SHK--Final projects 2010

Follow this link to project requirements and schedule.

English IV--Summer Reading List

English IV & AP
2010 Recommended summer reading

Prior to the first week of the new school year, please read at least one of the following titles, all written by authors from the British Isles or Commonwealth. If you are enrolled in English IV AP, please select at least two titles, one from list I and one from list II. You are, of course, encouraged to choose additional titles for your own pleasure reading. (N.B. “H” designates historical fiction, set in a period earlier than its date of composition; “F” represents a work set in the future.)

I. Nineteenth century
Jane Austen, Persuasion (1818)
Charlotte Bronte, Jane Eyre (1847)
Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights (1847)
Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities (1859) (H)
Thomas Hardy, Tess of the D’Urbervilles (1891)
Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (1818)

II. Twentieth/Twenty-first century
Richard Adams, Watership Down (1972)
Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale (1986) (F)
Pat Barker, Regeneration (1991) (H)
Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange (1962) (F)
A.S. Byatt, Possession (1990)
Peter Carey, The True History of the Kelly Gang (2000) (H)
Roddy Doyle, The Van (1991)
Nadine Gordimer, July’s People (1981)
Graham Greene, The Quiet American (1955)
Mark Haddon, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time (2003)
George Hagen, Tom Bedlam (2007) (H)
Nick Hornby, High Fidelity (1995)
Aldous Huxley, Brave New World (1932) (F)
Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day (1989) (H)
C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters (1942)
Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall (2009) (H)
Yann Martel, Life of Pi (2002)
Ian McEwan, Atonement (2001) (H)
Rohinton Mistry, A Fine Balance (1995) (H)
Patrick O’Brian, Master and Commander (1969) (H)
Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient (1992) (H)
George Orwell, 1984 (1949) (F)
Graham Swift, Waterland (1983)
Barry Unsworth, Sacred Hunger (1992) (H) or Morality Play (1995) (H)

Several of these novels have been adapted into fine movies. Feel free to rent the film after you read the novel, as you could elect to write a brief comparison of the two for your first written assignment.

Shakespeare--important dates

Friday, April 16--Vocab 23, 24
Wed. April 21 -- Test on Twelfth Night (ID's, a few passages, a short essay topic)
Friday, April 23 -- Sonnet performances in honor of Shakespeare's (and Sarah's) birthday (thanks to Sarah A and Salona for cake and cookies)
Tuesday, April 27 -- Review plays & vocab lessons 25 & 26
Wednesday, April 28 -- Selection of final performance projects
Friday, April 30 -- Last vocab quiz (25, 26)
Thurs, May 13 -- Final project performances in Dorrance, 11:30 - 12:15, public invited
Friday, May 14 -- Last day of class
Saturday, May 15 -- Prom
Monday, May 17 -- Awards Day
Tuesday, May 18 to Friday May 21 -- Senior class trip
Monday, May 24 -- Final exams for any unfortunate souls with averages below 72.5%
Thursday, June 3 -- Graduation rehearsal, graduation
Friday & Saturday, June 4 & 5 --Greer Days celebration & parade

AP--week of April 12

Day 1--small group discussions of The Glass Menagerie. All answers must be supported by examples drawn from the text of the play.
Group 1--what are Amanda's admirable qualities? How do they add to the presentation of her character? How sympathetic is her total portrayal in the play?
Group 2--Why does Jim respond so warmly, even protectively, to Laura? What do they have in common? Why does he pull back from her so suddenly?
Group 3--How does Tom, unlike Laura, protect himself from the debilitating atmosphere of the apartment? How do his soliloquies employ irony to illustrate his methods of psychological self-defense?

Day 2--before class, read Arthur Miller's essay "Tragedy and the Common Man," on p. 1833. Which of his ideas about tragedy differ most sharply from those implied in the plays of Sophocles and Shakespeare? in class, read the handout from "The Play is Memory," by Benjamin Nelson. Discuss this question: to what extent do you agree with his implication that the major shortcoming of The Glass Menagerie is that its characters lack tragic stature?

Day 3--Read Act 1 of Fences; come to class prepared to discuss your initial impressions of all the central characters. Also, in-class exercise on AP style analysis.

Day 4--vocab 23 & 24 quiz. Short video on the career of August Wilson. Continue reading and researching your outside novels.

Monday, April 19--finish reading Fences.

Final projects--African-American Lit

Suggested reading list for final projects.
N.B. Projects must be “multi-media” in some way. That is, the reading may be accompanied by research in an area related to its theme, into African-American popular culture, into film, art, and music, and the results of this learning are to by synthesized into a powerpoint presentation involving text and either audio or visual supplements.


Alice Walker -- The Color Purple
James Baldwin -- If Beale Street Could Talk
Audre Lorde ???
Gloria Naylor -- Mama Day, The Women of Brewster Place
Ishmael Reed -- Mumbo Jumbo
Rita Dove -- Mother Love
Ntozake Shange -- Nappy Edges, for colored girls who have considered suicide . .
Toni Morrison -- Bluest Eye, Sula, Jazz
Lucille Clifton -- Adventures of Everett Anderson—all volumes
Terri MacMillan -- Waiting to Exhale
Carolivia Herron -- Thereafter, Johnnie
Barbara Smith -- Home Girls
Paule Marshall -- Brown Girl, Brownstones
August Wilson -- The Piano Lesson
Ernest Gaines -- The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman
Alex Haley -- Roots
Maya Angelou -- I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Walter Mosley -- Devil in a Blue Dress

AP schedule April 5 - May 6

Week of April 5--Read The Glass Menagerie, scenes 1 - 5, pp. 1836 - 1860 for Thursday; multiple choice practice quiz Friday; blog on outside reading over the weekend.

Week of April 12--reading blogs due Sunday night; read The Glass Menagerie, scenes 6 & 7, pp. 1860 - 1885 for Monday; Read Fences, Act 1, pp. 1996 - 2026 for Thursday; vocab quiz 23-24 Friday.

Week of April 19--Read Fences, act 2, pp. 2026 - 2048 for Monday; multiple choice practice quiz Friday; finish novels and JStor research for papers

Week of April 26--Write papers; five typed pages due in class Tuesday/Wednesday; final drafts due Friday, April 30 (approx 2000 words); 60-minute multiple choice practice exam Thursday April 29.

Week of May 3--Exam review; exams in Government, French, Spanish, Statistics, Calculus, and Chinese; AP exam in English literature Thursday, May 6, 7:45 AM.

No class Friday, May 7

Week of May 10--To be Announced. We will definitely have class Friday May 14 (last day for seniors)

AP--Link to reading list

Here is the assignment for the final paper of this course.

Hurston paper

English IV: African-American Literature
Paper assignment
February 2010

WHAT: A three- to four-page paper (approximately 1000 words) discussing Hurston’s development of the character of Janie Crawford in the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God.

WHEN: Papers are due, both hard copy and to turnitin.com, Tuesday, March 2.

HOW: Trace Hurston’s presentation of Janie through the major stages of her life: childhood with Nanny, marriages to Logan, Jody, and Tea Cake, and sitting on her porch telling her story to Pheoby. Locate and discuss evidence of the growth of Janie’s strength and sense of self. Which of her thoughts, feelings, and actions are most indicative of the woman she becomes through the forty years of her life? To what extent does she embody the lives and concerns of women in general, not just those of one semi-literate Southern rural experience?

