Advanced Placement English Literature & Composition

2008-09

 

Teacher:	Mr. Noah Tonk	Classroom:	Room 729
Email:	tonkn@vail.k12.az.us	Phone:	520-879-2844
Web:	www.mrtonk.com	Planning:	None

 

COURSE DESCRIPTION

The AP English Literature and Composition course is designed to engage students in the careful reading and critical analysis of imaginative literature, and is designed to comply with the curricular requirements described in the AP English Course Description. Through the close reading of selected texts, students can deepen their understanding of the ways writers use language to provide both meaning and pleasure for their readers. As they read, students should consider a work’s structure, style, and themes, as well as such smaller-scale elements as the use of figurative language, imagery, symbolism, and tone. The course will include intensive study of representative works of recognized literary merit from American, British, and World authors written from the sixteenth through the twentieth centuries. As this is meant to be a college-level course, the literature is meant to challenge not only students’ perceptions of themselves as readers and writers, but to challenge their perceptions of the world surrounding them. Writing is an integral part of the AP English Literature and Composition course, as the AP examination is weighted toward student writing about literature. Writing assignments should focus on the critical analysis of literature and should include expository, analytical, argumentative essays. Students are expected (but not required) to take the AP English Literature and Composition test, for which they pay their own test fees. AP English Literature and Composition is also intended to support the skills necessary for the creation and development of the Senior Exit Project’s formal research paper.

 

COURSE OBJECTIVES

Students will:

1.     Demonstrate a wide-ranging vocabulary used with denotative accuracy and connotative resourcefulness;

2.     Write using a variety of sentence structures, including appropriate use of subordinate and coordinate constructions;

3.     Organize writing logically, using such specific techniques of coherence as repetition, transitions, and emphasis to enhance the organization of the writing;

4.     Construct argumentative literary analyses that strikes a balance between generalization and the use of specific, illustrative details;

5.     Demonstrate an effective use of rhetoric, including controlling tone, maintaining a consistent voice, and achieving emphasis through interpretive thesis statements, parallelism and antithesis;

6.     Read closely, taking time to understand a work’s complexity, to absorb its richness of meaning, and to analyze how that meaning is embodied in literary form;

7.     Reflect on how literary meaning is shaped by social and historical contexts;

8.     Make and record careful observations of textual detail;

9.     Establish connections between different observations;

10.  Draw from those connections a series of inferences leading to an interpretive conclusion about a literary work’s meaning and value;

11.  Gain awareness that the English language has changed dramatically through history and exists today in many national and local varieties;

12.  Recognize, interpret, and evaluate the use of literary and rhetorical devices in literature;

13.  Recognize, interpret, and evaluate how the author constructs theme through narrative techniques, resources of language, and literary and rhetorical devices;

14.  Write and revise timed essays written in response to specific prompts dealing with short or excerpted works of poetry and prose;

15.  Write and revise timed essays written in response to prompts demanding intricate, detailed knowledge of a variety of works of recognized literary merit.

 

PRIMARY TEXTS

Bloy, Barbara. English Literature: Close Reading and Analytic Writing. Peoples Publishing, 2006.

Foster, Thomas. How to Read Literature Like a Professor. New York: HarperCollins, 2003.

Griffith, Kelley. Writing Essays about Literature. Thomson, 2006.

Kirszner, Laurie & Stephen Mandell. Literature: Reading, Reacting, Writing. New York: Harcourt, 2001.

 

REQUIRED NOVELS & WORKS

Martel, Yann. Life of Pi. Orlando: Harcourt, 2001.

Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. New York: Norton, 1996.

Shakespeare, William. Hamlet. New York: Preswick, 2005.

Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart. New York: Anchor, 1994.

 

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES

Arp, Thomas & Greg Johnson. Perrine’s Sound & Sense. Thomson, 2005.

Casson, Allan. Cliff’s AP: English Literature and Composition. 4^th ed. Wiley, 2001.

Murfin, Ross & Supryia Ray. The Bedford Glossary of Critical and Literary Terms. Bedford, 2003.

