Ggusd Ap Literature & Composition Syllabus

Mr. Briggs ()_509

AP English Literature & Composition_Fall 2017

PHS AP Common Expectations Statement:

Our society values independence. By the time students reach their post-secondary goals, they are expected to have a certain level ofself-advocacywhich has been fostered throughout their years of schooling. The end goal is student independence.

Ownership and responsibility are two areas of the effort necessary to build independence in students. In order to take ownership and responsibility, students must learn tocommunicate effectivelywith their teachers.

If there is a situation that arises or complications occur that interfere with the success of your learning, please arrange a private time to speak with your teacher. Express your concerns and a solution may be met to help alleviate any of your issues.

Course Description

Advanced Placement English Literature is an optionalcourse designed to provide a “bridge” to college with enriched academic opportunities and curriculum; to raise the academic level of the overall student body; to provide students with the opportunity to excel on the AP English Literature test; to provide students equal access to programs and opportunities offered nationwide and allow students to be competitive regarding college entrance requirements; to develop skills in critical thinking; to further students’ effective use of language and organization of ideas; to develop awareness of the resources of language (including connotation, literary conventions, diction, etc.); to write clear, cogent and concise prose; to engage in thoughtful discussions and collaborations with others; to read deeply and broadly for multiple purposes—including pleasure; to enhance students’ skills in stylistic (and otherwise) analysis; and to collect and collate information with more precision for research projects. Reading in the course shall be broad and deep, the reading representative of many genres, historical periods, and cultures (though the reading list shall focus primarily on works originally written in English), considering the literary value of the works and the social and historical values they reflect, and deepening and sharpening the students’ appreciation of the literary artistry of the works read. The readings for the course shall be structured using a “Western Civ” approach, considering major works in their eras—usually in chronological order—beginning with the literature of the ancient Near East and progressing through the whole of the ancient world, medieval Europe, the European renaissance, and Age of Reason, the Age of Revolution, the Industrial Age, and ending in modern literature.

Curriculum—The curriculum for Advanced Placement English Literature follows the District Course Outline and the curriculum requirements described in The College Board’s publication entitled AP English Course Description.

Course Objectives

Students shall develop accurate, perceptive reading through the critical analysis of major texts (English, American, European, Classical and multi-cultural) representing various genres and periods from the sixteenth to the twenty-first century
Students shall reflect on the social and historical values a literary work reflects and embodies
Students shall write formal and informal analyses of literature through experience, interpretation, and evaluation, drawing conclusions about literary meaning and value
Students shall write brief, focused style analysis essays on aspects of language and structure
Students shall have numerous opportunities to write and rewrite.

Instructional Materials

DiYanni Literature, 5th ed. (McGraw, 2002]
The following works will be covered in full at some point in the school year (it will not be necessary to acquire them: The school has copies):

Antigone from The Theban Cycle (Sophocles)

The Cosmogony (Hesiod: excerpts)

Poetics (Aristotle: excerpts)

Rhetoric (Aristotle: excerpts)

The Canterbury Tales (Chaucer: excerpts)

“On Education” (M. Montaigne)

Doctor Faustus (C. Marlowe: excerpts)

Astrophel & Stella (P. Sidney: excerpts)

Amoretti (E. Spenser: excerpts)

Hamlet (Shakespeare)

The Way of the World (W. Congreve)

Absalom & Achithophel (J. Dryden)

Gulliver’s Travels (J. Swift: excerpts)

The Rape of the Lock (A Pope)

Pride & Prejudice (J. Austen)

“Why I Am a Humanity” from Ecce Homo (F.

Nietzsche)

Songs of Innocence & Experience (W. Blake:

excerpts)

Faust, Parts 1 & 2 (J. Goethe: excerpts)

Lyrical Ballads (W. Wordsworth & S.

Coleridge: excerpts)

Frankenstein (M. Shelley)

Don Juan (Lord Byron: excerpts)

The Expiation (V. Hugo: excerpts)

Wuthering Heights (E. Brontë)

“Bartleby the Scrivener”(H. Melville)

“The Bridegroom” (A. Pushkikn)

Jane Eyre (C. Brontë: excerpts)

Great Expectations (C. Dickens)

“The Great French Duel” (M. Twain)

The Importance of Being Earnest (O. Wilde)

A Doll’s House (H. Ibsen)

The Awakening (K. Chopin)

Heart of Darkness (J. Conrad)

The Sun Also Rises (E. Hemingway)

The Metamorphosis (F. Kafka)

To the Lighthouse (V. Woolf: excerpts)

The Waste Land (T. S. Eliot)

“Existentialism”(J. Sartres)

The Strangerand “The Myth of

Sisyphus” (A. Camus)

Waiting for Godot (S. Beckett)

“A Perfect Day for Bananafish” (J. D. Salinger)

The Crucible (A. Miller)

The Garden of Forking Paths (J. Borges)

One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest (K. Kesey)

Writing Expectations

Students will write interpretive essays based on careful textual observation which include:

- Textual details, including structure, style, themes

- Social and historical values

- Figurative language, imagery, symbolism and tone

Writing assignments will include statements, paragraphs, timed writings and formal essays (personal, expository and argumentative: writing to understand, explain, and evaluate)
All assignments for formal and timed writing will include the AP Literature & Composition grading rubric
Students will have opportunity to rewrite formal essays and literary analysis papers after receiving instructor feedback on

- Vocabulary/diction

- Varied sentence structure

- Logical organization

- A balance of statement, evidence and analysis

- Rhetoric including voice and tone

Ongoing mini-lessons will be provided throughout the course dealing with complex grammar and usage issues, sentence construction, and diction.