Outside sources for this assigment are optional. But if you do choose to do any research, be certain to document the source of your content, both verbatim quotations and broader concepts or ideas, in the text of your essay and on a works cited page.

DETAILS: Include a word count and digital receipt number in your heading. Submit your paper under the assignment titled “Hurston paper”.

SUGGESTIONS: Think about the issues that affect women, both in life and in literature—issues such as autonomy, self-expression, the need for community, self-determination, sexuality, the desire to love and be loved, and equality—and look for evidence of these themes in Janie’s experience. Which are most important to Janie? Where does she make the most progress? Where does she remain the same?

Hurston journal entry

Their Eyes Were Watching God
Chapters 19 & 20

A few things stood out to me when I re-read the ending of the novel:

1. When the hurricane comes (even though that's in chapter 18) Janie, Tea Cake, and their friends on the Muck can't interpret the warning signs. The narrator even points out that the Seminoles and the local wildlife start fleeing before the storm, but ironically the Black farm workers are lulled into a false sense of confidence because they are making good money with their work and because the Whites are not fleeing.

2. The scene is West Palm Beach where Tea Cake is forced to work burying the dead from the hurricane is one of the few places in the novel where racism is explicitly addressed. Even in death, and despite the stench of decomposition, White corpses receive better treatment than the common grave of the Blacks, and local police use their power arbitrarily to force refugees like Tea Cake to labor without pay.

3. The death of Tea Cake is a powerful scene. It's not fully clear why Janie doesn't hide the gun she finds under Tea Cake's pillow, but she is conscious enough of the fear that is taking over his mind to turn the cylinder so that three empty chambers will be the first fired. As a result, she has time to defend herself, making sure to wait until Tea Cake's intentions to harm her are clear, after he fires all three empty cylinders. Only then does she use the rifle to keep him from shooting her with a live cylinder.

4. Janie's trial is curiously understated. She tells her story to judge and jury, but rather than let us hear her testimony in her own words, the narrator summarizes, telling us "she just sat there and told and when she was through she hushed." In a law court, as at Jody's store, Janie's direct voice is absent, reminding us that the only time in the novel she has consistently had a strong, clear voice was while she was with Tea Cake.

5. And in the telling of her story to Pheoby. Inspired by Janie's recounting of her life story, especially of her time on the Muck, Pheoby says, "Ah done growed ten feet higher from jus' listening' to you, Janie." Despite Janie's grief over Tea Cake's death, she has come home satisfied to be there, having learned from her life's journey, "Two things everybody's got tuh do fuh theyselves. They got to go tuh God, and they got tuh find out about livin' fuh theyselves." She can sit on her porch in peace, finally able to "pull in her horizon like a fish-net." (483)

Shakespeare paper assignment

http://mrcoonsenglish.blogspot.com/2009/02/shakespeare-shylock-paper.html

Due Tuesday, March 2, both hard copy and turnitin.com

AP--February 16 - March 12

For Tuesday and Wednesday, February 16 & 17--Poetry wrap-up

For Thursday, February 18--In-class essay: Poetry analysis

For Friday, February 19: Vocab quiz, lessons 17 & 18. Read Oedipus The King, pages 1277 - 1322. Also read my Introduction to Tragedy and the questions at the end of the play. This is one of the most famous plays in all of Western literature. Why do you think that is? How does Sophocles give the play both philosophical and psychological depth in addition to developing the emotional tension which is central to the experience of all drama, especially tragedy? What does Oedipus’ story represent? How does it raise issues relevant to all human life? This weekend, group 1 will blog on some aspect of this play (entries due over the weekend by Sunday evening, please), while group 2 will post comments on at least 5 of your classmates blogs (be polite, be respectful, be responsive to others’ ideas—comments due by Monday night February 22).

[Group 1: Sarah B, Bianca, Ariel, Hannah, Maude, Basil, Yuka, Michael, Patrick, Peter, Margo, David, Margaret M, MacKenzie, Taylor, Ari; group 2: everyone else. Thank you, Spenser, for using random numbers to generate these groups.]

For Thursday, February 25: Read Antigone, pages 1323 - 1352 in our anthology. Look at the links on my blog and the questions at the end of the play. Why is Antigone’s dilemma important? What does it represent? Which character, Antigone or Creon, best fits the definition of the tragic character from the Introduction to Tragedy? Blog entries for group 2 are due Sunday evening, February 28. Comments (at least 5) from group 1 are due by Monday evening March 1. Multiple choice quiz Friday the 26th.

For Tuesday and Wednesday, March 2 & 3--Read Acts 1 & 2 of Hamlet, pp. 1470 - 1518. Prepare an oral answer to one of the questions on page 1588.

For Friday, March 5 - Vocab quiz, lessons 19 & 20.

For Monday, March 8 - Read Acts 3 - 5 of Hamlet, pp. 1519 - 1587. Blog your answer to one of the questions on page 1589.

For Friday, March 12 - Multiple choice scoring workshop, test of 1987. Read pages 1677 - 1718 in the anthology (Acts 1 & 2, A Doll's House).

Shakespeare--Performance assignment #1 (2010)

Link to instructions for Hamlet performance assignment

AP--another option for writing about poetry

For this assignment, if you wish, you might consider forms other than the expository essay as a way to "waterski across the poem, waving at the author's name." You may, for example, choose to enter into the human experience of the poem by rewriting the poem in another form. You could do so by writing an interior monologue of the speaker's thoughts and feelings, by writing a short story that contains the essential experience conveyed through the poem, by writing a letter from one character in the poem to another. Your writing could take whatever form, whether essay or something else, you think will best convey the essential qualities of the poem. The one requirement is that what you write must remain true to the original poem in some important way.

One of my favorite student pieces, written over 20 years ago by Miko McGinty, takes us into a famous William Carlos Williams poem about forbidden fruit:

Beyond What I (He) Just Said

I walked into the kitchen late this morning, and found a note from my lover. The note was a poem.

This is Just to Say

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

I woke at daybreak. I stretched and looked at the woman in bed with me. And smiled. She was tangled in the sheets, her legs were bare, but the night had been warm, and she looked comfortable. I showered and dressed and went into the kitchen. In the icebox were two plums, so purple they were almost black. They were firm and cold and when I bit into the first one, the juice dripped onto my fingers. They were the sweetest plums I have ever eaten. I left a note for her to explain why I had eaten them.

I read the note, and smiled. He enjoys life, he takes pleasure in small things, events. He is teaching me to enjoy them too, by sharing. He is considerate--his leaving a note tells me that. He did not take those plums for granted. He is not a taker, he ate them and appreciated them. He gives to me his love, he gives his experiences. He gives me this note. Through the poem I share in the eating. I can see him biting the plum, his skin as dark, though the color of the earth instead of the color of the night sky. He savors the flesh, he sees the beauty in the event. Of course I forgive him. I love him.

