May 29, 2014
Dear Students:
I am looking forward to working with you next year in Advanced Placement Language and Composition. There will be much to learn. In order for us to be prepared to analyze and write effectively about passages given on the AP exam, we must first read a variety of texts.
Below is a list of the three texts for your summer reading; the assignment for each text is included in this packet. Make sure that you read these texts over the summer. These are REQUIRED assignments, and they are all due on the first day of school. I will not accept late assignments except under EXTREMELY EXCEPTIONAL circumstances. Please note that it will be very difficult for you to do well in this class if you do not complete all the summer reading, for you will have in-class assignments related to what you read. You are responsible for getting your own summer books, which you should be able to find in any of the area libraries and bookstores. The summer assignment grades will count as part of your class average.
All of these summer assignments must be TYPED, so please use or recreate the templates included in this packet. See me before leaving school for the summer if access to technology is an issue. These assignments will be evaluated on the basis of accuracy, thoroughness, and grammar. Please be sure to complete all parts of each assignment.
The administration will post the summer reading list and assignments on our school website, and I will post these assignments on my high school site as well. If you have any questions, feel free to see or e-mail me at .
I hope you have a great summer and return to school refreshed and ready to go!
Sincerely,
Josie R. Jamison
Summer Reading
· I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou.
· The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
· “The Dumbest Generation? Don’t Be Dumb” by Sharon Begley. This assignment includes research and a position paper.
· Vocabulary (see attached assignment)
ASSIGNMENT INSTRUCTIONS FOR SUMMER READING
1. You must look up any unfamiliar terms. The following website will prove helpful. http://www.uncp.edu/home/canada/work/allam/general/glossary.htm
2. Examples for every assignment must include page numbers and chapter numbers, and for each column the examples must span the length of the book. For instance, you cannot rely on only one section of the book for your examples. When you are providing examples, do not condense sentences by omitting words and/or using ellipses. Points will be deducted for grammatical errors.
3. All assignments should be typed.
I KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRD SINGS: SYNTAX GRAPHIC ORGANIZER (Part 1)
Types of sentences/punctuation / Types of words / Types of paragraphsAre they predominantly simple, compound, complex, or compound-complex? Give five examples. (10 pts.) / Does the author rely on predominantly concrete nouns, active verbs, and/or descriptive adjectives? Give five specific examples. (10 pts.) / How often does the author rely on long developed paragraphs? Support your answer by counting the number in a chapter. Be sure to identify the chapter. (5 pts.)
Are they predominantly periodic sentences, loose sentences, or inverted sentences? Give five examples. (10 pts.) / Does the author rely on formal, informal, inflated, or slang diction? Give five examples. (5 pts.) / Does the author rely on indirect dialogue or direct dialogue? Give examples. Explain why you think the author chose to rely on this particular type of dialogue ( 10 pts.)
I KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRD SINGS: ANALYSIS OF IMAGERY/FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE (Part 2)
Choose 5 strong examples of figurative language. Identify the figure of speech and then, for analysis, explain the “layers” of meaning by discussing how each is used for meaning and effect. Think about the following questions: Why did the author use this figurative image instead of something else? What does this comparison/figure of speech do that literal language would not accomplish? (25 pts.)
Type of Figurative Language / Sentence from the book / Page Number / Explanation and analysis of the figurative languageI KNOW WHY THE CAGED BIRD SINGS: STRUCTURE GRAPHIC ORGANIZER (Part 3)
Question / Your answerHow many chapters does the book have?
Analyze the pattern of chapter division. Explain why the chapters start and end when they do. (10pts.)
Explain the theme of the book. List five specific details and page numbers from the book to support this theme. (10 pts.)
Maya Angelou recently passed away (May 28, 2014 in North Carolina). Read and document (in MLA format) at least 2 different articles that cover her life accomplishments. In a well-developed paragraph, briefly describe at least three of her life experiences or accomplishments not covered in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Consider the young Maya that we see in Caged Bird. Then explain why those life experiences or accomplishments stand out to you. (15pts.)
Total: ______/110 pts.