 

INDEPENDENT READING TEXTS

Students choose four of the following texts to read, annotate, and study for the Elements of Literature Portfolio (one per quarter):

 

Willa Cather, My Antonia

Amy Tan, The Bonesetter’s Daughter

Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale

George Orwell, 1984

Edward Albee, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

John Fowles, The French Lieutenant’s Woman

Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead

Dante Aligheri, The Inferno

Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre

Richard Wright, Native Son

Joseph Heller, Catch-22

Michael Cunningham, The Hours

Jack Kerouac, On the Road; The Dharma Bums

Barbara Kingsolver, The Poisonwood Bible

Norman McLean, A River Runs Through It

Aeschylus, Oresteia

Pearl S. Buck, The Good Earth

Ken Kesey, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

Louise Erdrich, Love Medicine

Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot

Rudolfo Anaya, Bless Me, Ultima

Khaled Hosseini, A Thousand Splendid Suns

Sue Monk Kidd, The Secret Life of Bees

Tim O’Brien, The Things They Carried

Edson, Margaret. Wit.

Kate Chopin, The Awakening

 

Other texts may be selected per approval of the teacher.

 

 

 

 

 

“ELEMENTS OF LITERATURE” PORTFOLIO

Basic Components:

·    Grammar & writing instruction notes

·    Notes on literary & rhetorical devices

·    Allusion notes on origins of references to the Bible, Western fairy tales, Greek mythology, and pop culture.

·    Daily exploratory & informal writing in response to short or excerpted literary works from Literature: Reading, Reacting, Writing, Perrine’s Sound & Sense, or English Literature: Close Reading and Analytic Writing or in response to released College Board writing prompts.

·    Written analyses justifying correct answers to periodic practice AP multiple choice quizzes; the questions are taken directly from released exams.

·    Dialectical journal for one approved novel per quarter, read independently of class activities.

·    Vocabulary journal, containing words that are new to the student or words that the student already knows but are used in a new context. Vocabulary must be accompanied by the sentence in which it appears in the original text and a brief definition.

·    One open topic essay for each of the independent and group novels.

 

Each week, students will be required to take notes on teacher- or student-led presentations on grammar and mechanics, literary and rhetorical devices, and origins of common, important literary allusions. The portfolio will be assessed quarterly and must reflect notes taken on each concept studied in class and include short, exploratory, informal writing constructed in response to a variety of literary works. At the end of each semester, students may revise and submit, for feedback and formal grading, one open topic essay from the portfolio.

 

STUDENT ESSAYS

Students will write a 40 minute, timed essay in response to a prompt taken from a released AP Literature exam every three weeks. During the first semester, students must complete these timed essays at home in good faith; during second semester they will be completed in class. These and other written work must use specific and well-chosen evidence to articulate an argument about poems, works of drama, and fiction, basing these arguments on close textual analysis of structure, style, figurative language, imagery, symbolism, tone, and the social or historical values of the work. On “off” weeks, students will either take a quiz on material (literary elements, allusions, grammar) from the previous three weeks or write a thesis statement and evidence set in response to a “quick prompt”, based on a released AP essay prompt or a prompt from English Literature: Close Reading and Analytic Writing. The student will choose one of the “quick prompt” responses from the previous three weeks to expand into a full essay. This essay will be peer-graded. At the end of each quarter, the student will choose one of the peer-graded essays to revise and turn in to the teacher for formal feedback and assessment. The rate of formal essay submission will increase to three per quarter during the second semester.

 

Essays will be graded using a variety of methods. Peer-assessment is a valuable means of writing instruction; when one can learn to see strengths and weaknesses in the writing of others, it becomes easier to see strengths and weaknesses of one’s own work. In addition, it is vital to understand the mechanics of the AP College Board rubric, and actually using the rubric to score real essays is the best means of achieving this. As such, many essays will include scores and feedback generated by consensus from a group of peer graders; I will review these scores for accuracy and make changes as needed, but written feedback on these essays will come from the students. Before assigning scores, students will be “calibrated” using sample essays and scores supplied by the College Board.

 

 

Teacher-assessed essays will be scored using a variety of strategies, though all will include the scoring of the essay with a universal version of the AP College Board essay rubric. These include:

·    Holistic grading, taking into account everything that should be in the essay and noting all strengths and weaknesses.

·    Grading for only one aspect, even ignoring the rest. This may be used for such things as effective introductions, developing arguments, tone, supporting statements, effective closing paragraphs, the integration of quotations, and the structure of the body paragraphs.

·    Only using the rubric to assign a score and providing no feedback. In this event, students will be required to work (independently or with peers) on analyzing the essay and marking those parts that help to explain the score. In this case, the student may be required to hold a writing conference with me in which the student conducts the conference and explains the reason for the score.

·    Only written feedback is provided, with no score attached. Students will be responsible for using the written commentary to determine the appropriate score. Written or verbal explanation for the score may be required.

