Centennial High School
1820 Rimpau Avenue, Corona, CA 92881
Phone: (951) 739-5670 Fax: (951) 739-5693
AP English Language and Composition Syllabus 2016-2017
Instructor: Mr. Lang
Office Hours: Monday thru Friday 7AM – 7:35AM Room 431 (or by appointment)
Phone (951) 739-5670 ext. 20431
Email:
Twitter: @mrlanguagearts
Introduction
Welcome to AP English Language and Composition. The Advanced Placement English Language and Composition course integrates California content standards and AP College Board expectations as well as examine American Literature (the AP Language and Composition test is principally nonfiction however we will not limit our studies to that genre alone). Hopefully, this paper will help you to understand the different parts of this course as well as my expectations of you. It is also an agreement that we understand this class is conducted at the college level with regards to reading, writing, speaking and listening.
Course Description from AP/College Board Website
The AP English Language and Composition course is designed to help students become skilled readers of prose written in a variety of periods, disciplines, and rhetorical contexts and to become skilled writers who can compose for a variety of purposes. By their writing and reading in this course, students should become aware of the interactions among a writer’s purposes, audience expectations, and subjects, as well as well as the way generic conventions and the resources of language contribute to effective writing.
The college composition course that the AP English Language and Composition course is intended to parallel is one of the most varied in the curriculum. The college course often allows students to write in a variety of forms – narrative, expository, argumentative – and on a variety of subjects from personal experiences to public policies, from imaginative literature to popular culture. But the main objective in most first-year writing courses is to enable students to write effectively and confidently in all their college courses and in their professional and personal lives. Therefore, most composition courses emphasize the expository, analytical, and argumentative writing that fosters the ability to write in any context. As in the college course, the purpose of the AP English Language and Composition course is to enable students to read complex texts with understanding and to write prose that is rich enough and complex enough for mature readers. An AP English Literature and Composition course should help students move beyond such programmatic responses as the five-paragraph essay that provides an introduction with a thesis and three reasons, body paragraphs on each reason, and a conclusion that restates the thesis. Although such formulaic approaches may provide minimal organization, they often encourage unnecessary repetition and fail to engage the reader. Students should be encouraged to place their emphasis on content, purpose, and audience and to allow this focus to guide their organization.
College writing programs recognize that skill in writing follows from students’ awareness of their own composing processes: the way they explore ideas, reconsider strategies, and revise their work. This process is the essence of the first-year writing course. For example, students can write essays that proceed through several stages or drafts, with revision aided by teacher and peers. Although these extended and revised essays cannot be part of the AP examination, the writing experience may help make students more self-aware and flexible writers and thus may help their performance on the exam itself.
Required Texts (will include but are not limited to):
Prentice Hall Literature:The American Experience. 2002 (Textbook), Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business, The Crucible, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Great Gatsby, Of Mice and Men, Catcher in the Rye.
Composition Notebook
You will need a Composition Notebook or Spiral Notebook that you will need to use solely for this class, and will need to bring everyday.
Grades
Summer Assignment/AP Tests 5% Annotations/Notebook/Homework 20%
Timed Writes/ Essays 40% Tests/Quizzes 25%
Participation 10%
Grading Scale
100 – 90 A = Outstanding work
89 – 80 B = Above average work
79 – 70 C = Average work
69 – 59.5 D = Below average, barely passing,
59.4 – 0 F = Failure, NO CREDIT
General Rules and Procedures
-One Person talks at a time
-No food or drinks (other than water)
-All assignments that are turned in need to have your name, period, date, and the name of the assignment..
-NO electronic equipment-other than when we are using them for class purposes
-Whenever an assignment is due, it is due before 12:00am. Consequently late work will be 50% off.
-When you e-mail something, if you attach a word document please also copy and paste the contents into the body of the e-mail. (Use period # label in subject line)
-If you miss a quiz you have two weeks to take it.
-If you are absent the day before the quiz it is your responsibility to be prepared for the quiz when you return, you have the reading and quiz schedule there are no excuses. If you are absent the day an assignment is due, the assignment is still due- (you can always have a classmate turn it in, or e-mail it to me). If you are absent the day an assignment is assigned, YOU are responsible to find out what it is and when it is due. If you are absent, you NEED to call a classmate before you return, or contact me, or check on planbook.com and make sure that nothing is do upon your arrival.
Planbook.com- this is the website I use primarily to put our daily/weekly schedule and activities. You can find the link to this from my teacher page on Centennial’s Website and from my @mrlanguagearts twitter account. You are always accountable for your work whether you are in class or not.
Remind 101- Your class will have a unique access code to sign up for your particular class and the information that is relevant directly to you. Parents and students can sign up for this. It is mandatory that you sign up and remain subscribed to this form of communication throughout the year. Only important information will be shared. This is not a forum for us to “chat”, but it is a tool to keep us connected as a class. Use it responsibly.