“”The Dumbest Generation? Don’t Be Dumb” ASSIGNMENT
Directions:
1. Read the article ”The Dumbest Generation? Don’t Be Dumb.” There is a copy of the article at the end of the packet. You may also access a copy of the article online.
2. Identify Begley’s assertion and the evidence that she uses to support her claim. Complete the attached graphic organizer. (10 pts.)
3. Do some additional research on the topic. Find four acceptable sources; these sources can either support or refute Begley’s claims. One of these sources must be visual text (such as a graph, chart, or editorial cartoon). The other sources could be books, online periodicals, newspaper articles, documentary or news clips, etc.). Before choosing your sources, do some research on the author of each source and consider the background of that author in terms of credibility of the source.
a. Does s/he have the knowledge and background to make these claims?
b. Is this person an expert or authority on the topic? How do you know? What qualifies this person to make this argument?
4. Create an annotated bibliography in MLA format. Each bibliography should include a brief summary of each source’s primary assertion and information about the author’s credibility.
*See http://owl.english.purdue.edu/media/pdf/20090309032047_614.pdf for a sample of an annotated bibliography. (40 pts.)
5. Write a position essay (approximately 2 pages, double-spaced, 12-point font, Times New Roman, 1” margin) that promotes your argument about this issue. Back up your assertion with supporting and documented evidence from the sources you have read, including the original text ”The Dumbest Generation? Don’t Be Dumb.” Be sure to use the MLA format. See http://citationmachine.net/index2.php or http://valenciacollege.edu/library/doc_mla_electronic.cfm if you need help with the MLA format. (50 pts.)
Graphic Organizer Name______
Text ______Author______
Author’s Argument
Supporting Evidence (include page numbers)
Name: ______Date: ______
THE GREAT GATSBY DIALECTICAL JOURNAL ASSIGNMENT
As you read this novel, keep a dialectical journal and cite examples from the novel that illustrate the list of topics below. I strongly suggest that you record your responses as you read. Your entries should include passages with page numbers and chapter numbers, the response type, and your thoughts. You need to complete a minimum of 25 entries spanning the entire novel (approximately 3 entries for every chapter. Also, you should use different types of responses for the entries. By the time you finish your journal, you should have used each of the 5 response types multiple times. Vary the response types per chapter. You will turn this sheet in with your completed dialectical journal.
Use the following response types as your headings:
1. CONTEXT:
· How does the setting affect the book or the plot?
· How do different points of view/perspective affect the story?
2. CONVENTIONS:
· Notice vocabulary, punctuation and grammar that are unique and original. Explain how it influences and adds to the book.
· Notice organizational patterns of the text and explain how those influence and add to the book.
· Notice rhetorical devices and explain how that device influences and impacts the text, characters, or plot line. See http://www.virtualsalt.com/rhetoric.htm if you need help here.
3. SYNTHESIS:
· Locate themes
· Notice real-world issues in the book.
· Make personal connections to the book.
· Compare and contrast characters, plot line, settings, etc. with other characters in the book or other novels.
4. INTERPRETATION:
· “Read between the lines” to recognize gaps, unclear plots, or ambiguities with the characters.
· Locate clues that help you read between the lines.
· Be able to revise your interpretations as more information is gathered.
5. EVALUATION:
· Express your opinion and make judgments about the text.
· Raise questions about the text.
· Be able to make judgments based on evidence, not emotion.
EXAMPLE (taken from The Great Gatsby):
Page Numbers / PASSAGE: / RESPONSE:Pg. 55 / “I looked back at my cousin, who began to ask me questions in her low, thrilling voice. It was the kind of voice that the ear follows up and down, as if each speech is an arrangement of notes that will never be played again…there was an excitement in her voice that men who had cared for her found difficult to forget: a singing compulsion, a whispered “Listen.” / Interpretation:
From the description of Daisy’s voice, I can infer that she is the type of person who commands attention. Her personality is contagious and engaging to the people around her. Sometimes it appears like she is talking simply to hear herself talk. The text implies that she is not easily forgotten by the men she had dated—like these men become “addicted” to her and can’t let her go…which may be foreshadowing something.