·    Papers written later in the year may be marked merely with X’s for errors and √’s for things they did well. Students would then be responsible for determining why those marks were given, based on performance on previous essays.

·    Other strategies as needed or brilliantly devised.

 

All essays scoring less than 6 on the AP rubric may be revised and resubmitted for a better grade. At the end of each semester, the two lowest essay scores for each student will be exempted from that student’s grade.

 

How AP Rubric Scores are converted to essay grades

Start with a total possible of eighteen points. You receive nine of these points merely for completing the essay. Each point from the rubric is then added to the nine completion points. The score is then converted to a percentage and then a number out of 100.

 

AP Rubric Score	Points Earned	Essay Score (out of 100)
9	18/18	100
8	17/18	94
7	16/18	88
6	15/18	83
5	14/18	77
4	13/18	72
3	12/18	66
2	11/18	61
1	10/18	55
0 (but submitted)	9/18	50

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

ONLINE RESOURCES:

 

Turnitin.com

With the exception of in-class timed writings, all students are required to electronically submit all drafts of all formal writing assignments completed at home online at www.turnitin.com. Instructions on how to do this will be given in class, posted on the classroom website, and distributed as a handout. Failure to read directions will not excuse students from this requirement; nor will limited computer access. If there is an internet connection issue, students must show up prior to the start of the next school day after the due date with a copy of the document on a disk or otherwise electronically provided for me. Otherwise, please see the late policy. Please note that someformal writing assignments will also need to be printed and submitted as a hard copy IN ADDITION to being uploaded.

Class ID: 2277608

Password: tonkap

 

MrTonk.com

Assignment instructions, handouts, and other resources are available for perusal and download at http://www.mrtonk.com. In addition, daily lesson plan summaries will be posted on the Senior English blog. Many, but not all, of these summaries will include an audio or video podcast of lectures or discussions. Students who are absent are expected to view the lesson plan summaries and listen to or watch the podcast in order to attempt to make up the classroom experience. All PowerPoint presentations given in class will be uploaded as QuickTime files, and most will include accompanying audio from the day they were presented. Finally, a general calendar for assignments will be available and frequently updated. Please check it periodically to ensure compliance with assignment due dates.

 

Google Online Discussion Group

All students are required to have a working email address and to register that email address at http://groups.google.com/group/tonkapenglish. Important announcements and handouts will be distributed through this discussion group, and periodically, students will be required to respond to the group as a whole regarding a topic related to a work currently being studied in class. Students are required to regularly check their email accounts, and to notify Mr. Tonk when a change of email address occurs.

 

SUMMER ASSIGNMENT:

For the summer assignment, to be completed prior to the start of the first quarter, students must do the following:

q      Read How to Read Literature Like a Professor, by Thomas Foster

q      Read Life of Pi, by Yann Martel

q      Online commentary on Life of Pi – Due July 2 & July 9, Turnitin.com, by 8 AM.

q      Life of Pi literary analysis – Due July 14, Turnitin.com, by 8:00 AM.

q      Literary Terms Collection – Bring a hard copy to class on the first day (July 18).

 

Additional details will be provided as part of the summer reading assignment packet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

UNITS, WORKS, AND THEMES

First Quarter: The Relationship Between Truth & Faith

Allusion Focus: The Bible

Primary Work: Life of Pi

Poetry and short fiction from Literature: Reading, Reacting, Writing includes, but is not limited to:

·    “The Second Coming”, W.B. Yeats

·    “Miss Brill”, Katherine Mansfield

·    “I Stand Here Ironing”, by Tillie Olsen

·    Additional works to be announced

 

Novel excerpts:

·    Excerpt from Pierre, or the Ambiguities, Herman Melville

·    Excerpt from Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf

·    Excerpt from The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde

·    Additional works to be announced

 

Other:

·    “One-Word Poem”, David Slavitt

 

One of the following:

·    Hesse, Herman. Siddhartha. New York: Dover, 1999.

·    Silko, Leslie M. Ceremony. New York: Penguin, 1986.

·    Vonnegut, Kurt. Slaughterhouse Five. New York: Dell, 1991.

·    McCarthy, Cormac. The Road. New York: Vintage, 2006

 

Writing Instruction:

Students will scaffold the development of essential skills in writing effective essays through multiple revisions of the personal college essay and the summer literary analysis essay. Essays will be revised for effective introductions, the development of supporting ideas, effective closing paragraphs, and body paragraph structure. The teacher will provide a review of basic grammar concepts.

