Course Description and Content

A.P. LITERATURE AND COMPOSITION Course Description and Content

Through thematic units, this 18-week A.P. Literature and Composition course studies a wide range of literature, spanning many centuries and genres. The class teaches the type of writing that is typically required at the undergraduate college level, while meeting the curricular requirements in the AP English Course Description. Grammar and effective writing strategies are taught in mini-lessons and in one- on-one conferences with the teacher and student discussing the student’s writing. These conferences focus on helping the student to develop stylistic maturity through effective diction, sentence variety, organization, effective support and elaboration, and the use of tone and voice. After each conference, students have the opportunity to revise and re- write some papers for a higher grade; there are writing assignments where revision, rewriting, and resubmission is required. During the first half of the course, students are required to keep a Personal Response Journal where they record their responses to both the content and to the author’s style and use of language. The Personal Response Journals are also used for vocabulary enrichment as the students record new and unfamiliar vocabulary.

WILLFUL WOMEN

Greek drama / elements of tragedy: Medea and Antigone After reading and studying these two plays, students will write an evaluation essay that analyzes and argues the social and cultural values represented in the works.

Independent novel study—choose from Far From the Madding Crowd, Wuthering Heights, Howards End, Jane Eyre, Sula, Woman Warrior, Madame Bovary, Out of Africa. During the independent novel studies, students will turn in a Personal Response Journal that records the following:  Personal reaction to the reading  Comments on author’s style and use of language  New vocabulary Timed in-class essay over independent novel: What social values, norms, or expectations create conflict within the character? How does the character react to these internal conflicts? How does the character’s response to the conflict contribute to the novel’s overall meaning?

Poetry Workshop: Poetry of Anna Akhmatova, Dorothy Parker, Joyce Carol Oates, Sylvia Plath, Adrienne Rich, Edith Sitwell, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and others. This workshop covers the elements of poetry, poetry terms, and poetry analysis, and short, in- class assignments ask the students to show their understanding of the text and the poet’s technique. The study culminates in a lengthy explication paper that analyzes the diction, figurative language, imagery, tone, structure, and syntax of an assigned poem. Tone and Prose Analysis Workshop: This workshop introduces the students to prose analysis and close reading techniques. Selections include “Why I Live at the P.O,” a selection from Main Street, a selection from To the Lighthouse, and a selection from Sula. The workshop will focus on tone analysis and the recognition and analysis of textual details. At the end of the workshop, the students write an extended literary analysis of a prose passage.

THE RENAISSANCE: Historical context of the Renaissance; Renaissance poetry, Shakespearean tragedy

This study will look at the ideas that inspired the literature of the Renaissance and some major Renaissance poets, focusing on the sonnet form; sonnets from other periods, including the modern period, will also be studied, and students will write a sonnet and explicate a poem.

Shakespearean tragedy—in-class study of Hamlet, followed by an analysis paper that considers the tragic elements of the play as they relate to Hamlet. Students will also read Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead as the class explores ideas of existentialism and the absurdist literature. .

Independent study of another Shakespearean drama. Choose from The Merchant of Venice, Othello, King Lear, or Macbeth

During this independent reading, students will use a Personal Response Journal to record significant elements of the drama as they read, including commentary on key plot events, character development, motifs, symbols, key thematic ideas, and the use of language. As they read the play, the students will develop their own thesis, find support for their thesis, and argue their thesis in writing after they finish reading the play, using information from their Personal Response Journal.

THE DARKNESS WITHIN

Prose analysis and close reading: “Greasy Lake,” A Good Man Is Hard to Find,” and “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” Personal Response Journal, class discussion, timed in-class compare/contrast essay.

In-class novel study: Heart of Darkness This novel study includes a close look at the social and historical background and Conrad’s use of language (imagery, symbolism, style, etc.), and is followed by an extended expository essay addressing the story’s meaning. WHAT’S SO FUNNY?

This unit is a study of satire and ironic tone, focusing on the context of satire during the Restoration Period / The Age of Reason. The focus will be on techniques and forms of satire. Students will write short interpretation papers focusing on point of view and tone, as well as some short prose analysis papers. The study will conclude with a timed write that analyzes speaker’s tone and technique.

This unit includes the study of the following works: Candide, “A Modest Proposal,” “The Rape of the Lock,” Bronte’s letter to Southey, selections from Anthony Trollope, and selections from modern satire.

RESEARCH ASSIGNMENT—The Story of a Masterpiece

This assignment focuses on challenges of research writing; the assignment also reinforces basic research skills and helps the students to become more familiar with style rules. Students will research an artist, his or her art and style, the historical context in which he or she worked, and the techniques employed by the artist, and record these findings in a paper that strictly follows the MLA style rules for form and documentation of sources. In addition, the student will pick one to two pieces of this artist’s work and write an analytical paper explaining how the piece(s) reflects what the student has researched.

At the conclusion of the paper, the student will summarize his or her findings, prepare a power-point presentation, and present this information to the other students in the class.

“LET NATURE BE YOUR TEACHER”—THE ENGLISH ROMANTICS

This unit includes a general study of the English Romantic movement, focusing on Blake, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, Shelly, and Keats. After a general overview of these poets, each student will study one of the Romantic poets in depth and prepare his or her findings in an MLA style paper, strictly following MLA style rules on form and documentation of sources. The paper will include the following information:  Background on the Romantic period and Romantic poetry  Biographical information of selected Romantic poet  An in-depth analysis and explication of two poems by the selected poet; the essay will include original conclusions about the poems that result from the researched information about the poet.

In addition, the student will prepare an oral presentation of the information and the poem explications and present this information to the class. THE VICTORIANS

During this unit students will study and analyze several poems of the period. The study will culminate in the student writing a literary analysis that compares and contrasts two poems from this time period. The poems studied will include selections from the following poets: Tennyson, Robert Browning (dramatic monologue), E.B. Browning, Baudelaire, Arnold, Kipling, Hardy, Houseman, Rimbaud

Types of Literary Criticism: This study combines the study of literary criticism with an independent novel study. Small group independent novel study—Choose from Austen, Jane Eyre, Frankenstein, Hardy, Dickens, Elliot, Trollope

Assignment: The students will find a piece of well-written (teacher approved) literary criticism on the novel they read and write an abstract of the criticism following an assigned format. The students will then participate in a series of Socratic seminars where those who read the same novel will discuss the work and the criticism.

Victorian drama: The Importance of Being Earnest and Pygmalion. Students will review the elements of drama; in addition, students will examine the plays in the context of the societies they present and the writer’s purpose. The readings of these plays will be followed by an extended expository/analytical essay that interprets and evaluates the meanings of the texts.

MODERN POETRY AND PROSE

Substantial class time the last two weeks of class will be spent in specific preparation for the A.P. Literature and Composition exam. We will see how the literary analysis skills we have learned foster a greater appreciation for the reading and study of poetry as we look at a wide range of modern poets. This list includes but is not limited to Yeats, Elliot, Auden, Spender, Akhmatova, MacNeice, Thomas, Owen, Sassoon, Heaney, Hughes, Larkin, Smith, St. Vincent Millay, Plath, Roethke, Williams, and Collins. We will also spend some time in the reading and analysis of short fiction (including works by Orwell, Lessing, Woolf, Gordimer, and others).

______

Primary Text: Perrine, Laurence. Literature: Structure, Sound, and Sense.

Supplementary Texts: Medea—Euripedes, Hamlet—Shakespeare, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead—Tom Stoppard, Heart of Darkness—Joseph Conrad, Candide— Voltaire, Literature: Timeless Voices, Timeless Themes—Pearson Prentice Hall, Publisher