Professional Documents
Culture Documents
COURSE DESCRIPTION
This is a college-level course in reading, writing, and rhetoric for motivated students,
constructed in accordance with the current College Board AP guidelines. The major
objective of this course is to help students “write effectively and confidently in their
college courses across the curriculum and in their professional and personal lives.” (The
College Board, AP English Course Description, May 2007, May 2008, p. 6)
We’ll read and carefully analyze a broad and challenging range of texts--expository,
analytical, personal, and argumentative essays; letters; speeches; images; imaginative
literature--deepening our awareness of rhetoric and how language works. Through
close reading and frequent writing, we’ll develop our ability to work with language
and text with a greater awareness of purpose and strategy, while strengthening our
own composing abilities. (See details below.)
We’ll write in a variety of modes for a variety of audiences, developing a sense of
personal style and an ability to analyze and articulate how the resources of language
operate in any given text. Because we live in a highly visual world, we’ll also study
the rhetoric of visual media such as photographs, films, advertisements, comic strips,
and music videos. (See specific writing assignments below.)
This course views writing as a process, so major writing assignments will include
required drafts and revisions. We’ll review and discuss our works-in-progress during
frequent class and group workshops. You’ll conference with me often as you write—
at least once for each major writing project.
In concert with the College Board’s AP English Course Description, we’ll learn to
read primary and secondary sources carefully, to synthesize material from these texts
in our own compositions, and to cite sources using conventions recommended by the
Modern Language Association (MLA).
Most classes will begin with a five or ten minute freewriting, in which you write
anything in your mind without stopping. I’ll occasionally ask you to focus your
freewriting on a question, idea, or text. You’ll keep a freewriting file on your laptop
and compile your freewritings over the course of the year.
We’ll have weekly vocabulary quizzes. Words will be drawn from texts we read in
class and from SAT word lists, and will include important rhetorical terms.
OVERVIEW
This course has three major components:
1. First Semester: Developing skills in rhetoric, analysis, and synthesis through the
study of mostly nonfiction texts
2. Second Semester: Further development by applying these skills to the study of
American fiction and poetry
3. The Junior AP English Demonstration in American Literature: The Junior
Demonstration, or Demo, is a year-long project that allows you to both follow a
personal interest and to demonstrate to your class and school community your
mastery of written, analytic, and research skills. Over the course of the school year,
you’ll explore a topic or a set of books within the field of American Literature--
chosen from a list of options or self-selected. To meet the requirements of the Demo,
you’ll write two analytic papers, the second of which is a researched argument that
requires the use of secondary sources, and keep a reading journal. The project
culminates in Junior Demo Colloquy in the Upper School Atrium. (See complete
description and Demo calendar following the syllabus.)
GRADING
For each term, your grade will be determined as follows:
Writing Projects 70% (Major projects must include drafts and revisions along with
a final grading version.)
Class Work 20% (Includes individual tasks leading to a larger product,
grammar reviews, annotation of texts, quizzes,
group work, participation in Workshop
activities and class discussions)
Vocabulary 10%
Semester final exams will constitute 20% of each semester grade. (See complete grade
descriptions following the syllabus.)
TEXTS
Conarroe, Joel, ed. Six American Poets. New York: Vintage, 1993
Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby. New York: Scribner, 2004.
Hawthorne, Nathaniel. Mosses From an Old Manse. New York: Modern Library, 2003.
O’Connor, Flannery. A Good Man is Hard to Find and Other Stories, New York:
Harvest/Harcourt, 1977.
Shea, Renee H., et al. The Language of Composition. Boston: Bedford/St. Martins, 2008.
Vonnegut, Kurt. Cat’s Cradle, New York: Dial, 1998.
Weeks Five and Six: Close Reading: The Art and Craft of Analysis (LOC 35-60)
Analyzing Style
Talking with the Text
Annotation
Dialectical Journal
Graphic Organizer
Close Reading a Visual Text
From Analysis to Essay: Writing about a Close Reading
Glossary of Selected Tropes and Schemes
Writing: Analytical essay. 1000 words.
Write an essay analyzing the rhetorical strategies John F. Kennedy uses in
his inaugural address to achieve his purpose. Peer review workshop of
draft/teacher conference.
Weeks Seven and Eight: Synthesizing Sources: Entering the Conversation (61-85)
Types of Support
Writers at Work
The Relationship of Sources to Audience
The Synthesis Essay
Conversation: Focus on the Community
Service
Identifying the Issues: Recognize Complexity
Formulating Your Position
Incorporating Sources: Inform Rather than Overwhelm
Writing: Synthesis essay. 1000 words.
