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BASIC NOT BORING

Books in this series present skills in a carefully researched sequence, and features exercises based on age-appropriate,
high-interest themes. The goal is to make fundamental skills exciting and achievable. The exercises in these books can be used to introduce new skills, review previously taught material, assess skills and content,
and encourage the use of higher order thinking skills.
 Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank developed the concept for this series.

Health and Human Body / Language Arts / Math

Health and Human Body

Basic Not Boring Human Body and Health: Series concept and development by Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank. Exercises by Marjorie Frank. Incentive Publications, ©2003. Books in this series present a carefully researched skill sequence with exercises based on age-appropriate, high-interest themes developed by experienced teachers to make learning basic skills interesting and achievable. The exercises in this book can be used to introduce new skills, review previously taught material, assess skills and content, and encourage the use of higher order thinking skills.  63 pages, each book. Answers are included. Titles are below:

    Basic Not Boring Human Body and Health Grades 4-5. This book will help students enjoy becoming acquainted with the parts of the body and how they function. Each page provides a high-interest, appealing exercise with will sharpen or review a specific skill, concept, or process. Students will increase their knowledge of the human body as they follow doctors and nurses around a medical clinic, listen in on their cell phone conversations, sympathize with complaining patients in the emergency room, and more. BTH-3053. $8.99-D

 

Language Arts

 

Basic / Not Boring Grammar and Usage   Series concept and development by Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank. Exercises by Joy MacKenzie. Incentive Publications, ©1997. Books in this series present a carefully researched skill sequence with exercises based on age-appropriate, high-interest themes developed by experienced teachers to make learning basic skills interesting and achievable. The exercises in this book can be used to introduce new skills, review previously taught material, assess skills and content, and encourage the use of higher order thinking skills.

    Basic / Not Boring Grammar and Usage Grades 4-5:  Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement.  The theme in this book is camping. Students learn sentence types as they read sentences related to Camp Lockout and solve a puzzle to determine in which state it is located. They climb the ladder to a tree house by finding subjects and predicates. They identify simple and compound sentences as they try to find a way for Carl to get to the other side of the lake with the instructions in those sentences. Other skills taught are distinguishing parts of speech, identifying and using verb tenses, using regular and irregular verb tenses, identifying and using adjectives and adverbs, using negatives correctly, and using punctuation and capitalization properly. 63 pages. BTH-3052. $8.99-D

    Basic / Not Boring Grammar and Usage Middle Grades:  Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement. The theme in this book is the beach. Students will discover commas lost in the surf, meet subjects and verbs more disagreeable than crabs, and find clauses that are caught in lobster claws. As they encounter various ocean and beach related exercises, students will learn to find subjects and predicates; identify simple, complex and compound sentences; identify parts of speech; identify, form and use possessive nouns; identify and use verb tenses; understand and use subject-verb agreement; identify and correct dangling modifiers; identify and use independent and subordinate clauses; use proper punctuation and capitalization; and create, explain, and properly  punctuate common contractions. 64 pages, including answers. Limited reproduction rights for classroom use. For grades 6-8. BTH-3041. $8.99-D

Basic Not Boring Language Skills: Words and Vocabulary, by Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank. Grades 4-5. Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement. This book is part of a series which presents skills in a carefully researched sequence and features exercises based on age-appropriate, high-interest themes. The goal is to make fundamental skills exciting and achievable. In this book the theme is ocean adventures, and this is the context in which students will develop some of the following skills:

Students learn these skills through puzzles, paraphrasing, drawing, analogies, choosing the right word, connecting words, and more. An interesting approach to expanding vocabulary. BTH-1550. $8.99-D

 

Basic Not Boring Language Skills: Words and Vocabulary,  by Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank. Middle Grades.  Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement. This book is part of a series which presents skills in a carefully researched sequence and features exercises based on age-appropriate, high-interest themes. The goal is to make fundamental skills exciting and achievable. In this book the theme is ocean adventures, and this is the context in which students will develop some of the following skills:

Students learn these skills through puzzles, paraphrasing, drawing, analogies, choosing the right word, connecting words, and more. An interesting approach to expanding vocabulary. BTH-1549. $8.99-D

 