Unit One: Tragedy(Law of the State versus Higher Laws and Individual Conscience: Sept.) – Tragic Form, Tragic Hero, Tragic Flaw, Humanity of Suffering, Hubris, Pity, Fear

This unit provides a foundation for all the literature to be studied during the year. We shall discuss cultures of the ancient world, beginning in ancient Eastern Mediterranean, and discussing influences and later treatments of the concept of tragedy.

(The summer reading assignment was for your benefit: The more excellent literary works you have “under your belt” at the time of the AP Test, the better—provided you understand and are able to discuss them intelligently in a good, well-organized academic essay. Any student who transfers to the school or into the class will be given ample time to make up the reading and journaling. These works will all be discussed in class at length and reviewed over the course of the schoolyear. Throughout the year, five weeks will be given for each outside reading full-length work, and copies will be provided.)

Readings:

Cosmogony(Hesiod: excerpts)and “The Creation” (J. W. Johnson)
Œdipus the Kingand Œdipus at Colonus (Sophocles: excerpts)
Antigone(Sophocles: to be presented in its entirety in class by us on our “stage”)
Poetics(Aristotle: excerpts)
Rhetoric(Aristotle: excerpts)
Lyric poetry by Horace
The Crucible (A. Miller)

Writing Assignments:

As with every unit (see summer reading handout), students shall journal every night in their Response Journals: personal, analytical responses related to that night’s required outside reading (depending on the night, a directed freewrite reacting to the work’s setting, protagonist, conflict, narrator, diction, tone, mood, imagery, rhetoric, figures of speech, structure (syntax, linear plot structure, and subplots), rising action, climax, resolution, or theme) which should include a value judgment based on the reading in that work up to that point and evidence from the reading to support that judgment
At the end of every five-week outside reading period (beginning in the summer assignment), a complete holistic analysis of the outside-reading work just read shall be produced and edited (edited, typed, proofread, and printed RJ’s shall receive a 10% grade-raise)
At the end of every month/unit, beginning with the second Friday of the schoolyear (relating to the summer reading assignment), there will be a test: Half of these shall be timed writings on an essay topic similar to those which appear on the AP English Literature Test—writing to understand, explain, and evaluate; teacher shall give written feedback on all but one of these every term (one shall be graded by the student’s classmates based on the District Writing Rubric), and the opportunity will always be presented for students to rewrite for a higher grade

Assessments:

The second Friday of the schoolyear the entire period will be used for a short-answer and short essay test on the summer reading: this test will count for 10% of the first quarter grade
Again, at the end of every month/unit, there shall be a test: Half of these shall be timed writings on an essay topic similar to those which appear on the AP English Literature Test (writing to understand, explain, and evaluate); teacher shall give written feedback on all but one of these every term (one shall be graded based on a rubric by the student’s classmates), and students shall have the opportunity every test for students to rewrite for a higher grade
Also, one of the tests each quarter will be a multiple-choice test similar to the multiple-choice portions of the AP English Literature Test

Unit Two: Regency Imperialism & Post-Colonialism

(Critical Lenses, Organization, Symbol, Imagery, etc.; Self and Other; Racial/Imperial Approach, Ethnic/Cross-Cultural Reading: Oct.)

This unit will cover literature from the Age of Imperialism - both “at home and abroad” - and reflect on the causes and effects of imperialism and on post-colonial echoes in the 21st century. Included in the discussion regarding Heart of Darkness shall be a brief history of critical theory and experimentation with varying methods of critical analysis.

