LAGUILAYAN NATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL

LEARNER’S ACTIVITY SHEET

ENGLISH 9

Name : _______________________ Grade & Section : ________________________

Teacher : _______________________ Date : ________________________

Lesson : QUARTER 4 WEEK 1 LAS 1

Activity Title : Relevance and worth of ideas
Learning Target : Judging the relevance and worth of ideas (EN9RC-IVf-2.22)
Reference(s) : English Expressways III Textbook, pages 31-33
LAS Writer : SUSAN L. FRAGIO

Relevance and Worth of Ideas

A. WHAT’S NEW?
Literature, as one of its purposes, makes people learn from ideas it contains.
This is especially appreciated when the literary piece has ideas that are sound and
that can be applied in the reader’s own life. Thus, literature is seen as especially
valuable because it is relevant to the reader. In order to find merit in literature,
readers first judge how solid the ideas and how sound the judgement of an author is.
In this way, the author can act as the voice of wisdom that teaches a reader without
the reader himself/herself having to go through the experience that the author had
gone through. This is called vicarious learning.
B. WHAT IS IT?
Read and understand the selection.
Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin
(An Excerpt)
In the evening I found myself very feverish and went to bed; but having read somewhere that
cold water drank plentifully was good for fever, I followed the prescription and sweat plentifully most
of the night. My fever left me, and in the morning, crossing the ferry, I proceeded on my journey on
foot, having fifty miles to go to Burlington, where I was told I should find boats that would carry me
the rest of the way to Philadelphia.
It rained very hard all day; I was thoroughly soaked, and by noon a good deal tired; so I
stopped at a poor inn, where I stayed all night, beginning now to wish I had never left home. I made
so miserable a figure, too, that I found, by the questions asked me, I was suspected to be some
runaway indentured servant and in danger of being taken up on that suspicion. However, I
proceeded the next day and got in the evening to an inn within eight or ten miles of Burlington, kept
by one Dr. Brown. He entered into conversation with me while I took some refreshments, finding I
had read a little, became very obliging and friendly. Our acquaintance continued all the rest of his
life. He had been, I imagine, an ambulatory quack doctor, for there was no town in England nor any
country in Europe of which he could not give a very particular account. He had some letters, and
was ingenious, but he was an infidel, and wickedly undertook, some years after, to turn the Bible
into doggerel verse, as Cotton had formerly done with Virgil. By this means he set many facts in a
ridiculous light, and might have one mischief with weak minds if his work had been published; but
it never was.
At his house I lay that night, and arrived the next morning at Burlington, but had the
mortification to find that the regular boats were gone a little before, and no other expected to go
before Tuesday, this being Saturday. Wherefore I returned to an old woman in the town, of whom I
have bought some gingerbread to eat on the water, and asked her advice. She proposed to lodge me
till a passage by some other boat occurred. I accepted her offer, being much fatigued by travelling by
foot. Understanding I was a printer, she would have had me remain in that town and follow my
business, being ignorant what stock was necessary to begin with. She was very hospitable, gave me
a dinner of oxcheek with great goodwill, accepting only of a pot of ale in return; and I thought myself
fixed till Tuesday should come. However, walking in the evening by the side of the river, a boat came
by, which I found was going toward Philadelphia with several people in her. They took me in, and as
there was no wind we rowed all the way; and about midnight, not having yet seen the city, some of
the company were confident we must have passed it and would row no further; the others knew not
where we were, so we put towards the shore, got into a creek, landed near an old fence, with the
rails of which we made a fire, the night being cold, in October, and there we remained till daylight.
Then one of the company knew the place to be Cooper’s Creek, a little above Philadelphia, which we
saw as soon as we got out of the creek., and arrived there about eight or nine o’clock on the Sunday
morning and landed at Market Street Wharf.
I have been the more particular in this description of my journey, and shall be so of my first
entry into that city, that you may in your mind compare such unlikely beginnings with the figure I
have since made there. I was in my working dress, my clothe coming round by sea. I was dirty, from
my being so long in the boat. My pockets were stuffed out with shirts and stockings, that I knew no
one nor where to look for lodging. Fatigued with walking, rowing, and the want of sleep, I was very
hungry; and my whole stock of cash consisted in a single dollar, and about a shilling in copper coin,
which I gave to the boatmen for my passage. At first they refused it, on account of my having rowed;
but I insisted on their taking it. Man is sometimes more generous when he has little money than
when he has plenty; perhaps to prevent his being thought to have but little.
I walked toward the top of the street, gazing about till near Market Street, when I met a boy
with bread. I had often made a meal of dry bread, and inquiring where he had bought it, I went
immediately to the baker’s he directed me to. I asked for biscuits, such as we had in Boston; that
sort, it seems, was not made at Philadelphie. I then asked for a three penny loaf and was told they
had none. Not knowing the different prices nor the names of the different sort of bread, I told him to
give me threepenny worth of any sort. He gave me accordingly three great puffy rolls. I was surprised
at the quantity, but took it, and having no room in my pockets, walked off with a roll under each
arm and eating the other. Thus I went up Market Street as far as Fourth Street, passing by the door
of Mr. Read, my future wife’s father; when she standing at the door, saw me, and thought I made, as
I certainly did, a most awkward, ridiculous appearance. Then I turned and went down Chestnut
Street and part of walnut street, eating my roll all the way; coming round found myself again at
market street wharf, near the boat I came in, to which I went for a draught of the river water; being
filled with one of my rolls, gave the other to a woman and her child that came down the river in the
boat with us and were waiting to go further.
Thus refreshed I walked again up the street, which by this time had many cleaned-dressed
people in it, who were all walking the same way. I joined them, and thereby was lead into the great
meeting-house of the Quakers, near the market. I sat down among them, and after looking round a
while and hearing nothing said, being very drowsy through labor and want of rest the preceding
night, I fell fast asleep and continued so till the meeting broke up, when someone was kind enough
to rouse me. This, therefore, was the first house I was in, or slept in, in Philadelphia.

(Source: McGraw-Hill, Glencoe American literature, New York: Glencoe McGraw-Hill, 2000.)

C. ACTIVITIES

Explain your answer for the following questions.

1. In the first two paragraphs, what can you say on Benjamin Franklin’s
determination to reach Philadelphia?
2. What incidents in the essay show that Benjamin Franklin is a man who values
more what he is doing and what his goal is, than what people will say about his
appearance?
3. Would you say that you are luckier now that you can reach places more easily
and more comfortably? Support your answer.

Scoring Rubrics

10 8 6 4
Quality of Very informative Somewhat Gives some Gives information
Writing and well organized informative and information but but very poorly
organized poorly organized organized
Grammar, No spelling, Few spelling and A number of So many spelling,
Usage and punctuations or punctuations and spelling, punctuations and
grammatical errors grammatical error punctuations and grammatical errors
Mechanics grammatical error
Writer:

SUSAN L. FRAGIO
Teacher II

QUALITY ASSURANCE TEAM

EVELYN A. RODRIGUEZ LIGAYA L. BANAWAG

Teacher III Teacher III

SUSAN L. FRAGIO LIMWELL R. TELMO

Teacher II, HRD Teacher II, ICT Coordinator

KIM E. ESTRELLAN
Secondary School Principal I