Here’s how to sign up:
1. Text
o Join directly via text:
Participantstext aclass @code to aRemind Phone Number. For US teachers, the Remind number is 81010.For example, if the code is@math and the phone number is 81010, youwould text@mathto81010
o Join online:
Visitremind.com/joinand enter the class code there along with your phone number.
2. Download the Remind app
Remind is available on iOS and Android devices. Anyone can download Remind, create an account and join a class quickly(tap the + next to Classes Joined) by using aclass @code or search for your teacher's class.
Here are the codes you will text to 81010 to sign up. Please sign up for your unique class to make sure you are getting the right info.
Period 5: @aplangcom5
Period 6: @aplangcom6
The AP Exam
You have studied for countless hours. You have read quite a bit. You have written several essays. Now it is time to put your studies to the test – and perhaps earn college credit – with the AP English Language and Composition Exam!
**The three-hour exam usually consists of a one-hour multiple-choice section and a two-hour free-response section. **
Section I: Multiple-choice
The multiple-choice questions test your ability to analyze the rhetoric of prose passage. Random guessing on this section can hurt your final score. While you do not lose anything for leaving a question blank, one quarter of a point is subtracted for each incorrect answer on the test. But if you have some knowledge of the question and can eliminate one or more answers, it is usually to your advantage to choose what you believe is the best answer from the remaining choices.
Section II: Free Response
You will write several essays in various rhetorical modes to demonstrate your skill in composition.
Scoring the Exam
The multiple-choice section counts for 45 percent of your grade. The free-response section contributes the remaining 55 percent.
Student Name ______
Student Signature
I hereby comply with the terms and conditions outlined in this syllabus. I do agree to READ, in their entirety, the texts that are assigned, and I will read them by the dates outlined in class.
X ______
Parent/Guardian Signature
I have discussed the conditions outlined with my student and endorse my student’s decision. I give my student full permission to watch the films and read the texts outline in, or attached to this syllabus.
X ______
The following videos MAY be shown in the eleventh grade language arts classes (along with others at Mr. Lang’s professional discretion). Note this is not a list of movies I WILL show, it is a list from which some MAY be shown:
TITLE RATED EXPLANATION OF RATING OR JUSTIFICATION FOR USE
Dances With Wolves PG13 Supplemental/violence & adult themes
The Crucible PG13 Supplemental/violence & brief nudity
Of Mice and Men PG13 Core/violence
Last of the Mohicans R Historical background/violence
Amistad R Historical background/brief
Guilty by Suspicion R Supplemental/adult language & themes
Three Sovereigns for Sarah NR Historical background/Salem witch trails
Elephant Man G Supplemental
Chief Joseph G Core
Moby Dick G Core
The Scarlet Letter G Core
The Adventures of Huck Finn G Core
My Antonia G Supplemental
The Red Badge of Courage G Core
The Great Gatsby PG Supplemental/violence & adult themes The Great Gatsby PG13 Supplemental/violence & adult themes
The Piano Lesson PG Supplemental/adult themes
The Grapes of Wrath PG Supplemental
The Snows of Kilamanjaro G Supplemental
Our Town (83770) G Core
A Raisin in the Sun G Supplemental
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest R Supplemental/adult themes & language/Violence
Dead Poets Society PG Supplemental/violence
Gandhi PG Supplemental/violence
Antz PG Supplemental
The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad G Supplemental
A Streetcar Named Desire PG Supplemental
The Glass Menagerie PG Supplemental
Death of a Salesman PG Supplemental
Uncle Tom’s Cabin PG Supplemental
Monty Python & the Holy Grail (clip) PG Supplemental
I Heart Huckabees (clip) R Supplemental
The Legend of Bagger Vance (clip) PG-13 Supplemental
SHORT STORIES (all of these are rated G or NR and are supplemental materials):
Bernice Bobs Her Hair Paul’s Case (2514)
The Jilting Of Granny Weatherall An Occurance at Owl Creek Bridge
BIOGRAPHIES
Arthur Miller G Supplemental
Henry David Thoreau G Core
A&E Mark Twain G Core
Herman Melville G Core
Great Books Moby Dick G Core
Great Books Scarlet Letter G Core
Mark Twain G Core
Langston Hughes G Core
F. Scott Fitzgerald G Core
Fredrick Douglas G Core
William Carlos Williams G Core
Ralph Waldo Emerson G Core
Beautiful Dreamers (Walt Whitman) PG13 Supplemental
Robert Frost NR Core
Neighbors in Eden NR Core
DOCUMENTARIES (all of these are rated G or NR and are supplemental materials):
Blacklisting in Hollywood Plato’s Republic For Classroom
Great Themes in Literature (057901) Man, Monsters, and Mysteries (85069)
McCarthy Years Public Speaking
Secrets of the Unknown Witches America in Portrait (83854)
Our American Century The Language of Life