. The books are designed to extend students’ skills and interest in communicating in English. Teachers can utilize the stories and exercises for listening comprehension, reading, writing, and conversation.  Book 1 focuses on present simple and present continuous reading exercises.  Book 2 takes students further with simple past, past continuous, and simple future tenses.

Check out the previews or download the first readings from Book 1 and Book 2  for free!  They include audio files, answer keys, and dialogues!

Stories For Young Readers Book 1 Kinney Brothers Publishing

You’ll find an abundance of support materials for this series in our online store, Donald’s English Classroom.  Visit for downloadable flashcards, charts, games, textbooks, answer keys, and audio files.

Stories For Young Readers Book 2 Kinney Brothers Publishing

You might also be interested in Dialogues for Young Speakers – a series of dialogues and surveys designed to extend students’ conversation skills. Following Stories for Young Readers, the dialogues progress from present simple to present continuous in Book 1, and simple past, past continuous, and future tenses in Book 2. Not only will teachers find a wealth of material that will get students up and talking, the dialogues also prove that students can effectively communicate with even a limited vocabulary. You can download these textbooks online, order directly from the Kinney Brothers Publishing web site, or order on Amazon.co.jp.  Download previews for Book 1 and Book 2 here!

Dialogues For Young Speakers Kinney Brothers Publishing

If you’d like to learn more about all Kinney Brothers Publishing has to offer, please download our catalogues!  Peruse the complete lineup of our Global Edition ESL Textbooks or check out our ESL Store right from your desktop!  Sign up for our newsletter and download a free CVC I Have/Who Has Activity Set!

Kinney Brothers Publishing Catalogues

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me at info@kinneybrothers.com.

As always, best of luck in your classes!

Donald Kinney
Kinney Brothers Publishing
kinneybrothers.com

Filed Under: Kinney Brothers Publishing Tagged With: Donald's English Classroom, esl, ESL Activities, ESL Dialogues, ESL Drills, ESL Flash cards, ESL Games, ESL grammar, ESL teaching, esl textbooks, ESL Worksheets, kinney brothers publishing, Stories For Young Readers

Ampersand

09/01/2019 by admin

As part of my blogging activities, I publish a weekly Fun Facts About English series that offers tidbits of trivia about the English language. This has turned out to be quite a pleasurable indulgence in that I get to research somewhat obscure but fascinating facts. I set out with a goal of creating 50 facts for one year’s worth of posts. I’m about half-way through and feel a bit smarter for the effort.

In this post, I’m going to explain the simple factoid below.

Donald's English Classroom

Maybe it would be better to say, “the & glyph was per se the 27th character included with the alphabet.”

History

Donald's English Classroom2

In Latin, the ampersand represents a cursive combination of the two letters E and T and is pronounced et, or and in English. Around the time when Old English was shedding its runic characters and adopting the Latin alphabet, the & ligature arrived as part of the orthographic package, and to this day continues to be used to represent the word and.

Donald's English Classroom3

Why ampersand?

The ampersand was included in schoolbooks as the 27th letter of the English alphabet until the mid 19th century. It was understood not as a vowel or consonant, but as a useful symbol, added to the hind end of the alphabet, and simply known as and. Today, when we recite the ABCs, we often say “X, Y, and Z.” Two centuries ago, children’s chants included and (&) as the last letter. To say “X, Y, Z, and and” was a bit confusing, so the Latin phrase per se – meaning by or in itself – was inserted. In recitations, it sounded like this: X, Y, Z, and per se and (&). Eventually, and-per-se-and slurred into ampersand, a mondegreen that we use today.

By the late 1800s, the word ampersand also became a slang term for “rear end, posterior,” or “the buttocks.” Over time, the & glyph was de-classified within the alphabet, its usage decreased, and today is often frowned upon when used in modern writing.

And now you know.

As always, best of luck in your classes!

Donald Kinney
Kinney Brothers Publishing

Filed Under: Kinney Brothers Publishing Tagged With: ampersand, Donald's English Classroom, ESL Activities, ESL Flash cards, ESL Games, ESL grammar, esl textbooks, ESL Worksheets, fun facts about english, kinney brothers publishing

Teaching Stacked Adjectives

07/01/2018 by admin

stacked adjectives kinney brothers publishing

What are stacked adjectives?

Nothing made me feel more inculcated into my own language than the idea of stacked adjectives. As native English speakers, it’s not something we often consciously think about.  Nonetheless, I’ve learned that teaching my youngest ESL students adjectival order is not only beneficial to their long-term studies, I’ve discovered a pleasurable approach that insures the lessons stick in their memory.  Unlike native speakers, it has to be taught intentionally.

In an English speaker’s subconscious mind, multiple adjectives have a specific order. When they fall out of that learned order, the brain glitches and the meaning can be lost, confused, or even misconstrued.