Basic Not Boring Language Skills: More Words and Vocabulary,  by Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank. Middle Grades.  Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement. This book is part of a series which presents skills in a carefully researched sequence and features exercises based on age-appropriate, high-interest themes. The goal is to make fundamental skills exciting and achievable. In this book the theme is  interesting activities in and around the sea, in which students will use word skills for many situations: whether a barnacle could wear a monocle, what the word shark brings to mind, whether a bandage could be put on an antiphony, and more. This is the context in which students will develop some of the following skills:

Students learn these skills through puzzles, paraphrasing, drawing, analogies, choosing the right word, connecting words, and more. An interesting approach to expanding vocabulary. BTH-3006. $8.99-D

 

Basic Not Boring Study and Research, Middle Grades, Exercises by Joy Mackenzie. Incentive Publications, 1997. Books in this series present skills in a carefully researched sequence, and features exercises based on age-appropriate, high-interest themes. The goal is to make fundamental skills exciting and achievable. The exercises in these books can be used to introduce new skills, review previously taught material, assess skills and content, and encourage the use of higher order thinking skills.  Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank developed the concept for this series. This book features a detective theme. Students investigate a tip left by an anonymous caller and follow an old map to find buried treasure while learning how to solve real-life research mysteries. Students will learn to listen for information; use a table of contents; use a variety of reference books; locate information in newspapers; interpret charts, tables, and diagrams; use the library; organize information to give a report; and outline and summarize information.   64 pages. Reproducible. For grades 6-8+. BTH-3431. $8.99-D

Basic Not Boring Writing, Middle Grades, Exercises by Joy Mackenzie. Incentive Publications, 1997. Books in this series present skills in a carefully researched sequence, and features exercises based on age-appropriate, high-interest themes. The goal is to make fundamental skills exciting and achievable. The exercises in these books can be used to introduce new skills, review previously taught material, assess skills and content, and encourage the use of higher order thinking skills.  Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank developed the concept for this series. In this book students will learn to use figurative language and personification in exercises designed to increase their word power and their communication skills. They will practice how to use specific, effective words; write clear sentences; write strong beginnings, middles, and endings in their work; make strong connections between ideas or parts in  their writing; provide interesting, relevant details and examples; clearly develop main ideas in their writing; create fluent sentences and paragraphs; choose form, style and content for a specific audience or purpose; and experiment with different forms of writing. 63 pages. Reproducible. BTH-3430. $8.99-D

Math

 

Fractions and Decimals Middle Grades: Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement by Terri Breeden and Andrea Sukow. Incentive Publications, 1997. This book is based on a sports theme, so students will learn their critical math skills by working problems based on bobsledding, rollerblading, camping, baseball, and other sports. Some of the skills they will sharpen are reading and writing fractional numbers and mixed numerals; identifying factors, prime factors, and composite factors and multiples; identifying and writing fractions in lowest terms; comparing and ordering decimals and mixed numerals; identifying place value in decimals; naming fractional parts of a whole or set; changing fractions to decimals and decimals to fractions; understanding, reading, and writing percents; and writing decimals as percents and percents as decimals. BTH-3163. $8.99-D

 

More Basic Not Boring Decimals for Middle Grades: Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement by Marjorie Frank,  Incentive Publications, 2005. This book is based on exciting Olympic sports activities. Students will use decimal skills to compare the fastest man to the fastest avalanche, discover who can jump farthest -- a frog, a flea, or an Olympic athlete, calculate the speeds of Olympic kayakers though wild rapids, and more. In the process they will practice reading and writing decimal numerals and mixed decimals; solving problems with decimals and decimal integers; adding, subtracting, multiplying, dividing and rounding decimals; comparing and ordering decimals; changing fractions to decimals and decimals to fractions; solving problems with percent and money; and identifying terminating and repeating decimals. 64 pages.  BTH-3168. $8.99-D

 

Geometry and Measurement, Middle Grades: Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement by Terri Breeden. Incentive Publications, 1997. This book is based on an Olympic theme, so as students solve math problems, they will also be discovering interesting facts about Olympic athletes -- from the first Olympic runners to Michael Johnson. Some of the skills students will sharpen include the following: identify points, lines, and planes; identify and name angles; identify properties and parts of a circle; determine the circumference of circles; identify similar and congruent triangles; recognize and define space figures; find perimeter, area, and volume; identify congruent triangles and other polygons; identify and use metric units for measuring; and estimate measurements. 64 pages.  BTH-3164. $8.99-D

