English IV AP Syllabus

    

English IV AP –English Literature & Composition 2018 - 2019 

jlcantu84@yahoo.com

Room 218

4th Period Conference (10:30 to 11:20)

COURSE OVERVIEW

English Literature and Composition AP is designed to be a university level course. This course will provide students with the intellectual challenges and workload consistent with a typical undergraduate university English course.  Students are encouraged to take the Advanced Placement English Literature and Composition Exam toward the end of the school year since the structure of the course focuses on proper preparation for this exam. The AP English Literature and Composition course is designed to engage students in the careful reading and critical analysis of imaginative works. It is the responsibility of the student to get the most out of this course and prepare both in and out of class. A student who receives a score of 3 or higher on the AP Exam will be granted college credit at most colleges and universities in the United States. In addition to a rigorous literature course, students will write in informal and formal contexts to become competent in their personal writing and proficient in expository, analytical, and argumentative assignments. Evaluation and use of primary and secondary sources in addition to learning multiple methods to cite sources will be learned in this course. Timed responses mirroring the demands of the AP exam will be a frequent form of evaluation.

Course Objectives: (This course will cover the following components which you will practice throughout most units)

1.      The course includes an intensive study of representative works such as those by authors cited

in the AP English Course Description. By the time the student completes English Literature

and Composition, he or she will have studied during high school literature from both British

and American writers, as well as works written in several genres from the sixteenth century to

contemporary times. SC1

2.      The course teaches students to write an interpretation of a piece of literature that is based on a

careful observation of textual details, considering such elements as the use of figurative language,

imagery, symbolism and tone. SC2

3.      The course teaches students to write an interpretation of a piece of literature that is based on a

careful observation of textual details, considering the work’s structure, style and themes. SC3

4.      The course teaches students to write an interpretation of a piece of literature that is based on

a careful observation of textual details, considering the work’s social, cultural and/or historical

values. SC4

5.      The course includes frequent opportunities for students to write and rewrite timed, in-class

responses. SC5

6.      The course includes frequent opportunities for students to write and rewrite formal, extended

analyses outside of class. SC6

7.      The course requires writing to understand: Informal/exploratory writing activities that enable

students to discover what they think in the process of writing about their reading (such

assignments could include annotation, free writing, keeping a reading journal, reaction/response

papers, and/or dialectical notebooks). SC7

8.      The course requires writing to explain: Expository, analytical essays in which students draw upon textual details to develop an extended interpretation of a literary text. SC8

9.      The course requires writing to evaluate: Analytical, argumentative essays in which students draw

upon textual details to make and explain judgments about a work’s artistry and quality. SC9

10.  The course requires writing to evaluate: Analytical, argumentative essays in which students draw upon

textual details to make and explain judgments about a work’s social, historical and/or cultural values. SC10

11.  The AP teacher provides instruction and feedback on students’ writing assignments, both before and

after the students revise their work that help the students develop a wide-ranging vocabulary used

appropriately. SC11

12.  The AP teacher provides instruction and feedback on students’ writing assignments, both before and

after the students revise their work that help the students develop a variety of sentence structures. SC12

13.  The AP teacher provides instruction and feedback on students’ writing assignments, both before and

after the students revise their work that help the students develop logical organization, enhanced

by specific techniques to increase coherence. Such techniques may include traditional rhetorical

structures, graphic organizers, and work on repetition, transitions, and emphasis. SC13

14.  The AP teacher provides instruction and feedback on students’ writing assignments both before and after they revise their work that help the students develop a balance of generalization and specific, illustrative detail.

