Advanced Placement English Language And Composition

Advanced Placement English Language and Composition

2012 – 2013

Welcome to AP Language and Composition. This college-level class is the equivalent of an introductory college composition class. We have a mission in this class—to prepare you for the College Board Advanced Placement Language and Composition test which you will take in May. I can’t guarantee that you’ll earn college credit—that’s up to you—but I will promise that you can be well-prepared for the test, further AP classes, and college classes. I also promise to help you become a skilled reader, writer, and thinker. You will be intellectually challenged and stimulated. I assume that you willingly accept the rigor our mission involves and will give nothing but your best effort.

AP Language is a rhetoric class. Rhetoric is the “art of crafting effective texts for specific audiences” (Jolliffe). In this class you will learn to:

· Read texts (usually prose, from several disciplines and time periods) critically to see how an author produces his or her desired effect on a particular audience.

· Write texts in which you accomplish your purposes for a specific audience.

· Develop research skills that allow you to evaluate sources, both primary and secondary, and synthesize key information from them in order to support your researched argument, complete with citations, in MLA (Modern Language Association) format.

Every assignment and activity we do will help you practice these highly complex skills.

You will write often and reflect on your own writing so you can grow into a mature writer who could enter any freshman or sophomore-level college writing class and succeed. You'll learn effective reading strategies and apply them to short, mostly non-fiction selections, mainly arising spontaneously from current issues. You will read fiction to analyze the author's linguistic and rhetorical choices. It is an honor and privilege to teach this course, and I hope you feel honored and privileged to be here. There are no entrance requirements for this class, but a desire to challenge yourself and satisfy your intellectual curiosity is absolutely necessary.

Some of the texts we will read this year include:

The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (summer reading homework)

The Language of Composition by Scanlon, Shea, & Aufses

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

An Ordinary Man by Paul Rusesabagina

The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan

The class work we'll do this year includes but is not limited to:

· Discussing what we've read in large and small groups

· Using protocols for text-based analysis

· Practicing rhetorical analysis in timed writes

· Taking multiple choice tests

· Analyzing previous AP exams

· Acquiring new vocabulary

· Learning to identify and apply rhetorical devices

· Expressing ideas in writing and speech

· Remediating problems with the conventions of grammar and spelling

· Responding in writing to non-verbal texts paired with written texts, or as texts themselves

· Close-reading of texts

· Documenting your own research and analyzing the documentation of the research of published authors

· Crafting argument and analyzing the rhetoric of written argument

· Reading several books from the "AP Literature List of Books of Literary Merit" and analyzing them in a variety of ways

· Writing essays of several kinds: narrative, expository, analytical, synthesis, compare/contrast, argumentative

· Practicing the writing process for all major writing assignments: pre-writing, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing.

· Learning strategies of both peer and self-analysis of your own writing

· Writing-to-think and writing-to-learn: journals, reader-response, free-writes, imitation of style, collaborative writing, quick writes

· Learning advanced research skills, using both primary and secondary sources

· Evaluating sources, and artfully synthesizing information from sources

· Using MLA format for research

· Reviewing grammar (up through subordination and coordination) as necessary to analyze syntax and write a variety of sophisticated sentences

· Practicing effective use of rhetoric, especially control of tone

· Reading texts written in a variety of rhetorical modes, genre, and time periods by both canonical and minority authors

I expect the following from you:

· Thoughtful and completed reading and writing assignments

· Work that is word-processed, on time, and professionally presented

· Courtesy and attentive listening in discussions so everyone's opinion can be heard and valued

· Supreme organization and superior study skills

· Your best effort always

· A good attitude and an open mind

· Adherence to school rules

· Generous intellectual contribution to all group work

· Honesty and integrity in all class transactions

· Signing up for and taking the AP Language Exam

Month-by-Month Classroom Activities, Major Assignments, and Assessments:

Summer 2012:

· Tracking a published columnist: reading and analyzing writing style

· Reading The Great Gatsby

Unit 1 – Writing Style

September:

· Analyzing style: various columnists

· Write a one-page analysis of your columnist’s writing style

· Write a column in the style of your columnist

· Introduction to writing to a prompt (released free-response questions)

· Writing strong sentences: avoiding passive voice, vague references, shifts in point of view, pronoun antecedent agreement

· Voice in writing

· Begin vocabulary and literary terms list

· Reading Inventory

· Close-reading strategies

· Socratic Discussion: The Great Gatsby

Unit 2 – Topic: Education

October - November

· Understanding point of view

· Texts: “Superman and Me” by Sherman Alexie, “Learning to Read and Write” by Frederick Douglas, “Learning to Read” by Malcolm X

· Narrative essay – Describe an important experience in your life related to education. Once rough drafts are completed, students will share essays with groups in class taking notes on questions, concerns, and suggestions from their peers. Students will revise essays before turning in a final draft. This process will occur for all major writing assignments.

