Tuesday, October 16, 2012

8:1 disingenuous

Where & When: While reading a Times article with my 9th graders, I stumbled upon the word disingenuous. The article is titled "Should the Law Treat Kids and Adults Differently?"


"Or are there other factors? Defense attorneys might offer a different argument: Since the bulk of the drop-off in juvenile crime predates most states' embrace of harsher penalties for young offenders, it is disingenuous to assume any connection between the two."

Definition: lacking in candor; also : giving a false appearance of simple frankness : calculating

In other other words (what I told my students) it means not truly honest or sincere.

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/disingenuous

In Context: While playing poker, the girl was disingenuous when she told the players she was terrible at playing poker.

Level of Familiarity: I do not recall knowing the definition of this word. I believe I have heard the word before, but never sought out to learn it's meaning.

Reflective Commentary: I picked this word for a few reasons. If I am unsure of a word and I am using it for a lesson, I think it's important to know the word. Usually I can figure out its meaning using context clues, and save myself the trip to the computer. I had my 9th graders think of questions they asked themselves when I read the article to them. To get them started I gave them question prompts, such as asking what a word meant; I used the word disingenuous as an example. I think this is a great word to know as its synonyms are common words (insincere - false - devious - hollow-hearted).

No comments:

Post a Comment