15.  The AP teacher provides instruction and feedback on students’ writing assignments both before and

after they revise their work that help the students establish an effective use of rhetoric including

controlling tone and a voice appropriate to the writer’s audience. SC15

WRITING OBJECTIVES (Critical/Creative/Formal/Informal)

You should expect plenty of writing as part of your AP course work, both inside and outside the classroom. Typically, you will write, revise, review and workshop an essay every two weeks in this course. For this reason, you should expect to not only write independently, but learn how collaborating with others, as when participating in the many peer review workshops this course will offer, will help improve your writing. As part of your AP course work, you will be writing several critical papers whose purpose will be to analyze and explain novels, poems, short stories and dramas using appropriate writing and vocabulary. These diverse readings will require a close reading of each work, some of which will also require you to write research-based papers. Regardless of the genre, whether poetry, drama, or fiction, your critical essays will require you to form well-developed arguments focused on either close textual analysis of the social/historical values inherent in each respective work, analyze a work’s structure and style (figurative language, imagery, symbolism and tone), and/or an interpretive piece of literature based on careful observations of textual details, considering the work’s structure, style and themes. 

Furthermore, writing will not always be assigned for homework. Every reading will provide frequent opportunities for you to write and re-write timed, in-class responses. These will range from responding to reader-response journal entries, writing practice AP prompts, vocabulary-writing exercises, annotation exercises, free writing, reading journals, reaction/response papers, and/or dialectical notebooks). You will also participate in writing workshops where you will be peer-reviewing other students’ writings. Critical essays and research papers will always require peer review workshops before final submission; these peer review workshops will be completed, in-class. Furthermore, the final papers you submit will require you to turn in any previous drafts to show evidence of revision. Therefore, expect to write, rewrite, and revise regularly in this course. Aside from peer-review, I will also provide you with plenty of instruction and feedback on your writing, both before and after submission, to aid you in establishing an effective use of rhetoric including controlling tone and a voice appropriate to your audience, as well as to help you develop a balance of generalization and specific, illustrative detail in your writing. Using graphic organizers and diverse rhetorical structures, this course will teach you to develop logical organization, enhanced by specific techniques to increase coherence. The advanced writing in this course will also cover sentence structure; I will provide instruction and feedback in your early drafts as well as in general feedback. This course should will teach you how important it is for your style to complement the content of your essay.

 (Expository/Analytical/Interpretive/Persuasive Writing)

As this is a literature and composition course, you will be expected to use every assignment that involves writing and rewriting to practice your best composition skills. Composition assignments will include: statements, paragraphs, timed writes (essay tests), and formal essays (personal, expository, and argumentative). No matter the kind of writing assigned, your best composition skills should be practiced. We will work with various composition constructions, Standard Written English, sentence variety, and word choice. You will also write analytical and argumentative essays as part of your AP course work.  In other words, you will write to evaluate, by writing analytical and argumentative essays in which you will draw upon textual details to make and explain judgments about a work's artistry and quality, to make and explain judgments about a work's social, historical and/or cultural values.

Vocabulary

As per the nature of the AP course, you will have weekly vocabulary lists of words to learn and weekly vocabulary quizzes. The purpose of emphasizing vocabulary in this AP course is to enhance your comprehension of many of the works we will be reading in class, as well as familiarize yourself to some of the advanced vocabulary you will encounter in the AP exam. Furthermore, as reading and writing are linked, developing your vocabulary should also help elevate your diction to the standards of AP level course work.  

READING OBJECTIVES

The most important requirement for this course is that students read every assignment— read it with care and on time. Students unused to literature courses will need to plan time in their schedule for more reading than most courses require. Poetry, though usually not long, is dense and complicated and should always be read at least twice.

Novels in particular require planning. Beware.

Expect the following:

ü  read works from several genres and periods — from the 16th to the 21st century;

ü  read deliberately and thoroughly, taking time to understand a work’s complexity, to absorb its richness of meaning, and to analyze how that meaning is embodied in literary form;

ü  consider a work’s literary artistry, as well as reflect on the social and historical values it reflects and embodies;

ü  experience literature by subjectively reading and responding to literary works, making pre-critical impressions and emotional responses;

ü   interpret literature by analyzing literary works through close reading to arrive at an understanding of their multiple meanings;

ü  evaluate literature by assessing the quality and artistic achievement of literary works and considering their social and cultural values.