· Texts: “I Know Why the Caged Bird Cannot Read” by Francine Prose, Education by Ralph Waldo Emerson, “A Talk to Teachers” by James Baldwin, “Let Teenagers Try Adulthood” by Leon Botstein, “A Model for High Schools” by David S. Broder, “What’s Wrong with American High Schools” by Bill Gates, “Failing the Wrong Grades” by Diane Ravitch, data tables from Reading at Risk , a report of the National Endowment for the Arts on trends in literary reading

· Writing skills: sentence, paragraph structure, appositives

· peer revision/self-analysis of writing

· Understanding tone

· Argument essay (Scanlon) – Think carefully about the nature of the arguments you have read and analyzed. Is American education in trouble? Is high school to blame? Are there other causes? Do the pieces we read offer reasoned arguments and reasonable solutions? Consider these questions as you plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue and write an argument in response. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, observation, and experience.

Once rough drafts are completed, I will conference with students about their essay, making sure their argument is clear and that appropriate support is included. Students will revise their essays before turning in a final draft.

· Independent Reading Book Report 1 due: writing style

· Practicing timed writes (released free-response questions)

· Continuing writing skills: embedding quotations

Unit 3 – Topic: Community

December - January

· Texts: “Letter from Birmingham Jail” by Martin Luther King Jr., “Where I lived, and What I Lived for” by Henry David Thoreau, “The Singer Solution to World Poverty” by Peter Singer, “Lifeboat Ethics: The Case against Helping the Poor” by Garrett Hardin, The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck, Reflections (painting) by Lee Teter, Three Servicemen (sculpture) by Frederick Hart

· The Five Canons of Rhetoric

· Writing a research report (synthesis of information)

· The rhetorical triangle

· Researching a variety of sources

· Organization of a formal paper

· Learning proper forms of citation

· Plagiarism

· Synthesis Essay (researched argument) (Scanlon) – In his essay “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” Martin Luther King Jr. writes, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Consider carefully the meanings of this statement as it relates to the readings we have done for this class, and develop a thesis in response to the statement. In an essay that synthesizes at least four sources for support, take a position that defends, challenges, or qualifies King’s statement. One of the sources must be visual. Cite sources in the paper using MLA Format and include a Works Cited Page.

· Writing compare and contrast

· Writing skills: parallel structures

· Independent Reading Book Report # 2 due -compare/contrast

· Practice with AP multiple choice items

Semester Exam: Timed Write prompt: synthesis, 2 multiple choice sections

Unit 4 – Topic: Language

February

· Texts: “A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood” by Richard Rodriguez, “Politics and the English Language” by George Orwell, “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, Decolonizing the Mind by Ngugi Wa Thiong’o, “Studying Islam, Strengthening the Nation” by Peter Berkowitz, “Bilingualism in America: English Should Be the Official Language” by S.I. Hayakawa, “How Much Wallop Can a Simple Word Pack?” by Geoffrey Nunberg, Rumors, Lies, Innuendo (cartoon) by Mike Twohy, “Census Data on Language use in the United States” (table) by James Crawford.

· Writing Skill: Concise Diction

· Expository Essay: (from The Language of Composition) Most professions – plumbers, lawyers, teachers, accountants, physicians – have their jargon, a language that practitioners use among themselves. In many ways, that language defines the user as a member of the community and sets them apart from others who do not “belong.” Choose one profession or group, describe key elements of that group’s language, and analyze how the language defines the group as a community.

Unit 5 – Topic: Politics

March - April

· Texts: “A Modest Proposal” by Jonathan Swift, “On Seeing England for the First Time” by Jamaica Kincaid, “The Destruction of Culture” by Chris Hedges, “On the Duty of Civil Disobedience” by Henry David Thoreau, “Every Dictator’s Nightmare” by Wolf Soyinka, “Shooting an Elephant” by George Orwell, “The Empire Fights Back” by Chinua Achebe, An Ordinary Man by Paul Rusesabagina, clips from Hotel Rwanda, “I Have a Dream” by Martin Luther King Jr., political cartoons

· Understanding and creating satire

· Argument Essay: Write a satirical essay on a current local or national issue

· Rhetorical Analysis

· Rhetorical Appeals

· Visual Literacy

· Writing Skill: Subordination in the complex sentence

· Analysis Essay: Rhetorical Analysis of “I Have a Dream”

· Multiple Choice practice/analysis

· Independent Reading Book Report #3 due – Mock AP Exam Multiple Choice Questions

· AP practice exam

· Continued synthesis, argument, analysis study

· Test strategies

Unit 6 – Topic: Popular Culture

May - June

· Texts: “High-School Confidential: Notes on Teen Movies” by David Denby, “Corn-Pone Opinions” by Mark Twain, “We Talk, You Listen” by Vine Deloria Jr., “Show and Tell” by Scott McCloud, The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway, The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan

· Compare/Contract Essay: From The Language of Composition. After reading and discussing Mark Twain’s “Corn-Pone Opinions” find examples of prose that are ornate and diffuse and examples that are compact and simple. Write an essay in which you compare and contrast the effects of the two-types of language.

· Writing Skill: Modifiers

· AP Exam

· Independent Reading Book Report # 4 due – Oral Presentation

· Narrative Essay: Writing the college essay

Vocabulary words will be given weekly. Vocabulary will be assessed through weekly quizzes including the 10 most recent words and 10 random words from previous weeks. Students will need to spell each word correctly, provide a synonym, and demonstrate the correct use of the vocabulary word by creating original sentences.