Activity 1: Making Words Meaningful

Directions: GROUP WORK. Working in triads, answer the question about the italicized
word in the middle of the graph. Get some clues about the nature of this target word by
discovering its uses in the following selection.

What is it? What is it like?

Something that hasn’t Unfamiliarity
been experienced before
and so is interesting.
Uniqueness

Oddity
NOVELTY

What are some examples?

Brand new toys Fabric Tourist during their

given to children. textiles first time of the place.

What is it? What is it like?

Something that happens or New
existing now

Current

CONTEMPORARY Recent

What are some examples?

Contemporary Contemporary Contemporary

issues Music literature
 What is it? What is it like?
It is a state of solving and Clear up
investigating something

Resolve

UNRAVEL Sort out

What are some examples?

To solve a crime Explaining a Sorting out what

mystery to do

What is it? What is it like?

To think carefully about something Examine
for a long period of time

Ponder

MULLING OVER Pore over

What are some examples?

Identity crisis Choosing the Where to study

right job (university)

Activity 2: Using the Newly Learned Words

Directions: On the lines provided, use each term in a sentence.
I smell the air of novelty when I entered the institution. I walked through the
empty hallway where the music, both old-fashioned and contemporary, echoed
through the gray walls. I thought that the institution was boring and I was mulling over
to transfer to another school. But they, my classmates, proved me wrong. The tangling
emotions and memories is already hard to unravel but I was happy that it would stay
that way. And that was the first time I saw happiness.