Readings:

Great Expectations (C. Dickens)
Heart of Darkness (J. Conrad)
“The White Man’s Burden” (R. Kipling)
“The Brown Man’s Burden” (H. Labouchere)
Lyric Poetry by Wole Soyinka
Lyric Poetry by Derek Walcott

Writing Assignments:

Students shall continue to journal every night in their Response Journals:personal, analytical responses related to that night’s required outside reading (depending on the night, a freewrite reacting to the work’s setting, protagonist, conflict, narrator, mood, tone, imagery, rhetoric, structure (linear and subplots), rising action, climax, resolution, or theme)—and, again, a value judgment should be included in the student’s response along with support from the reading for that judgment
Again, at the end of every five-week outside reading period, a complete holistic analysis of the outside-reading work just read shall be produced and edited (for edited, proofread, and printed RJ’s receive an automatic 10% grade-raise)
Again, at the end of every monthly unit of the schoolyear, there will be a test: Half of these shall be timed writings on an essay topic similar to those which appear on the AP English Literature Test (writing to understand, explain, and evaluate); again, teacher shall give written feedback on all but one of these every term (one to be graded by the student’s classmates based on the District Rubric), and students shall always have the opportunity to rewrite for a higher grade
Also, at this time many of the students shall be writing personal statement essays in conjunction with college applications, and class time shall be devoted to peer editing

Assessments:

Again, at the end of every month-long unit, there will be a test: Half of these timed writings on an essay topic similar to those which appear on the AP English Literature Test; teacher shall give written feedback on all but one of these every term (again, one shall be graded by the student’s classmates based on the District Rubric), and students shall have the opportunity to rewrite for a higher grade
Half of these tests will be AP English Literature Test multiple-choice sections either from actual AP Tests or from applied practice or other resources

Unit Three: Feminism and Realism

(Gender Roles, Options for Women, Escapes, Gender Issues, etc.: Nov.)

This unit shall focus especially on the literature of the middle and late nineteenth century and gender issues in the distant past, in the nineteenth century, and today. Emphasis in our analysis of the reading shall be Freudian and feminist interp.

Readings:

The Awakening (K. Chopin)
A Doll’s House (H. Ibsen: presented by us on our “stage”)
Lyric poetry by Sappho
Lyric poetry by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Lyric poetry by Christina Rossetti

Writing Assignments:

Students shall continue to journal every night in their Response Journals(personal, analytical responses related to that night’s required outside reading—depending on the night, a freewrite reacting to the work’s setting, protagonist, conflict, narrator, mood, tone, imagery, rhetoric, structure (linear and subplots), rising action, climax, resolution, or theme)—and, again, a value judgment is to be included in the student’s response (along with support from the reading for that judgment)
Again, at the end of every five-week outside reading period, a complete holistic analysis of the outside-reading work just read shall be produced and edited (for edited, proofread, and printed RJ’s receive an automatic 10% grade-raise)
Again, at the end of every monthly unit, there will be a test: Half of these timed writings on an essay topic similar to those which appear on the AP English Literature Test; again, teacher shall give written feedback on all but one of these every term (one shall be graded by the student’s classmates based on the District Rubric), and students shall always have the opportunity to rewrite for a higher grade

Assessments:

Again, at the end of every monthly unit, there will be a test: Half of these to be timed writings on an essay topic similar to those which appear on the AP English Literature Test; teacher shall give written feedback on all but one of these every term (again, one test per quarter shall be graded by the student’s classmates based on the District Rubric), and students shall have the opportunity to rewrite for a higher grade
Again, one test each quarter will be a multiple-choice test similar to what appears on the multiple-choice section of the AP English Literature Test; during this unit only there shall be no assessment other than the bi-weekly exams.

Unit Four: Society’s Pressure on the Individual

(The High Price of Conformity - and the High Price of Individuality: Dec.)

Readings:

“Bartleby the Scrivener” (H. Melville)
Lyric poetry by Emily Dickinson
Lyric poetry by Percy Bysshe Shelley
The Waste Land T. S. Eliot)
One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest (K. Kesey)
“A Perfect Day for Bananafish” (J. D. Salinger)

Writing Assignments:

Students shall continue to journal every night in their Response Journals (this shall be the last unit that makes use of the regular Response Journal; next semester the Response Journal shall become the Annotated Response Journal: See handout);again, these are to be personal, analytical responses related to that night’s required outside reading (depending on the night, a freewrite reacting to the work’s setting, protagonist, conflict, narrator, mood, tone, imagery, rhetoric, structure (linear and subplots), rising action, climax, resolution, or theme)—and, again, a value judgment should be included in the student’s response (along with support from the reading for that judgment)
Again, at the end of every five-week outside reading period, a complete holistic analysis of the outside-reading work just read shall be produced and edited (for edited, proofread, and printed RJ’s receive an automatic 10% grade-raise)
Again, at the end of every monthly unit, there will be a test: Half of these will be timed writings on an essay topic similar to those which appear on the AP English Literature Test; teacher shall give written feedback on all but one of these every term (one shall be graded by the student’s classmates based on the District Rubric), and students shall always have the opportunity to rewrite for a higher grade

Assessments:

Again, at the end of every monthly unit, there will be a test: Half of these will be timed writings on an essay topic similar to those which appear on the AP English Literature Test; again, teacher shall give written feedback on all but one of these every term (again, one shall be graded by the student’s classmates based on the District Rubric), and students shall have the opportunity to rewrite for a higher grade
Again, one test each quarter will be a multiple-choice test similar to the multiple-choice section of the AP English Literature Test

Unit Five: Existentialism and Man’s Search for Meaning (Jan.)