Dialectical Journal adapted from http://www.hse.k12.in.us/staff/dyoung/Gatsby%20Dialectic%20Journal.doc
Grading
Grade A
____sufficient number of entries
____exceptionally thorough entries that show in-depth analysis
____no evidence of plagiarism from written or online sources
____no grammatical errors
Grade B
_____sufficient number of entries
_____thorough entries that show analysis
_____no evidence of plagiarism from written or online sources
_____few grammatical errors
Grade C
_____sufficient number of entries
_____somewhat thorough entries that show analysis
_____no evidence of plagiarism from written or online sources
_____several minor grammatical errors
Grade D
_____insufficient number of entries and/or poorly written entries
reflecting little thought
_____no evidence of plagiarism from written or online sources
_____multiple serious grammatical errors
Grade F
_____insufficient number of entries
_____incomplete, illegible, and/or poorly written entries
_____evidence of plagiarism from written or online sources
_____numerous serious grammatical errors
VOCABULARY
Directions: Create your own template so that you can type in your information. Choose ten words from your summer reading that you did not know. Type the original sentence and then type what you think the word means in context. Finally, type the actual dictionary definition.
Word and part of speech / Work and page number in which word appeared / Original sentence from the text / Your definition / Dictionary definition (denotation)Culture: The Dumbest Generation? Don’t Be Dumb BySharon Begley
The following article was written by science columnist Sharon Begley; it appeared in Newsweek in May 2010.
Really, don't we all know by now that finding examples of teens' and twentysomethings' ignorance is like shooting fish in a barrel? If you want to exercise your eye-rolling or hand-wringing muscles, take your pick. Two thirds of high-school seniors in 2006 couldn't explain an old photo of a sign over a theater door reading COLORED ENTRANCE. In 2001, 52 percent identified Germany, Japan or Italy, not the Soviet Union, as America's World War II ally. One quarter of 18- to 24-year-olds in a 2004 survey drew a blank on Dick Cheney, and 28 percent didn't know William Rehnquist. The world's most heavily defended border? Mexico's with the United States, according to 30 percent of the same age group. We doubt that the 30 percent were boastful or delusional Minutemen.
Like professors shocked to encounter students who respond with a blank-eyed "huh?" to casual mentions of fireside chats or Antietam or even Pearl Harbor, and like parents appalled that their AP-amassing darling doesn't know Chaucer from Chopin, Mark Bauerlein sees in such ignorance an intellectual, economic and civic disaster in the making. In his provocative new book "The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future (Or, Don't Trust Anyone Under 30)," the Emory University professor of English offers the usual indicators, grand and slight. From evidence such as a decline in adult literacy (40 percent of high-school grads had it in 1992; only 31 percent did in 2003) and a rise in geographic cluelessness (47 percent of the grads in 1950 could name the largest lake in North America, compared with 38 percent in 2002), for instance, Bauerlein concludes that "no cohort in human history has opened such a fissure between its material conditions and its intellectual attainments."
He is a little late to this party, of course. The old have been wringing their hands about the young's cultural wastelands and ignorance of history at least since admirers of Sophocles and Aeschylus bemoaned the popularity of Aristophanes ("TheFrogs," for Zeussakes?!) as leading to the end of (Greek) civilization as they knew it. The Civil War generation was aghast at the lurid dime novels of the late 1800s. Victorian scholars considered Dickens, that plot-loving, sentimental ("A Christmas Carol") favorite, a lightweight compared with other authors of the time. Civilization, and culture high and low, survived it all. Can it survive a generation's ignorance of history? For those born from 1980 to 1997, Bauerlein lamented to us, "there is no memory of the past, just like when the Khmer Rouge said 'this is day zero.' Historical memory is essential to a free people. If you don't know which rights are protected in the First Amendment, how can you think critically about rights in the U.S.?" Fair enough, but we suspect that if young people don't know the Bill of Rights or the import of old COLORED ENTRANCE signs—and they absolutely should—it reflects not stupidity but a failure of the school system and of society (which is run by grown-ups) to require them to know it. Drawing on our own historical memory also compels us to note that philosopher George Santayana, too, despaired of a generation's historical ignorance, warning that "those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." That was in 1905.