Basic Not Boring Graphing, Statistics, and Probability by Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank. Incentive Publications, 2000. This book is based on a sports theme that allows students to develop graphics, statistics, and probability skills as they step into a world of daredevil activities and wild fun. They will learn these skills: reading and interpreting frequency graphs, line graphs, circle graphs, and bar graphs; analyzing data to find range, mean, median, and mode; constructing and reading multiple line graphs and double bar graphs; interpreting and drawing conclusions from data; solving problems from statistics shown on graphs and tables; describing permutations of sets; finding the probability of independent and dependent events; and using random samplings to make probability predictions. 63 pages. For middle school grades. BTH-3428. $8.99-D

Basic Not Boring Pre-Algebra by Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank. Incentive Publications, 2000. This book is based on an adventurous camping  theme. They will learn to identify opposites for positive and negative integers; add, subtract, multiply, and divide integers; evaluate and write mathematical expressions; rewrite equations using inverse operations; identify and use number properties; solve equations with rational numbers; solve and graph inequalities; identify and extend patterns and sequences; and solve proportions.  63 pages. For middle school grades. BTH-3429. $8.99-D

Basic Not Boring Problem Solving, Grades 4-5: Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement by Marjorie Frank, Incentive Publications, 1997. This book is based on a sports theme, so as students solve math problems, they will be trying to discover which operations will help the hockey team solve their injury problems, solve problems gymnasts face in their sport, how many batches of energy shakes Big Bruno will need to make to supply different groups of friends, and more. Some of the skills students will sharpen include the following: identify and define a problem; identify information needed for problem solving; solve problems using information from charts, graphs, maps, and tables; solve a variety of word problems; select appropriate operations for solving problems; solve problems using customary U.S. and metric measurements;   use formulas to find perimeter, area, and volume;  use estimation, mental math, and logic to solve problems; write explanations of how problems were solved, and check the accuracy of problem solutions.  BTH-3166. $8.99-D

 

Basic Not Boring Problem Solving, Middle Grades: Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement by Marjorie Frank, Incentive Publications, 1997. This book is based on a sports theme, so as students solve math problems, they will be trying to discover which skier will win the most gold medals, how much debt a scuba diver will incur as he buys new equipment, how many pizzas the cross-country team can eat after a meet, and more. Some of the skills students will sharpen include the following: identify and define a problem; create diagrams, graphs, and charts; solve problems using statistical data; select appropriate operations for solving problems; choose and use formulas to solve problems; solve consumer problems involving interest and discounts; use logic to solve problems; and check the accuracy of problem solutions.  BTH-3165. $8.99-D

 

More Basic Not Boring Problem Solving, Middle Grades: Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement by Marjorie Frank, Incentive Publications, 2005. This book is based on a record-setting theme, so students will find solutions to some unusual situations: garbage can racing, fast food eating, spoon balancing, fire walking and more Students will practice the following skills: identify and define a problem; select appropriate operations for solving problems; use statistics and tables; choose appropriate strategies, apply trial and error, utilize working backwards, and determine the reasonableness of solutions. BTH-3167. $8.99-D

Social Studies

Basic Not Boring Economics, Middle Grades: Inventive Exercises to Sharpen Skills and Raise Achievement by Marjorie Frank, Incentive Publications, 1997. Books in this series present skills in a carefully researched sequence, and features exercises based on age-appropriate, high-interest themes. The goal is to make fundamental skills exciting and achievable. The exercises in these books can be used to introduce new skills, review previously taught material, assess skills and content, and encourage the use of higher order thinking skills. Imogene Forte and Marjorie Frank developed the concept for this series. <P>In this book students will acquire basic economic and money management skills through entertaining characters such as Penny Pincher, Mr. Bigg de Posit, and Patricia Profit. They will learn basic economic vocabulary and concepts and processes related to earning and spending money. They will also be introduced to practical skills such as banking earning interest, obtaining credit, paying interest, and budgeting. They will also learn about taxes, federal monetary policy, supply and demand, and the global economy.  BTH-5574. $8.99-D

 

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