Having completed the AP course work, students will:

ü  explain clearly, cogently, even elegantly, what they understand about literary works and why they interpret them as they do;

ü  develop and organize ideas in clear, coherent and persuasive language;

ü  develop stylistic maturity in writing using a wide-ranging vocabulary used with denotative accuracy and connotative resourcefulness;

ü  write using a variety of sentence structures, including appropriate use of subordinate and coordinate constructions;

ü  write using a logical organization, enhanced by specific techniques of coherence such as repetition, transitions and emphasis;

ü  write using a balance of generalization with specific illustrative detail;

ü  effectively use rhetoric, including controlling tone, maintaining a consistent voice, and achieving emphasis through parallelism and antithesis.

TENTATIVE COURSE TEXTS

·          Jago, Carol . Literature & Composition, Reading, Writing, and Thinking. Bedford: Freeman/Worth. 

TENTATIVE NOVELS / NOVELLAS

·          Miller, Arthur. The Crucible

·          Coelho, Paulo. The Alchemist

·          Hesse, Herman. Siddhartha

·          Tolstoy, Leo. The Death of Ivan Ilyich

·          Dostoevsky, Fyodor. Notes from the Underground.

·          Excerpts: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

·          Excerpts: Beowulf, The Canterbury Tales & Gulliver’s Travels

·          Letters from the Earth/ Diaries of Adam and Eve. Mark Twain.

·          Perkins Gilman, Charlotte. The Yellow Wallpaper.

·         Wilde, Oscar. The Picture of Dorian Gray.

·          Wilde, Oscar. The Importance of Being Earnest. (Play)

·          Shakespeare, William. MacBeth. (Play)

·          Sartre, Jean-Paul. No Exit. (Play)

·          Fall Outside Reading Options: Alighieri, Dante. The Inferno OR Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man. OR Marlowe, Christopher. The Tragical History and the Life and Death of Doctor Faustus.

·          Spring Outside Reading: Bronte, Emily. Wuthering Heights.

TEACHING STRATEGIES / STUDENT ASSESSMENTS:

Summer Reading—Students are required to read The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho over the course of summer. Students will answer several discussion/analysis questions and write an essay as an assessment of their reading.  A grading rubric will be used to determine your grade.

Writing Assessment— Students will complete several multi-draft essays including, but not limited to:

o   Prose Analysis

o   Poetry Analysis

o   Comparative Analysis

Critical Reading—Readings for the course include excerpted as well as full length fiction and non-fiction texts. Students are expected to do these readings outside of class and come prepared to discuss the texts beyond a superficial level. The students’ reading is inherently assessed by all activities of the class.

Discussion—Discussion in class will take various forms ranging from graded formal seminars to informal classroom chat. Students will be assessed on their meaningful contributions to discussions at all levels.

British Literature Studies—Students will complete units documenting the evolution of British literature. They will make note of historical context, stylistic features in the representative works of major authors. Students will be assessed both in writing and orally on their ability to demonstrate the trends of the British canon.

World Literature —In preparation for the AP Exam, British literature studies may be replaced with comparable worldly literature.

MATERIALS
Students should be prepared for class (no later than Wednesday) with the following MANDATORY materials:

§  3-Ring Binder with side pockets §  5 Tab Dividers for organization §  Paper §  Pencils & Pens (black ink only; at least two of each) §  2 Highlighters (choose preferred color)

§  USB/Jump Drive §  Recommended – Pencil Pouch with 3 ring holes §  Journal—Recommended

Grading Policy
The following grading policy will be used to calculate student averages. Extra credit may be offered periodically.

Exams (Tests and Quizzes)               60%   (i.e. Objective Tests, Essay Tests, Major Projects)

Quizzes                                              20%   (i.e. Announced and Unannounced Quizzes)

Homework Assignments                   10%   

Participation and Behavior                10%

Class Rules/Expectations

1.       SIT – Students should be seated in their assigned seat, unless directed otherwise by the teacher, when the bell rings.