I think about her, finding the note, perhaps smiling. I think about how the plums are like our life together, delicious and sweet, meant to be enjoyed. I know she understands the underlying message--the love that I wove into the note. It is wonderful that we now live together, that the icebox is not hers or mine but just "the" icebox. It is wonderful that I can leave a note explaining I ate "the" plums, not her plums. It is wonderful that I can leave a note that addresses day to day life.

He leaves me this note, just a short note. But it says more than I ate the plums, it says we live together, it says I want to share with you. It just says I love you.

AP--Poems for Discussion

Section 1
M 1/11--LCC--My Last Duchess 668
Tu 1/12--LCC--Metaphors (771) & "Swan and Shadow" (885)
Th 1/14--Christina--"The Silken Tent" p. 780
Fr 1/15--Brian--"A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning" p. 1102
Tu 1/19--Sarah--"Those Winter Sundays" p. 1173
Th 1/21--Sophie B--"My Papa's Waltz" p. 674
Fr 1/22--Kevin--"When I Have Fears" p. 1129
Mo 1/25--Alex--"Dover Beach" p. 1078
Tu 1/26--Ariel--"Death Be Not Proud" p. 1101
Th 1/28--Hannah--"The World is Too Much With Us" p. 912
Fr 1/29--Maude--"That Time of Year" p. 1163
Mo 2/1--Sophie L--"Her Kind"--687
Tu 2/2 Basil White Lies 680
Th 2/4 Yuka Lady Lazarus 934
Fr 2/5 Katie When You Are Old 1190
Mo 2/8 Michael Dulce et Decorum Est 698
Tu 2/9 Patrick To an Athlete Dying Young 1124

Section 2
M 1/11 LCC My Last Duchess 668
W 1/13 LCC Metaphors 771 & Swan and Shadow 885
Th 1/14 Peter The Unknown Citizen 690
Fr 1/15 Margo My Papa's Waltz 674
W 1/20 Bianca Traveling Through the Dark 991
Th 1/21 Spenser Death Be Not Proud 1101
Fr 1/22 David White Lies 680
Mo 1/25 MargLiu Neutral Tones 897
We 1/27 MargMc Those Winter Sundays 1173
Th 1/28 Taylor One Art 998
Fr 1/29 Josh When you Are Old 1190
M 2/1 Zach The World 912
W 2/3 Katharine When I Have Fears 1129
Th 2/4 Mackenzie Dover Beach 1078
F 2/5 Asmit Batter My Heart 709
M 2/8 Ari Since There's No Help 858
W 2/10 Diana 100 Love Sonnets 973
Th 2/11 Devika The Silken Tent 780

Why We Read Books

When you have read a book, you have added to your human experience. Read Homer and your mind includes a piece of Homer’s mind. Through books you can acquire at least fragments of the mind and experience of Virgil, Dante, Shakespeare—the list is endless. For a great book is necessarily a gift: it offers you a life you have not time to live yourself, and it takes you into a world you have not time to travel in literal time. A civilized human mind is, in essence, one that contains many such lives and many such worlds. If you are too much in a hurry, or too arrogantly proud of your own limitations, to accept as a gift to your humanity some pieces of the minds of Sophocles, of Aristotle, of Chaucer—and right down the scale and down the ages to Yeats, Einstein, E.B. White, and Ogden Nash—then you may be protected by the laws governing manslaughter, and you may be a voting entity, but you are neither a developed human being nor a useful citizen of a democracy.


--Poet and Professor John Ciardi, from a 1954 speech

AP--Waiting for the Barbarians

What does the magistrate learn from his experiences?

1. He is wrong when he tells the barbarian girl, "Don't make a mystery of it, pain is only pain" (31) He cannot understand the meaning of what happened to her by having her tell him what Colonel Joll did to her. Doing so is compassionate but misguided. Pain cannot be understood second hand; it must be experienced to appreciate its power.
2. In the face of pain, nothing else matters any longer. "My torturers are interested only in demonstrating to me what it meant to live in a body, a body which can entertain notions of justice only as long as it is whole and well, which very soon forgets them when its head is gripped and a pipe is pushed down its gullet and pints of salt water are poured into it till it coughs and retches and flails and voids itself. . . They came to my cell to show me the meaning of humanity, and in the space of an hour they showed me a great deal" (113). The truth learned by every brutal regime, by every political prisoner, by every torturer and their victims, is that pain is more powerful than dignity, than humanity, than justice, than truth. Where there is pain, there can be nothing else. It is the only reality.
3. If one difference between the civilized and the barbaric is the existence of law, The Empire forfeits the right to consider itself civilized. The Magistrate, who represents and administers and believes in law and the force of law, who wants from the Empire nothing more than his day in court, his moment before the law, discovers that the law no longer has any meaning in a corrupt Empire run by its secret police. "They will use the law against me as far as it serves them, then they will turn to other methods. That is the Bureau's way. To people who do not operate under statute, legal process is simply one instrument among many" (82).
4. Nothing, not even the Empire, is more powerful than History: "Empire dooms itself to live in history and plot against history. One thought alone preoccupies the submerged mind of Empire: how not to end, how not to die, how to prolong its era" (131). Prolonging its era is the mission of agencies like the Bureau, but eventually their methods backfire, they doom themselves to defeat, and the forces of history, as they did long ago with the civilization the Magistrate has studied for the last twenty years, once again prevail.
5. No matter how painful the knowledge, the Magistrate must accept his own complicity in the nature of Empire. The events of the novel shatter his naive belief that the outpost under his rule was a benign, harmonious environment where Empire and Barbarian co-existed peacefully, where neither harmed the other. He is not, as he wished to be, the opposite of the Colonel, merely the other side of the coin: "I was the lie that Empire tells itself when times are easy, he the truth that Empire tells when harsh winds blow. Two sides of imperial rule, no more, no less" (133).

AP--end-of-semester schedule

Week of November 30
Day 1--Read WFB, part 4, to p. 119; begin student-led discussions; blog 1 contfor WFB due if not written last week.
Days 2 through 4--Finish reading WFB; continue student-led discussions. No quiz.

Week of December 7
Day 1--Blog #2 due for WFB. Topic: Make a meaningful connection between WFB and Conrad's HOD. Before writing your blog, read "Three Ways of Going Wrong" by Douglas Kerr on JStor, (Modern Language Review, vol. 95, #1, http://www. jstor.org/stable/3736367) esp. pp. 21-27. Length: 400-500 words.
Day 2--Finish discussion of WFB. Both sections meet both Monday and Tuesday.
Wednesday, December 9--Reading Day. No classes meet.
Friday, December 11--Office Hours. I will be available to answer questions from 11:00 AM (following the math exam) to 12:30 PM. Please bring a specific question you would like answered.

Week of December 14
Semester Exam Monday December 14, 9 AM, Hormel Arts Center. Format: AP-style multiple choice questions (one-third), essay analyzing prose passage (one-third), essay on WFB/HOD (one-third).

English IV-final paper

For your last essay of the semester, identify an important area of human life, human nature, or human values and write a paper of five to seven pages (1600-2000 words) discussing the theme you have identified. In your discussion, refer generously to three works we have studied. Choose one work from each of the following groups. Your third work may be chosen from either group.