Using the documents on community service requirements in high schools
in section 3.14 of LOC, write an essay explaining whether you
believe that high schools in general--or Sayre Upper School in particular--
should make community service mandatory. Incorporate references or
quotations from a minimum of three of these sources in your essay.
You will need to turn in one draft and one revision with your final
grading copy.
Weeks One -- Three: To what extent do our schools serve the goals of a true
education?
Francine Prose, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Cannot Read” 89
Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Education” 102
Writing: In-class essay, analytical (one hour)
James Baldwin, “A Talk to Teachers” 123
Kyoko Mori, “School” 130
Interview: Kyoko Mori on Writing 141
Poem: Billy Collins, “The History Teacher” 143
Story: Sandra Cisneros, “Eleven” 144
Visual Text: NEA, from “Reading at Risk” 147
Tyler Wilcheck, “A Talk to High School Teachers” (Student Essay: Argument:
Using Personal Experience as Evidence) 164
Additional Resources: “Conversation: Focus on the American High School”
(LOC 150-163))
Grammar as Rhetoric and Style: The Appositive 167
Exercise 5 (173): Identify the appositives in the sample sentences,
determine their effect, and then write sentences of your own using
the samples as models.
Writing: Personal Essay/Revision to Argument: 1250 words
Many see standardized testing as the answer to improving education in the
United States. President Bush’s “No Child Left Behind Program,” for
example, emphasizes testing as a means of pursuing and
measuring progress. Students, particularly in public schools, face all
sorts of mandated tests, and the SAT, ACT, and AP exams
often dictate school curriculums. What do you think? Write a personal
essay draft discussing whether standardized testing is an effective
way to bring about improved instruction and performance. Then, revise
your draft, broadening its scope beyond your own experience by
synthesizing your ideas with those of some of the writers we’ve
discussed in the last few weeks. Group peer review workshops/teacher
conference.
Weeks Seven -- Eight: What is the relationship of the individual to the community?
Martin Luther King, Jr., “Letter From Birmingham Jail” 260
Henry David Thoreau, “Where I Lived, and What I Lived for” 276
Peter Singer, “The Singer Solution to World Poverty” 319
Grammar as Rhetoric and Style: Parallel Structures 339
Exercise 4 (344): In-class group work: Read (and listen on the web:
bedfordstmartins.com/languageofcomp) the paragraph from Toni
Morrison’s Nobel Lecture, delivered in 1993 when she won
the Nobel Prize in Literature. Find examples of parallel structure;
identify whether the construction is a word, clause, or phrase; and
explain its effect.
Writing: Analytical Essay: 1000 words.
Select one of the three main essays in this section and write an essay
analyzing the rhetorical strategies the writer uses to achieve his
purpose.
Semester Exam
FOURTH QUARTER: Further Development and the Junior Demo (ten weeks)
The Junior Demonstration, or Demo, is a year-long project that allows you to both follow
a personal interest and to demonstrate to your class and school community your mastery
of written, analytic, and research skills. During the First Term, you’ll explore sets of
books and topics of interest to you in the field of American Literature--from the list of
options that follows or from your own affinities. At the beginning of the Second Term,
you’ll select your topic, design your course of study, and begin serious reading and
research. To meet the requirements of the Demo, you’ll write two analytic papers, the
second of which is a researched argument that requires the use of secondary sources, and
keep a reading journal. The project culminates in Junior Demo Colloquy in the Upper
School Atrium.
Norah and Laurie are the only characters that don’t do anything for me, and while Eugene
is annoying I’m glad he’s there. He is my only friend inviting me into this brave new
world of Brighton…
However, at the end of act one, I already know that this play is not about the
characters but about the relationships between characters. The dynamics in this house are
interesting, not for any reason, they just are. Even though it’s a play, you believe that they
are a real family and you wonder about things that happened before and after the play
started. What’s Christmas like at their house (ignore the whole Jewish thing)? Vacations?
Birthday parties? We’re lucky enough to be the friend sleeping over for a night watching
this family…laughing and crying with them.
One thing I’m confused about: Is Eugene a narrator? What’s the point of view of
this play? Are these Eugene’s memoirs? We see things that Eugene doesn’t see…don’t
we? Does he see everything? How does his age effect the narration? Is this an accurate
picture of the family?….all will be revealed. Maybe. [245 words]
Demo Timeline
Now: Begin looking over the list of topic options and thinking about additional
ideas you might have. Get some of the books that look interesting
in your hands and read around in them. Find your interests and
follow them.
October 15: Turn in your signed topic sheets. If you’re developing a topic of your own,
you’ll need my approval.
October 19: Public posting of final list of topics in the Atrium display area.