2.       PREPARE – Students should come to class prepared to learn, physically and mentally.  Students should have all of the necessary materials and completed assignments.  Students should also have their minds set on learning.

3.       RESPECT – Students should be respectful toward the teacher, their peers and any other authority figures that enter the classroom. Students should be respectful in words and in actions.

4.       FOLLOW – Students should follow all policies and procedures outlined in their student handbook.

5.       LISTEN – Students should actively listen to all instructions given by the teacher.

Late/Missing Work Policy

Students are expected to adhere to due dates on all assignments.  However, if work is not turned in on time, it may be turned in late for a significant reduction in grade.  Late work will be graded as follows:

·         One day late = 20 points off

·         Two days late = 30 points off

·         Three or more days late = student will only receive half of the score he/she earns (grade will not exceed a 70)

It is important to note that a lower grade is much better than a zero, and therefore, students should make every effort to complete any missing assignments.  Adjustments to this policy will be made for students with documented excused absences.  

Plagiarism / Cheating:
Plagiarism includes copying or paraphrasing another’s words, ideas or facts without crediting the source; submitting a paper written by someone else, either in whole or in part, as one’s own work; or submitting work previously submitted for another course or instructor.  Cheating includes copying any peer’s assignment or exam AND allowing someone else to cheat by letting him or her see/copy your own work. 

Plagiarism, cheating or other forms of academic dishonesty on any assignment will result in failure (a grade of ZERO) for that assignment and will result in a referral to the principal for further disciplinary action.

Course Outline
1^st Semester (18 Weeks)

Week 1 -2            Review of Summer Reading: The Alchemist; Introduce and begin reading Arthur Miller’s The Crucible (Play). Excerpt Johnathan Edward's "Sinners in the Eyes of an Angry God." Vocabulary List Number 1. Poem Analysis 1. Introduce Peer Review to students and discuss its merits in writing. Students will receive their essay graded and annotated, and be assigned to revise, edit, and peer review their work.
Take AP Diagnostic Exam; Evaluate performance and identify individual areas for focus; Examine AP essay rubrics and determine focus areas

Week 3-6         Finish Arthur Miller's The Crucible, make connections with modern day social media witch-hunts. Discuss similarities and differences between Salem witch-hunts, and modern witch-hunts. Read Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's The Little Prince. Compare with Paulo Coehlo's The Alchemist. Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” & “Desiree’s Baby”; use graphic organizers to establish thematic parallels and identify historical and social context; Read/analyze The Awakening by Kate Chopin with a focus on internal characterization; Compose Internal Events essay & complete Chalk Talk exercise to analyze text and make personal connections. In a well developed analytical essay, students will examine Kate Chopin’s use of symbolism in “Story of an Hour” to describe Mrs. Mallards’ oppression. Students will workshop and peer review their drafts, in class, before final submission. Discuss how writer’s use of literary elements can help them establish theme and tone in journal writing and class discussions.

Week 7-10          Read Henrik Ibsen’s A Doll’s House and make connections to The Awakening; Compose Comparative character analysis essay (Edna vs. Nora) & have class debate that determines which text better presents the argument for gender equality. Read Letters from the Earth/ Diaries of Adam and Eve by Mark Twain and pair this work with Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal. Students will write an analytical expository essay examining Mark Twain’s use of satire. Students will debate the differences in attitude, purpose, tone and rhetorical effect between Twain and Swift.

Week 11-12        British Literature Focus – Read excerpts from Beowulf, The Canterbury Tales & Gulliver’s Travels and analyze texts for structure, style and theme. Students will write a creative writing essay, five page minimum, in which they write from the perspective of one of Beowulf’s warriors as they travel along with Beowulf and encounter the threats Beowulf encounters.  