Group A—Antigone; Things Fall Apart; A Doll's House; One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich; Much Ado About Nothing; The Post Office

Group B—“War,” “Torn Lace,” “The Heavenly Christmas Tree,” “How Much Land Does a Man Need?” “Sunrise on the Veld,” “Good Climate, Friendly Inhabitants,” a Garcia Marquez story, “Forty-Five a Month,” “Interpreter of Maladies”.

Your papers are due Monday, December 14 by 11 AM, hard copy with turnitin receipt number (turnitin title: 2009-Final Paper). Papers are to be turned in at the Upper School office. They will be collected as soon as my exam is over at 11 AM; papers arriving after that time will be marked late and penalized accordingly. Use MLA parenthetical style for textual references with list of Works Cited.

Schedule:

Week of November 30:

Day 1: Finish Much Ado about Nothing discussion, including examples of findings of search teams

Day 2—Much Ado About Nothing Quest

Day 3—Preliminary thesis and list of texts for final paper due, in writing, with a short note on each explaining why it was chosen—10 points

Day 4—Outlines brought to class for discussion and approval—10 points

Week of December 7
Monday, December 7—Three pages of draft due in class for editing—10 points

Tuesday, December 8—Five-page drafts brought to class for editing—20 points

Week of December 14

Monday, December 14—11 AM—papers due, both hard copy and turnitin.com, 1600-2000 words—150 points

(N.B.-point values may be adjusted slightly, as this assignment is weighted as 25% of the semester total by Upper School policy.)

Sample Questions (develop your own variations):

What does it take to be a successful human being in the world? Is “success” a matter of getting what one wants, of attaining a desired result—love, money, power, freedom, social status—or is it a question of character, of developing within the self those qualities most essential to a complete human being: virtue, wisdom, compassion, spiritual enlightenment, moral insight, ethical depth, duty, honor?

Can social institutions, cultural traditions, or rituals help develop successful people, or does the literature portray these customs more as impediments to growth?

What is a “complete” human being? What components are most important in defining what a human being “should” be?

Under what conditions do the characters’ worlds become traps, bringing out the worst in people, debasing their lives and stripping their existence of meaning or purpose? What happens to the hearts and souls of those who live in such worlds?

Professor Robert George of Princeton says, “the conquest of the self is part of what it means to lead a successful life.” Which characters have inner demons or parts of themselves they must conquer? How successful are they?

William Faulkner said that literature is composed of “old universal truths lacking which any story is ephemeral and doomed—love and honor and pity and pride and compassion and sacrifice.” Which of Faulkner’s truths find most powerful expression in the literature we have read this semester.

Dr. Carl Hammerschlag, a psychiatrist, writes, “Mental health . . . can be described as having your head, mouth, and heart in a straight alignment. Mental health happens when what you believe in your heart is the same as what you say with your mouth. You are mentally healthy when what you feel is something you also believe. . . .You have to keep in balance if you want to stay healthy.” In these terms, which characters are healthiest? Which are not? How do they achieve balance? What are the costs of not finding it?

Many works we have read center on characters who, because of their personalities, beliefs, or personal circumstances, find themselves in conflict with their society. Choose three important characters from different works and discuss the ways in which they are out of synch with the world around them. For each character you discuss, say whether the conflict primarily reveals a flaw in the character or in the society’s assumptions and moral values.

You may of course find other similarities around which to build your papers. An ethical issue, a question of human relationships, a political question, the idea of conscience, the issue of identity—any of these or a wide array of potential topics lie at your disposal. But choose wisely. You want a topic that lends itself to the three works you will discuss, and it must be not too broad an issue to develop specifically in the assigned length. For example, the question “What is human nature,” while intriguing, is too general to be useful here. Pick something narrower and try to go deeper in your discussion.

AP assignments November 09

Week of November 2

Days 1, 2, and 3--Finish discussion of The Sound and the Fury; continue second round of mini-blogs

Thurs/Fri--multiple-choice quiz #4, questions 39-53.

Day 4--(Friday November 6) Style analysis exercise for Heart of Darkness--read the opening paragraphs of the story, especially paragraphs # 2, 3, 4, & 6, more than once, and make notes in the margin. Consider diction, syntax, tone, organization, & tension, and the introduction of the character Marlow.

Monday, November 9--in-class essay on The Sound and the Fury; also, read part 1 of Heart of Darkness, pp. 3-31.


Week of November 9

1. Heart of Darkness: read part I for Day 1, part II for day 3 (pp. 31-54), part 3 for Friday, November 13 (pp. 54-77). Continue annotating the text, noting significant passages, key images, new vocabulary, and examples of Conrad's stylistic devices. Cite specific passages in mini-blogs.
2. Vocab quiz, lessons 11 & 12

Week of November 16

1. No class day 1, Monday, November 16.
2. Begin reading Waiting for the Barbarians: read parts I & II (to p. 55) for Day 4
3. Blog: Read your assigned section of background and criticism; summarize its most important ideas on your blog in a series of bullet points; due before class day 2 (T/W), to be presented in brief oral summaries.
4. Cumulative Vocabulary Review Quiz, lessons 1-12 Friday, November 20. Begin presenting mini-blogs on Waiting for the Barbarians day 4.

Week of November 23

1. Waiting for the Barbarians: Read part III (to p. 74) for Monday.
2. Both sections meet both Monday and Tuesday, no school Wed-Fri (Thanksgiving holiday)
3. No vocab quiz
4. Blog: due day 1 describing initial responses to characters, style, and content of WFB (approx. 300-400 words)

Essay assignment: Things Fall Apart

Topic choices for a three- or four-page paper on Things Fall Apart (approx. 1000-1200 words)

Topic choice and thesis due in class Friday 11/6
Draft due in class Monday or Tuesday (day 1) depending on section, 11/9 or 11/10.
Paper due in class and on turnitin.com by class time day 2 (Tuesday or Wednesday 11/10 or 11/11).
Other assignments:
Day 3--Read "A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings," p. 577 in anthology
Day 4--Read "The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World," (handout); vocab quiz, lessons 11 & 12.
Monday, November 16/Tuesday 17th--begin reading Much Ado About Nothing, Act I
Friday, November 20--Cumulative Vocabulary Review Quiz, lessons 1 through 12. (Rescheduled)

Choose one of the following topics to develop into an essay based on your understanding of the novel Things Fall Apart. In your essay, refer to specific passages and examples from the novel to support your ideas. This is an interpretive essay based on your reading of the novel; no outside sources should be used.

•Is Okonkwo a tragic figure? Review what you know from our study of Greek tragedy and assess to what extent those ideas apply to Things Fall Apart in general and Okonkwo in particular.

•How does Achebe’s narrator both endorse and critique the values and practices of Ibo culture? Why does he present some elements of the culture as problematic or flawed and others as sources of strength for the Ibo people?

•How does Okonkwo determine right from wrong? Choose three examples of decisions Okonkwo makes and examine what belief systems, values, laws or traditions he uses to choose a course of action. Evaluate the wisdom or effectiveness of these decisions.

•What kind of leader is Okonkwo? Choose three strong actions which demonstrate his leadership. Identify the values, beliefs, and/or traditions on which he bases each action and evaluate its effectiveness.