 

Literary Analysis:

Students will be introduced to formal and informal methods for explicating a text, and will explore the concept of literary-theme-as-thesis. Students will examine the methods of formalist and reader-response criticism.

 

Second Quarter: The Power of Redemption

Allusion Focus: Fairy tales

Primary Work: Frankenstein

Poetry and short fiction from Literature: Reading, Reacting, Writing includes, but is not limited to:

·    “On Passing Thru Morgantown, PA”, Sonia Sanchez

·    “The City Planners”, Margaret Atwood

·    “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer”, Walt Whitman

·    “The Unknown Citizen”, W.H. Auden

·    “Story of an Hour”, Kate Chopin

·    Additional works to be announced

 

 

Novel excerpts:

·    Excerpt from The Master Butcher’s Singing Club, Louise Erdrich

·    Additional works to be announced

 

One of the following:

Atwood, Margaret. Oryx & Crake. New York: Anchor, 2004.

Morrison, Toni. Beloved. New York: Vintage, 2004.

Hosseini, Khaled. The Kite Runner. New York: Riverhead, 2003.

Andre Dubus, House of Sand and Fog. New York: Vintage, 2000.

 

Writing Instruction:

Students will continue to develop essential skills for the AP essay, focusing on argument development, tone, consistency in voice, and the proper integration of quotations; students will begin writing biweekly timed essays this quarter in response to College Board prose & poetry prompts. Grammar instruction will focus on the development of a variety of sentence structures using both subordination and coordination.

 

Literary Analysis:

In preparation for writing timed essay responses to literature, students will learn and practice methods of analysis particularly suited to poetry, such as TPCASST and DIDLS, and will examine the methods of historical and psychological criticism.

 

The final exam for the semester will be designed to resemble the AP English Literature and Composition Exam and is required of all students.

 

Third Quarter: Humanity’s Quest for Identity

Allusion Focus: Popular Culture

Primary Work: Hamlet

Poetry and short fiction from Literature: Reading, Reacting, Writing includes, but is not limited to:

·    “To His Coy Mistress”, Andrew Marvell

·    Excerpt from “An Essay on Man”, Alexander Pope

·    “Ex-Basketball Player”, John Updike

·    “What is an Epigram?”, Samuel Coleridge

·    “You Fit Into Me”, Margaret Atwood

·    “The Eagle”, Alfred Lord Tennyson

·    Additional works to be announced

 

Other:

·    Excerpt from Hamlet

·    Additional works to be announced

 

One of the following:

Sophocles, Oedipus Rex. Publisher TBA.

Kesey, Ken. One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. New York: Penguin, 1999.

Shakespeare, William. Macbeth. New York: Washington Square, 1992.

Conrad, Joseph. Heart of Darkness. Ed. Ross Murfin. Bedford, 1996.

 

 

 

 

Writing Instruction:

Students will begin to write timed essays for open topic prompts, in addition to continuing responses to prose- and poetry-based prompts. Students will develop the skills required for “mental revision” as they work on in-class essays, as well as effective, concise, and subtle transitions. Sentence fluency will evolve as students explore different methods of subordination using adjective, adverb, and noun clauses.

 

Literary Analysis:

Students will evaluate drama as a literary form. The class will complete a group project in which each group is assigned an act from Hamlet to analyze and rewrite in modern language, retaining themes, key dialogue, characters & their motivations, and important images created in the original text. In addition, each group member will choose a scene from the act to score using theatrical analysis methods involving character analysis, scene & line objectives, and blocking. Acts will be cast within the groups and filmed outside of class; complete work will be shown to the class following the AP Exam in May. Students will examine the methods of sociological and mythological criticism.

 

The midterm exam will be a full-length, released AP English Literature & Composition exam from the College Board, split across two block periods during the week prior to spring intersession break.

 

Fourth Quarter: Hubris: Arrogance & Pride

Allusion Focus: Greek myth

Primary Work: Things Fall Apart

Poetry and short fiction from Literature: Reading, Reacting, Writing includes, but is not limited to:

·    Excerpt from “The Bells”, Edgar Allan Poe

·    “The Tyger”, William Blake; “Jabberwocky”, Lewis Carroll

·    Additional works to be announced

 

Novel excerpts:

·    Excerpt from Siddhartha

·    Additional works to be announced

 

One of the following:

Tan, Amy. The Joy Luck Club. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2000.