Let me quote from Katy Waldman’s The Secret Rules of Adjective Order:

Though red big barns and big red barns are semantically identical, the second kind pleases our ears more.  These tricky situations – neither pure correlation nor accumulation – generally occur when you cross the border between adjectival regions, such as size and color.  When that happens, an invisible code snaps into place, and the eight categories shimmy into one magistral conga line:  general opinion, then specific opinion then size then shape then age then color then provenance then material.

Thank you Katy!  Think about the following sentences:

A cat.

A black cat.

A big black cat.

A big black plastic cat.

A beautiful big black plastic cat.

A beautiful big old black plastic cat.

A beautiful big old black French plastic cat.

Even the simple sentence, “A black big cat” is a language pothole, difficult for an English speaker to mentally ignore, let alone read when the adjectives are out of their stacked order (did you miss it or did your brain reorder the sentence?)  Figure this one out:

A yellow cotton handsome Indian new jacket.

It’s difficult to even say, much less discern what the sentence is trying to convey, coming off more like a word salad to an English speaker’s way of ordering meaning.  In their proper sequence, the adjectives should be aligned thusly:

A handsome new yellow Indian cotton jacket.

How did it happen that, without any memory of having learned this, I expect my adjectives to be in a choreographed line dance with each other?  It begins when we’re very young and is reinforced in numerous story and picture books, like Lillie’s Purple Plastic Purse, or The Giant Jam Sandwich.

So, don’t be afraid to start exposing your ESL students to adjectival order.  In fact, I recommend that you start off very young – even before they learn how to read.  With a bit of forward-thinking, it will make their elementary and junior high school English classes a little easier.  If you’ve been doing chants such as, “Five Little Monkeys” or “Five Little Ducks,” you’re not only priming your kids to hear the sounds associated with numbers and plurals, but stacked adjectives as well!

Making Sentences Without Words

Start with simple nouns that begin with a consonant, like ‘cat.’  Pull out an ‘A’ card from your ABC deck.  Then grab a few of your number, color, size, and emotions cards as well. (Download color and number flashcards from my online store for free!)

Start with a simple minor sentence.  Then add a color adjective.  Once kids understand this easy pattern, mix the cards up, and have students reorder or make new sentences themselves.  It may be helpful to teach your kids that ‘A’ means ‘1’ in this context.*  Don’t forget to make a small ‘period’ or ‘full stop’ card as well.  And there’s no need to be all academic when explaining it!  There will be plenty of time for that in their little futures.  Teach a ‘period’ as a ‘bliiiing!’ or ‘ker-dunk’ or a Khoisan click of your tongue and I promise your kids will never forget to include it – to the point of annoyance.

Now, let’s add some more adjectives.

With emotions, colors, size, and an ‘A’ card, your kids have learned to make their first stacks of adjectives – and they can’t even read yet!  You’re also teaching them to recognize ‘A’ as their first sight word.  Like many teachers, you’ve probably been drilling a lot of vocabulary in separate flashcard sets.  This exercise brings that vocabulary together into coherent and ordered meaning that visually mimics language and text.  Later on, as your students move from speech to text recognition, and then to decoding language in connected text, it will be helpful to remind them of this simple exercise and the songs they used to sing when little.  Let the kids make their own sentences or dictate sentences for an excellent listening exercise.  Always ask the students to ‘read’ their sentences and help students who don’t yet understand that the correct order is important.

Upping the Ante

Once students are confident with ordering simple adjectives, start throwing numbers into the mix. By necessity, you’ll also be putting an emphasis on the ‘s’ sounds of plurals that they’re likely already using in songs and regular verbal exercises, like “Five Little Monkeys?” and “I’m four years old.”  For more on this topic, be sure to check out my post on teaching plurals to ESL students!

Now that you’ve introduced these concepts to your kids, keep a board or table available with cards so that students can make sentences on their own.  You may be surprised at what they put together!  It also pays to have a bit of sympathy and patience. Trying to consciously LEARN this order must be terrible!  I’m glad I have no memory of it – a sort of potty training of the brain.  If you introduce this concept early on, it’s going to be easier as their studies become more sophisticated.

If you’re teaching older students, download a stacked adjective worksheet page from Stories For Young Readers, Book 2, a full textbook available on David Paul’s ETJ Book Service  or the Kinney Brothers Publishing web site.  The worksheet is very helpful when learning to do the Adjective Conga and includes an answer key.  Again, color, number, and more flashcards are available from my Teachers-Pay-Teachers store.  Please feel free to visit and download!

To learn more about early reading skills, check out my previous posts Sight Words: What, When, and How and Teaching CVC Words.  You might also be interested to learn about the most common adjectives, why Big Bad Wolf follows a different adjectival order, or test your knowledge of stacked adjectives.

Good luck and enjoy!