•Of his daughter Ezinma, Okonkwo thinks, “She should have been a boy” (p. 64). Why is it necessary to the story that Okonkwo’s favored child be a girl?

AP--October 15 papers

• The written portion of the assignment is a paper of approximately 5 pages (1500 words) in which you cover three key points: your reasons for choosing the story, some biographical background on the writer, and an analysis of some aspect of the story using the methods and vocabulary we have discussed and practiced in class. The analysis will be approximately two-thirds of the entire essay, the other sections a paragraph or two each.
  
• Drafts of your papers are due in class Thursday October 16. Final papers are due, both hard copy and turnitin.com, on Friday, October 17.
• Documentation should be included for the following information: titles and sources of all stories you read as you made your decision, source of biographical information on the author (Wikipedia is getting better but still needs independent verification for academic purposes). Mention the source of the information in the body of the essay or in a parenthetical citation, and include full documentation on your works cited page.
  

AP English

October , 2009

Study guide for The Sound and the Fury

I. Characters—Identify each of the following characters and gather information about their actions and personalities:

Benjy (Maury)

Caddy (Candace)

Mother (“Miss Cahline” or Caroline)

Father (Mr. Jason)--actually Jason III

Jason IV (usu. referred to simply as “Jason”)

Quentin (brother)

Quentin (daughter of ??)

Uncle Maury

Dilsey

Roskus

Versh

Frony

T.P.

Luster

II. Events—How many different scenes or events does Benjy remember?

What are the key elements of each memory?

What does Benjy love? What upsets him most?

Who died?

Who was married?

What were the four siblings (Caddy, Quentin, Benjy, and Jason) like as children? Who was their leader? Describe the various relationships among them. What have they become as adults?

Why are there two Quentins? What happened to the first? Who is the second? Describe her relationship with her Uncle Jason.

What happened June 2, 1910?

Why did it happen?

III. Images and motifs—climbing up trees to look in windows, climbing out windows and down trees, running away, funerals, weddings, swings, water (the branch), fire, smells, crying, golf, Uncle Maury and the Pattersons, “Sasspriluh,” sickness, watches, time, virginity, child support payments

AP assignments October 2009

October 12-16

Day 1--No school Monday--Fall Break
Day 2--Finish Sound and Fury, pp. 3-75 (April 7, 1928)
Day 3 (Th)--Begin part II of Sound and Fury, pp. 76ff. (June 2, 1910); drafts of short story papers due
Day 4 (Fr)--Continue part II; vocab quiz 7 - 8; short story papers due, hard copy & turnitin

October 19-23

Day 1--Finish S&F, pp, 76-179
Days 2 & 3--Read a scholarly article from JStor regarding the novel; begin reading pp. 180-264.
Day 4--Multiple choice quiz; continue reading part III (April 6, 1928)

October 26-30

Day 1--Finish reading S&F, pp. 180-264; blog a comment on your scholarly article. Give the citation of the source of the article, quote a brief passage or summarize an idea you found helpful, interesting, or just plain puzzling, and write a brief comment in the form of a blog entry.
Day 2--Begin reading pp. 265-321 (April 8, 1928)
Day 3--Continue
Day 4--Finish pp. 265-321; vocab 9 & 10

English IV assignments for October 2009

Week 6: September 28-October 2
Finish reading One Day; work on reading guide; vocab 5-6; reading quiz

Week 7: October 5-9
Day 1: Blogs due: One day in the Life of . . . .
Day 2: “Quest” on One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (day 3 for section 2—Carroll-Villadolid)
Day 3: “Interpreter of Maladies” handout (day 2 for section 2)
Day 4: No school Friday, Fall Break

Week 8: October 12-16
Day 1: No School Monday
Poetry day for section 1 Tuesday—Attaway-Troutman
Tuesday: "Interpreter of Maladies," (handout) for section 2 (Carroll--Villadolid)
Wednesday: "Forty-five a Month," p. 495 in anthology, both sections
Thursday: "The Grasshopper and the Bell Cricket," p. 464, section 1
Friday: "The Post Office," p. 411, both sections; vocab 7 - 8 quiz

Week 9: October 19-23
Day 1: “A Sunrise on the Veld,” p. 308
Day 2: “Good Climate, Friendly Inhabitants,” p. 316
Day 3: Begin reading Things Fall Apart (paperback), chapters 1-3
Day 4: TFA, chapters 4-6

English IV blog assignment (One Day)

Follow this link to this week's blog assignment, due BEFORE day 1 of the upcoming week.

AP--Paper on additional short story

In addition to the short essay on the story you have been assigned, your final assignment for our study of short fiction is to research and write a paper on a story you choose based on your own interest. Listed below are the requirements and guidelines for this assignment:

• Your story must have been published for the first time in the last 5 years, that is 2005 to the present.

• Your story must have actually been “published”; no self-published internet pieces by amateur writers, please.

• Since I am asking you to research the author and write an analysis of the story, I strongly suggest that you read several stories,  minimum three, from a variety of sources, then choose the one you enjoyed the most. As you read new stories, I encourage you to post short responses to them as part of your weekly blogs commenting on our assigned short stories.

• Published short stories are not as abundant as they were 50 or 75 years ago. Nevertheless, you may find excellent material in a variety of places: New Yorker magazine publishes short stories regularly, and Mr.Thommen has set over 100 issues out in the reference section of the library. Also, Mr. Thommen has begun a subscription to a periodical called One Story, each issue of which contains, you guessed it, a single short story. The Best American Short Stories series publishes a new edition every year (guest editor for the 2007 edition was Stephen King), and I have ordered copies of the two most recent collections. Finally, literary journals in libraries often contain new stories, and both single-author and anthology collections of stories may be found in bookstores as well. For example, Jhumpa Lahiri, author of The Namesake on my summer reading list, has a new story collection called Unaccustomed Earth.

• The written portion of the assignment is a paper of approximately 5 pages (1500 words) in which you cover three key points: your reasons for choosing the story, some biographical background on the writer, and an analysis of the story using the methods and vocabulary we have discussed and practiced in class.

• Drafts of your papers are due in class Thursday October 16. Final papers are due, both hard copy and turnitin.com, on Friday, October 17.

English IV--September 11-October 2

Week 3: September 8-11
Friday, September 11— Read A Doll’s House, Act I, pp. 140-165; introduce Spiderman blog assignment

Week 4: September 14-18
Day 1—Spiderman blogs due
Day 2—A Doll’s House, Act II, pp. 165-184
Day 3—A Doll’s House, Act III, pp. 184-202
Friday, September 18—Vocabulary quiz, lessons 3-4; bring hard copy of spiderman blog to class for peer edit workshop

Week 5: September 21-25
Day 1—Revised Spiderman blogs due as hard copy and to turnitin.com
Day 2—“The Heavenly Christmas Tree,” pp. 121-125
Day 3—“How Much Land Does a Man Need,” pp. 126 – 138
Friday, September 25—Begin reading One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich; start Wednesday night, average, 20 pages per night Thursday night and all weekend, finish reading by Monday night September 28

Week 6: September 28-October 2
Day 1—Continue reading One Day
Day 2—Finish reading One Day, possible quiz
Day 3—Continue discussion of One Day
Friday, October 3—One Day blogs due; vocab quiz lessons 5-6

Spiderman blog

Reread Jim Hall's Spiderman poem "Maybe dats your pwoblem too." Think about how the metaphor of a "fwame-wesistant" suit might apply to people other than Spiderman. Perhaps the suit represents, for example, a part of our life we cannot escape, some aspect of our identity difficult or seemingly impossible to shed, even if we would like to do so, to be able, as Hall says Spiderman wishes to do, to become "someone different, something new."