Twain, Mark. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2005.

Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man. New York: Vintage, 1995.

Salinger, J.D. Catcher in the Rye. New York: Back Bay, 2001.

 

Writing Instruction:

Students will work to eliminate forms of the verb “to be” from their writing, as well as all instances of the first and second person; students will also work to ensure that no sentence is structured in the same manner as the sentence preceding or following it. Students will complete one major out-of-class essay comparing important literary and thematic elements of the primary work and the reading group novel in the context of an exploration of the concept of hubris.

 

Literary Analysis:

Students will focus on reacting to and evaluating literature on a first or second reading in order to prepare for rapid literary analysis in preparation for the timed writing essays. Students will also examine the methods of deconstructive and postmodernist criticism.

 

 

LATE WORK, TARDY, AND ABSENCE POLICIES:

·    Late work will be accepted when…

o      …the day’s lesson is not dependent upon the completion of the work, and

o      …it is turned in within three calendar days of the original due date. This work will be penalized 50%.

·    Late work will not be accepted when...

o      ...the student is present for a lesson that depends on the completion of previously assigned homework. Many assignments fall under this category.

§       Example: In class today, we are discussing pages 38-47 of the novel Things Fall Apart. You didn’t complete the notes, so Mr. Tonk doesn’t have any evidence that you completed the reading on time. You cannot be in class, listen to discussion, participate in the lesson, and then complete the notes later and expect credit.

o      In the sole judgment of Mr. Tonk, extreme circumstances may warrant rare exceptions to this late policy. Frequent requests by a student that circumstances be considered “extreme” will result in the suspension of this exception for that student.

·    Students have two calendar days for each class absence to make up missed work, and must do so according to procedures outlined in the “Student Rules & Procedures” handout. Students may not receive assignment credit for unexcused absences.

·    Homework due on the day the student returns to class, and assigned prior to the student’s absence, is expected to be complete when the student returns to class; otherwise, it is considered late.

·    Vacations, school trips, and student employment will never count as reasons to hand in an assignment late.

·    Bellwork assignments must be made up. It is up to the student to speak with peers or consult MrTonk.com in order to get the writing prompt or other assignment. Students may also opt to write an appropriate number of lines about why they were absent; this is required of students who are absent on a day when independent reading was assigned as the bellwork. If collected, bellwork assigned when a student is absent will be recorded in PowerSchool as “ABS”, with a value of ‘0’ until the student makes it up. Students have two calendar days for each absence in which to make up work. Makeup work may be submitted online at MrTonk.com.

·    Students talking during bellwork will be given a score of TLKNG in PowerSchool, which is equivalent to a ‘0’.

·    It is CHS policy that students who reach 12 non-school related absences will not be allowed to get credit for the course in which the absences occurred.

 

These requirements must be followed regardless of the reasons for the absences. Remember, credit for a course implies that you have mastered the skills and content for that course. Excessive absences may prevent you from doing so. The grade expectations for excessive absences reflect your commitment to demonstrate mastery of the course without having to attend. It is also important to note that if you missed this much time at your job, without compensating for it, you would be fired.

 

EXTRA CREDIT:

Students are allowed to gain 100 points of extra credit per semester; however, almost the only permissible extra credit assignments are those contained on the “Acceptable Extra Credit” sheet in this syllabus. Extra credit is not meant to be a substitute for the regular classwork. Students may only receive extra credit if they have completed every assignment for the semester or the equivalent. If a student is missing assignments and requests extra credit, that student will be expected to complete all missing assignments before extra credit will be permitted. Work that is handed in late under this policy will be given a grade of “NC” or “No Credit.” Extra credit may be withdrawn from a student’s grade if he or she is missing assignments by the end of the semester.

 

FINAL EXAMS

The final exam will be comprehensive, covering all content and skills studied during both semesters. Certain accommodations may be made for students entering class more than one month after the start of the semester. Students who choose to take the official College Board exam on May will be exempt from the in-class final exam, but must still complete the final project for the course.

 

GRADING SCALE

100-90% - A

80-89.9% - B

70-79.9% - C

60-69.9% - D

<60% - F

 

Students’ borderline grades will only be rounded up to the next grade level if they have handed in all of their assigned work on time or within the late penalty grace period.

 

BEHAVIOR EXPECTATIONS

·    I will not engage in any behavior that could disrupt my own learning or the learning of others.

·    I will not disrespect myself by engaging in any behavior that is disrespectful of others.