Week 13-17        Shakespearean Sonnets & Tragedy – Study the structure and content of William Shakespeare’s sonnets; Study inverted structure of poetry and iambic pentameter; Read The Tragedy of Macbeth, and analyze text for characterization and elements of tragedy; Complete AP multiple choice practice questions for each act; Compose essay that analyzes Macbeth’s obsession with power as the driving force of the plot.

                                Discovering Irony through Inquiry by reading Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown.” Students will examine “Young Goodman Brown” by writing a literary analysis by selecting one of the following elements: allegory, imagery, symbolism, or tone to argue how this particular element, as used by Hawthorne, proves necessary in understanding a work’s meaning. I will conference with students to discuss their writing and also provide peer-review sessions prior to submitting final drafts.  Students will present and discuss their papers in class.

Week 18              Prepare for Winter Break Reading – Siddhartha; Establish historical context for novel; Discuss point of view and the subtleties of language; Read critical reviews of the novel to set student expectations of text

                                Students will keep a reflective reader-response journal for each chapter of Siddhartha. Students will annotate Siddhartha’s growth throughout the novel and evaluate the way Hesse uses the river as a symbol for Siddhartha’s transformation. Students will adapt the themes inherent in Siddhartha and place them in today’s world by writing a script and filming a short movie.

2^nd Semester (18 Weeks)

Week 19              Review Wuthering Heights and take comprehensive exam; Analyze text for characterization and point of view; Compose essay on how the narrative structure of the novel contributes to theme. Peer Review workshop before student’s final submission.

Week 20              Complete AP Practice Exam #1; Grade assessment (including essays) using AP rubrics; Analyze results for areas of improvement

Week 21-24        Reading Poetry Responsively – Study the elements of poetry for identification and analysis.

·         Focus on Diction, Denotation & Connotation, and Tone, using Randal Jarrell, “The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner,” Judith Ortiz Coffer, “Common Ground,” Robert Herrick, “To the Virgins to Make Much of Time,” Andrew Marvell, “To His Coy Mistress,” Margaret Atwood, “Bored,” and Jane Yolen, “Fat is Not a Fairy Tale.”

·         Focus on Symbols, Allegory and Irony, using Robert Frost, ‘Acquainted with the Night,” Edgar Allan Poe, “The Haunted Palace, Edwin Arlington Robinson, “Richard Cory,” Robert Browning, ‘My Last Duchess,” and Gary Soto, “Behind Grandma’s House.”

·         Focus on the Sound of Poetry (Musical Devices, Rhythm and Meter), using Emily Dickinson, “A Bird came down the Walk—,” Richard Armour, “Going to Extremes,” Gerard Manley Hopkins, “God’s Grandeur,” john Keats, “Ode to a Nightingale,” and Theodore Roethke, “My Papa’s Waltz.”

·         Focus on Poetic Forms: the Sonnet, using John Keats, William Wordsworth, William Shakespeare and Edna St. Vincent Millay; the Villanelle, using Dylan Thomas, “Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night”; the Elegy, using Theodore Roethke, “Elegy for Jane”;  the Ode, using Barbara Hamby, “Ode to American English,” John Keats, “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” and Percy Byshe Shelley, “ Ode to the West Wind.”

Week 25              Complete AP Practice Exam #2; Grade assessment (including essays) using AP rubrics; Analyze results and compare to previous practice exam and further identify areas for improvement

Week 26-28        Read Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison and ask: How and why is the search for self an essential pattern in literature, and why is this search so critical to the human experience? What elements of society act against an individual’s search for an understanding of self?; Complete Calligraphy assignment

Week 29-31        Read Heart of Darkness by Stephen Conrad and make connections to Impressionism; Focus on archetypes, symbolism, imagery, characters and multiple levels; Compare William Blake’s “Lamb” and “Tyger” to the novel.