Consider the following questions:
How might this metaphor apply to all of us?
Can you apply the metaphor to yourself? Are there parts of your "suit" you would like to burn?
Which pieces of our identity are most difficult to rid ourselves of ("fwame wesistant")?
Are there times when people would most like to "buin der suits"? Why? What can lead to such a desire?
If you could reinvent yourself, what would you do to make your "heart beat at a diffwent wate"? What prevents you?

You needn't try to answer all these questions. Do some brainstorming and choose your strongest ideas to develop into a personal piece of some 500 words. And since it is a personal piece written for a public audience (your classmates and me) choose how much personal information you wish to include.

You may, if you wish, consult the poet James Hall's blog and read what he says about his poem. Be aware, however, that Hall says a poet should never be the final authority on what a poem can mean to a reader.

Finally, here is a link to the poem itself.

Blog starters for Antigone

Follow this link to some ideas that occurred to me as possible topics for your Antigone blog. To be written any time between now and next Tuesday September 8. Also, look at section III of the course syllabus for other suggestions of blog starters that may be used with any literary work. Suggested length: 400 to 500 words.

See you Tuesday.

AP--short story unit

Here is a link to the document describing various responsibilities for presenting material from the short story anthology in our textbook.

The list of story titles and page numbers may be found on the current assignment schedule.

Pride and Prejudice essay--AP

Write an essay of approximately 600-750 words (2-3 typed, double-spaced pages), in which you discuss in as much detail as space permits the significance of the following passage to the work as a whole. In your discussion you may focus on an appropriate combination of the following elements:

• How does the passage characterize its participants and Austen’s methods of characterization?
• What is the relationship of this scene to the “action” of the novel? Does it contribute to either the complication of the action or to its resolution?
• How does it embody or advance themes important to the novel?
• In what sense is the scene “comic”?
• How does it most significantly illustrate Jane Austen’s style?

Drafts are due in class day 3 for peer editing and essays are due Friday, September 4, both hard copy and electronically to turnitin.com. Here is a link to the formatting requirements. Here is a link to the syllabus, section 5 of which details turnitin.com procedures.

Passage:

“Tell me once for all, are you engaged to him?”

Though Elizabeth would not, for the mere purpose of obliging Lady Catherine, have answered this question, she could not but say, after a moment’s deliberation, “I am not.”

Lady Catherine seemed pleased.

“And will you promise me, never to enter into such an engagement?”

“I will make no promise of the kind.”

“Miss Bennet, I am shocked and astonished. I expected to find a more reasonable young woman. But do not deceive yourself into a belief that I will ever recede. I shall not go away, till you have given me the assurance I require.”

“And I certainly never shall give it. I am not to be intimidated into anything so wholly unreasonable. Your ladyship wants Mr. Darcy to marry your daughter; but would my giving you the wished-for promise, make their marriage at all more probable?” . . . .

Her ladyship was highly incensed.

“You have no regard, then, for the honour and credit of my nephew! Unfeeling, selfish girl! Do you not consider that a connection with you must disgrace him in the eyes of everybody?”

“Lady Catherine, I have nothing further to say. You know my sentiments.”

“You are resolved then to have him?”

“I have said no such thing. I am only resolved to act in that manner which will, in my own opinion, constitute my happiness, without reference to you, or to any person so wholly unconnected with me.”

My Most Memorable Books

1. Catcher in the Rye, Salinger (when I was 15 I thought it the truest book I'd ever read)
2. The stories of Edgar Allan Poe (the summer I was 12--couldn't stop reading--I can still picture the library book)
3. All the Kings Men, R. Penn Warren--first time when I was 20--lots of times since
4. Master and Commander, P. O'Brian--the whole series, 20 volumes--counts as one for me. Read them all at least twice.
5. Winter's Tale--Mark Helprin--a burglar, a consumptive heiress, a flying horse, and bridges from the future
6. A Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole--the most outrageously funny book I've ever read.
7. Outlander, D. Gabaldon--another series--volume 7 is due out next month.
8. Lonesome Dove--Larry McMurtry--my all-time favorite western
9. Crossing to Safety--Wallace Stegner--wonderful story of friendship between two married couples lasting 40 years
10. Gone to Soldiers--Marge Piercy--my favorite WW2 novel
11. Anna Karenina--Tolstoy--read it one chapter a night before bedtime for three months--amazing story.
12. Absalom Absalom, W. Faulkner--even better than the Sound and the Fury, which I also love.
13. Pride and Prejudice, Austen--my 2nd favorite 18th century novel
14. Tom Jones, Henry Fielding--my favorite 18th century novel
15. Great Expectations, Dickens--he may be out of fashion now, but I love Dickens
16 Adventures of Huckleberry Finn--the book I've read the most times, so many I've lost count.

English IV & AP--blog assignment #2

For FRIDAY, August 28, all sections:

N.B. This blog assignment is NOT subject to the usual suggested length of 500 words.

This summer, one of the topics bouncing around facebook between me and some of my friends went something like this:

What are the 15 books you have ever read that have stayed with you the longest and made the greatest impression on you? Don't think too hard about this topic. Just list the ones that come into your mind first as books that have made a lasting impression on you.

I'd add the following notes: a) your lists don't have to be 15 titles long, although I hope you have at least 5 or 10 you can honestly name that have stuck in your mind; b) for each title on your list, write a sentence, two at the most, explaining why it's on your list.

2 PS's: Remember to turn off "word notification" if you have not done so already; it will speed up my process of replying to your initial blog posts; second, if I have your url, delete my e-mail address from the notification box. If I don't have your url, well, you're already a bit behind, so please get with the program.

Blog vs. essay

Revising a blog

FROM BLOG TO ESSAY IN FIVE EASY STEPS

1. Look at the blog entry you’ve chosen for the idea that you can develop into an essay of several paragraphs. It may or may not be the topic most addressed in the blog, but it should be one which forms a considerable part of your blog discussion and which you think you can develop further in essay form.

2. Rewrite the current opening statement or write a new, brief opening paragraph. Keep your opening concise, identify the focus of the essay, and, at the end of the paragraph, make a clear, specifically worded statement of thesis, the interpretive idea whose validity you wish to prove in the essay.

3. Look at the middle paragraphs of your blog entry. Are they too long? Too short? If they don’t already begin with sentences that state ideas rather than facts, add clear topic sentences that relate to your thesis. Check within each of those middle paragraphs for a balance between specific textual evidence, preferably both examples and brief quotations, and your own commentary designed to identify the significance of your evidence and fully develop the depth of each paragraph. Finally, make sure each of these middle paragraphs helps support the validity of your thesis.