Donald Kinney

Kinney Brothers Publishing

*OK, you grammar mavens – let’s keep it simple. I understand that ‘a’ is a special kind of adjective called an indefinite article that refers to a singular noun whose specific identity is not known to the listener or reader.  Unfortunately, at their age, my kids aren’t going to get that as an explanation – nor should they be expected to.  I also use numbers instead of written words in sentences until they learn to read the numbers as sight words.  I’m aware that this is a grammatical infraction, but I pay little heed to academic imperatives when it comes to teaching my youngest English learners.  Using easy-to-understand concepts (reduced though they may be) to teach young learners is not damaging anyone.  If you are so inclined to always be aligned to Elements of Style, simply put the words on the front of all your cards and you’ll be covered.

Filed Under: Kinney Brothers Publishing Tagged With: adjectives, Donald's English Classroom, ESL Activities, ESL Flash cards, ESL Games, ESL grammar, ESL teaching, esl textbooks, ESL Worksheets, free worksheets, kinney brothers publishing, teaching grammar

Planning ahead…

02/20/2018 by admin

No matter the time of year, I get inquiries about the best way to purchase Kinney Brothers Publishing textbooks and downloadable resources.  You shouldn’t have to worry about getting the materials you need for your students.  We offer many options so you can make the best choice for your classes.

In Japan, the Stories For Young Readers series, published by Independent Publishers International (I.P.I.), is available with a special discount through David Paul’s ETJ Book Service.  Print-on-demand services make this series available online through Amazon.com worldwide!  For full textbook pdf and paperless (Google Slides) downloads, visit Donald’s English Classroom!

The Stories For Young Readers series includes questions, grammatical explanations, exercises, and puzzles for beginning students. The books are designed to extend students’ skills and interest in communicating in English. Teachers can utilize the stories and exercises for listening comprehension, reading, writing, and conversation.  Book 1 focuses on present simple and present continuous reading exercises.  Book 2 takes students further with simple past, past continuous and simple future tenses.

Check out the previews or download the first readings from Book 1 and Book 2  for free!  They include audio files, answer keys and dialogues!

Stories For Young Readers Book 1

You’ll find an abundance of support materials for this series in our online store, Donald’s English Classroom.  Visit for downloadable flash cards, charts, games, textbooks, answer keys, and audio files.

Stories For Young Readers Book 2

You might also be interested in Dialogues for Young Speakers – a series of dialogues and surveys designed to extend students’ conversation skills. Following Stories for Young Readers, the dialogues progress from present simple to present continuous in Book 1, and simple past, past continuous, and future tenses in Book 2. Not only will teachers find a wealth of material that will get students up and talking, the dialogues also prove that students can effectively communicate with even a limited vocabulary. You can download these textbooks online, order directly from the Kinney Brothers Publishing web site, or order on Amazon.co.jp.  Download previews for Book 1 and Book 2 here!

Dialogues For Young Speakers

If you’d like to learn more about all Kinney Brothers Publishing has to offer, please download our catalogues!  Peruse the complete lineup of our Global Edition ESL Textbooks or check out our ESL Store right from your desktop!  Sign up for our newsletter and download a free CVC I Have/Who Has Activity Set!

Kinney Brothers Publishing Catalogues

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact me at info@kinneybrothers.com.

As always, best of luck in your classes!

Donald Kinney

Kinney Brothers Publishing

kinneybrothers.com

Filed Under: Kinney Brothers Publishing Tagged With: Answer Keys, Dialogues For Young Speakers, Donald's English Classroom, ESL Activities, ESL Flash cards, ESL Games, ESL grammar, ESL Worksheets, kinney brothers publishing, Stories For Young Readers

Free Digital Files for Distance Learning

10/16/2017 by admin

Free and Ready!

Not sure how to get started in Google Classroom?  Here are four free files you can download now and try out in your new virtual classroom!  Play games, work with flash cards, or assign work from our digital textbooks!

Click on these links to learn more about Google Classroom, watch an introductory video or read this FAQ.  Anyone with a gmail account can sign up for free!

Donald’s English Classroom has lots of digital files to get you started!  Check out our popular Bingo Games and Flash Cards.  We also have the complete Stories For Young Readers series, Book 1 and Book 2 available.  Download individually or get the discounted Bundles.

Download the files below for free!  Be sure to comment and let us know how you used these files in class!

SFYR BK2 Lesson 1SFYR BK1 Lesson 1 Paperless Resources Kinney Brothers PublishingFree Flash Cards for Distance Learning Kinney Brothers Publishing

Filed Under: Kinney Brothers Publishing Tagged With: Donald's English Classroom, ESL Activities, ESL Dialogues, ESL Flash cards, ESL Games, ESL grammar, ESL teaching, esl textbooks, ESL Worksheets, kinney brothers publishing

Primary Sidebar

Search

Kinney Brothers Publishing

Kinney Brothers Publishing Catalogue

Donald’s English Classroom

Donald's English Classroom Catalog

Click to download!

USA Map Puzzle

Sign up and download for free!

Kinney Brothers Publishing 50 Plus Flash Card Activities

Click to see full listings!

Jooble Ad ESL Tutor Jobs

Weekly Fun Facts About English!

Fun Facts About English

Now in Japan!

Independent Publishers International

Copyright © 2023 · Genesis Sample on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

 

Loading Comments...