Week 32-33        Major Works Study Project – Compile data sheets for all novels studied and identify author style, major plot points, significance of setting, themes and anticipated essay questions. Write essays for practice and score using AP rubrics.

Week 34-36        Read Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. Discuss: What point is Huxley making about human nature and the nature of human communities? Discuss the power of language in the book, the power of the word to influence thought and behavior. Why did Huxley choose Shakespeare as the medium of John's intellectual awakening? Discuss Huxley's use of narrator. Does the fact that Huxley's vision was impaired for part of his life have any bearing on the way he narrates the story and sets the scenes?

Tentative Course Outline

1st Semester Thematic Focus: Looking Inward: A Critical Study of our Epoch, our Inner Selves in Relation to our Environment, and our Personal Philosophy ·         Review of Summer Reading Text: The Alchemist ·         Kate Chopin’s “The Story of an Hour” & “Desiree’s Baby” & The Awakening ·         Henrick Isben’s A Doll’s House ·         Excerpts from: Beowulf, The Canterbury Tales & Gulliver’s Travels ·         Charlotte Perkins Gillman’s The Yellow Wallpaper ·         Excerpts from, Pirsig’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Moravia’s Contempt, Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray   ·         Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown” ·         Arthur Schopenhauer: Excerpts from Selected Writings ·         William Shakespeare's MacBeth ·         SAT/AP Vocabulary Quizzes ·         Oscar Wilde’s Importance of Being Earnest ·         Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral” ·         Edgar Allen Poe's “The Masque of the Red Death” and short stories ·         Outside Reading Options: Richard Wright’s Native Son, Herman Hesse Demian, C.S. Lewis Mere Christianity ·         Poetic Elements and Forms & SPOTTTS Poetry Analysis: “The Sun Goes Down on Summer”, “Theme for English B”, “Negro”, “Rime of the Ancient Mariner”, “Jabberwocky”, “Ode to a Grecian Urn”, “Death Be Not Proud”, “Daddy”, “Rites of Passage”, “Dover Beach”, “Do Not Go Gentle Into the Night”, “The Tyger”, “The Lamb”, “Another Brick in the Wall”, “Dulce et Decorum Est”, “Imagine”, “I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry” (More to follow) ·         AP Diagnostic Exam & Mock Tests ·         Analytical and Reflective Reading Journal ·         SAT/AP Vocabulary Quizzes

2nd Semester Thematic Focus: Products of Our Environment? ·         Outside Reading:  Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights ·         Selections from: Charles Dickens’ Great Expectations, Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment, Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Albert Camus’ The Stranger ·         Critical study into the historical perspective of literary texts ·         Dostoyevsky’s  Notes from the Underground ·         Franz Kafka The Metamorphosis ·         Jean-Paul Sartre No Exit ·         Heart of Darkness by Stephen Conrad contrasted with William Blake’s “The Lamb” and “Tyger” ·         Alice Walker Everyday Use ·         Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God ·         AP Language Practice (Writing & Critical Analysis) ·         Flannery O’Connor’s “A Good Man is Hard to Find” ·         Reading the Bible as Literature – Read and analyze biblical stories for literary merit (The Book of Job, Heroes, Tragic Stories, Parables) ·         AP Mock Tests & Saturday Study Sessions ·         Analytical and Reflective Reading Journal ·         SAT/AP Vocabulary Quizzes Poetic Elements and Forms & SPOTTTS Poetry Analysis: Maya Angelou’s “Phenomenal Woman”; Sor Juan Inez de la Cruz’s “Poem 92”; Lucille Clifton’s “Homage to my Hips”; Melanie Martinez’s “Doll’s House”; Tennyson’s “The Lady of Shallot”; Plath’s “Morning Song” and “Mirror”; Beyonce’s “Who Run the World”, “Death be Not Proud,” “A Red, Red Rose”, “Homage to my Hips”, “The Lady of Shallot”, “Sonnet in Primary Colors”, “A Woman Mourned by Daughters”, “La Migra”