4. Check your final paragraph. Make sure it does not simply repeat what you have already stated. Draw a conclusion from the evidence you’ve presented. Save your most important idea, the one everything else in your essay leads up to, for last.

5. Last but certainly not least, read all your sentences out loud for clarity and clutter. Have you expressed your biggest ideas in simple words? Have you taken out who, which, and that whenever possible? Are you varying the length of your sentences, alternating complex and compound sentences with simple ones? Does the punctuation of your sentences help make them clearer and more meaningful? Have you caught the spelling mistakes spellcheck won’t catch?

Headings, formats, and style tips

HEADINGS FOR PAPERS—Always head your papers with the following information:

• Your name,
• Course and section number (Monsters 2, Time 1, for example)
• Paper ID number from Turnitin.com
• Word count (your word processing program should perform this last task for you automatically).

FORMATTING:

• Use 12-point font
• Choose a font with serifs (Times New Roman, for example)
• Set 1 inch margins all round
• Give your paper a title which indicates its subject; when writing about literature, give more than just the name of the text you are writing about.
• Double space text
• Keep quotations brief; for quotations of FIVE lines or longer, block the passage with one and one-half inch margins and single spacing.
• Remember to put novel and play titles in italics, poem and short story titles in quotation marks, and to give your paper a title different from the literary work it discusses.

STYLE

• Use American spelling and usage: double quotation marks, not single; toward, not towards; judgment, not judgement; gray, not grey; honor, not honour, and so on.
• Avoid "naked" pronouns: this, that, which.
• Whenever possible, omit who, which, and that--make the relative clause either the main clause or a participial phrase.
• Simplify your language; use everyday words to express important ideas.
• Omit unnecessary words from your sentences, unnecessary sentences from your paragraphs, unnecessary paragraphs from your essays. Be studious of brevity.
• Whenever you face a choice between a general term and a specific word, opt for the latter.

  ATTRIBUTION

• Use parenthetical citation for primary texts (the literature from the course)
• If you looked at any outside sources, be sure to cite them fully and accurately. This responsibility extends both to direct language (in quotation marks) and paraphrased ideas (your own words, not in quotation marks, but clearly cited).

English IV--assignments to September 8

English IV—World Literature
Mr. Coon
Schedule of Assignments
August—September 2009

Note: Assignments are DUE on the day indicated.

Week 1: August 24—28
Day 1. First day—welcome, syllabus, blog intro, assignments
Day 2. Set up account with Google Reader (see “how to start a blog,” below); write the blog entry indicated in the instructions after you establish your blog; vocabulary intro (bring books)—
Day 3. Print blog entry, bring to class for discussions and workshop (blog to essay in five easy steps); begin peer review
Day 4. Continue peer review; begin revision and re-writing of draft 2

Week 2: August 31—September 4
Day 1. Essays due, both hard copy and turnitin.com; introduction to tragedy
Day 2. Read Antigone, pp. 14 to 32 (to line 593 “enter Ismene”)
Day 3. Antigone, pp. 32-44, to line 1034;
Day 4. Antigone, finish reading to page 57; vocab quiz 1, lessons 1 & 2

Week 3: September 8—11 (No school Monday--Labor Day)
1. Read “Torn Lace,” pp. 73--77
2. Read “War,” pp. 79-82
3. Writing activity TBA

AP--Assignments to October 8

English IV—Advanced Placement World Literature
Mr. Coon
Schedule of Assignments
August—October, 2009

Note: All assignments are DUE for the class day listed.

Week 1: August 24—28
Day 1: First day—welcome, syllabus, blog intro, assignments
Day 2: Set up account with Google Reader (see “how to start a blog,” on mrcoonsenglish.blogspot.com; write the letter indicated in the instructions after you establish your blog; vocabulary intro (bring books); Introduction to close reading
Day 3: Bring Pride & Prejudice; continue introduction to close reading
Day 4: Quiz 1—Multiple choice (15 minutes); close reading exercise

Week 2: August 31—September 4
Day 1: Discussion of passages
Day 2: Discussion of Pride and Prejudice; introduce short story presentations & roles
Day 3: Essay draft due in class on Pride and Prejudice; vocab quiz 1 (lessons 1 & 2)
Day 4: Read A Rose For Emily (28) (LCC); revised essay due


Week 3: September 8—11 No classes Monday (Labor Day)
1: Everyday Use (p.443)
2: Teenage Wasteland (35)
3: Interpreter of Maladies (p. 579); Multiple choice quiz 2

Week 4: September 14—18
1: A & P (p. 14); blogs due
2: Parker’s Back (382)
3: A Good Man is Hard to Find (p.358)
4: Cathedral (p. 98); Vocab quiz 2 (lessons 3 & 4)

Week 5: September 21—25
1: A Clean, Well-Lighted Place (156); blogs due
2: Battle Royal (p. 526)
3. Shiloh (p. 604)
4: The Yellow Wallpaper (p. 424); Multiple choice quiz 3

Week 6: September 28—October 2
1: Greasy Lake (p. 129); blogs due
2: Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been (p. 613)
3. I Stand Here Ironing (p. 637);
4: The Things They Carried (p. 625); vocab quiz 3 (lessons 5 & 6)ALSO, spend one free period in the library browsing the short story collections Mr. Thommen has set out.

Week 7: October 5—8—No school Friday (Fall Break)
1: The Five Forty-Eight (p. 503); half blogs due--update on independent short story project--less than 500 words is preferred.
2 & 3: Begin the Sound and the Fury (pp. 3-75); finish reading and research for short story papers.

How to Start a Blog

Go to www.blogger.com. You should be automatically directed to their start page. Follow the "three easy steps" :
--Create your account using your PCDS e-mail account and a password of your choice (suggestion: use the same account and password for your turnitin.com account). Since your blog will only be read by me and by your classmates, please use your first and last name as your display name; that way I always know whose blog I'm reading and you get credit for having written it.
--Name your blog. Whatever you like, but it's a school assignment, so be appropriate, please. For your blog's url, use firstname-lastname so that we may find each other's blogs easily during the year.
--Select a template for your blog. Pick whichever one you like, with one condition. My eyes are getting older and I can't read text set against a black or dark blue background, so please don't choose one of those templates.

After you create your template, click "start posting" to go to the editing page of your blog. From there, you have one more crucial task. Click the Settings tab, then the e-mail tab. Type my e-mail address in the box marked "BlogSend": (lance.coon@pcds.org). After I have an RSS feed for your blog, I’ll ask you to turn this setting off. But to get started you need to include this step or you may not receive credit for your blog entries. (IMPORTANT: Be sure to click "Save Settings" before closing this tab.)

Finally, one crucial setting. Open the "comments" tab, scroll down, and click the "NO" button next to a setting called "show word verification for comments." This one is important to save me a great deal of time and bother when I write comments back to you about your blog posts. Again, click "save settings" before you leave this section of your settings.

When you have completed all these steps, click the "Posting" tab and create your first blog entry.

For AP English: Write your first blog about the reading you did this summer. I’m interested not only in the books you chose from my recommendations but also any books you read on your own. Include a list of any books you have read since the beginning of June, both titles and authors, and then write a short piece about ONE of the titles you read. Pick the one that made the strongest impression on you, or the one you enjoyed the most, or the one that stayed with you the longest after you read it. Here is a link to such a piece, one I wrote last summer after I read Cormac McCarthy’s novel The Road. As you write, remember to be as specific as you can in your language, your reasons, your examples.

For English IV: Write a blog about the book you chose from the grade 12 Summer Reading List. If you read more than one title from the list, choose the one that made the strongest impression on you. In your blog (500 words or so), identify which aspects of the novel are most prominent, which ones go the furthest to explain the impression the book made on you. Was it an idea, a character who seemed particularly lifelike, a relationship, the ambiguity of the book's ending or meaning, something about the writer's style? Your blog will serve as the first draft of a paper to be turned in next week, so give some thought to identifying and discussing those elements of the book which are most notable.

I recommend that you write, edit, spell-check, and word-count your letter as a word document then paste it into the box on the posting page of your blog. When you're done, give it a title, click the orange button marked "publish post," and voila!—you have created your first blog entry (436).

English IV Syllabus 2009

English IV Syllabus
Mr. Coon; Fall, 2009

I. Goals

In the courses which comprise English IV, we seek to expose members of the senior class to significant pieces of literature from the world tradition. The required semester selection of world authors includes pieces from the classical Mediterranean world, Asia, Africa, South America, and Continental Europe. Canonical authors such as Sophocles, Shakespeare, Ibsen, Kafka, Tolstoy, Achebe, and Solzhenitsyn provide depth and balance to the assigned material. Authors and works are chosen with an eye toward providing significant intellectual, esthetic, moral, and literary challenges to readers. Each course asks students to read and think carefully, to listen and discuss, and to develop their language skills, especially in writing, critical reading, vocabulary, and English usage.

II. Readings

World Literature (first semester)
1. World Literature , Donna Rosenberg (editor)
2. Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe
3. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, Alexander Solzhenitsyn
4. Short stories of Gabriel Garcia Marquez
5. selected novel(s) for summer reading

Advanced Placement World Literature (two semesters)
1. Literature: An Introduction, (10th edition) X. J. Kennedy & Dana Gioia, editors
2. Waiting for the Barbarians, J. M. Coetzee
3. The Sound and the Fury , William Faulkner
4. Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad
5. Pride and Prejudice, Jane Austen (summer reading)
6. selected novels for summer reading

African-American Literature (second semester)
1. Black Boy, Richard Wright
2. Raisin in the Sun, Lorraine Hansberry
3. Fences, August Wilson
4. Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston

Shakespeare (second semester); team taught with Mr. Burns
1. Hamlet
2. As You Like It
3. The Merchant of Venice

III. Additional text for all sections: Vocabulary for Achievement, 6th course


IV. Written work
The primary forum for written work is your blog. You are required to post weekly blog entries relating to the literature studied in the classroom. Your blogs will receive a gradeat the end of each marking period, accounting for 30% of each quarter’s grade. Blog entries should be approximately 500 words in length (please indicate word count in parentheses at the end of each entry). I will not, however, grade by length alone; rather, quantity will be one of four criteria, along with regularity of entries, style, and originality of content. Instructions about creating and posting blog entries may be found on my blog at mrcoonsenglish.blogspot.com.
Occasionally I will ask you to respond to particular prompts or questions on my blog, but often there is no set topic for your weekly entries. Rather, I ask you to find an element of the assigned reading that interests you and discuss it thoughtfully. This comment may take many forms, a few of which are suggested here:
• Discuss a character’s actions, words, personality, moral values, or humanity.
• Comment on the writer’s style, use of language, tone, irony, or imagery.
• Consider a topic or idea raised in class discussion, trying to go beyond what has already been stated.
• Raise and discuss a question about the text under consideration.
• Discuss the importance or meaning of a key passage or scene from the reading.
• For longer works, show how a scene or passage develops a theme or pattern identified in class.
• Make a comparison between a scene, character, or idea from the literature and something from another source or from your own experience
• Use an idea from my blog or from that of one of your classmates as a point of departure for your response.
• Locate relevant research material on the web, post a link to the site on your blog, and discuss your choice.
• Using first person, tell the story of your reading of and interaction with the text.

In all cases, your goals are to demonstrate close, careful reading of assigned texts, challenge yourself to creative, original thinking, and develop your fluency as a writer. In addition to blog entries, several times each semester, I will assign papers, either revisions of blog entries or interpretations of asigned novels, plays, poems, or stories. Your papers will account for another 30% of your grade.

IMPORTANT: HEADINGS FOR PAPERS—Always head your papers with the following information: your name, date, turnitin receipt number, and word count (your word processing program should perform this last task for you automatically).


V. Turnitin.com
In addition to submitting hard copies of your papers this year, you are required to submit electronic copies of all papers to turnitin.com. These instructions will help you submit your papers. Use the same e-mail address and password for turnitin.com that you use for your account at blogger.com.
• On your web browser, go to turnitin.com. Register as a new user or login to the personal home page you created last year. You must give your e-mail address and a personal password which contains both letters and numbers to register. Click “student” as your user type. Give whatever other information may be necessary as you move through the required fields.
• When you reach your personal home page, click “join new class.” Then enter a class ID and a class enrollment password. For AP students, the class ID is 1598905 and the password pcdsap; for World Literature students (non-AP) the class ID is 1875359 and the password is pcdswl. Click “submit” when you finish. N.B: You only need to complete this step once.
• Then submit your paper. When you click on the class title, you will go to the class history page. Click on the word “submit” in the middle navigation bar. Enter the title of your paper and select the assignment with the correct date from the pull down menu. Assignments are listed by the title of the work and the date an assignment is due.

• After entering your title and selecting the correct assignment, paste your essay into the box marked “main text.” (In my experience, the copy and paste method works better than the upload method. You may, of course, find otherwise). You may ignore the boxes marked abstract and bibliography unless otherwise instructed. When your paper has been pasted into the “main text” box, click “submit.”
• Remember to put your digital receipt number on the assignment before you give it to me. Otherwise your assignment will be marked late and penalized accordingly.

VI. Participation and attendance
• Class discussion is a crucial part of the course. Therefore, it is imperative that we all treat one another with respect and behave in such a way as to contribute to, not disrupt, an atmosphere conducive to maximum learning.
• Participation in class is mandatory. I understand that the introverts have difficulty speaking in front of your peers and me; nevertheless, I expect you to contribute meaningfully to class activities and discussions. You must come to class having done the reading assigned and be prepared to discuss the material, answer questions, venture informed opinions, and articulate personal responses.
• Participation grades are assigned as follows and account for 20% of your grade in the class: "A" students are fully engaged, on time with the necessary books and supplies. They display obvious enthusiasm for the tasks of the class: reading, talking, listening, working in a group, thinking about a problem. "B" students' engagement varies slightly, sometimes at "A" level, sometimes not. "C" students are generally involved but with noticeable lapses. They may arrive late to class or frequently forget materials. They spend time on things other than the work at hand: chatting with friends, doing homework for another class, catching up on sleep, or staring off in space. "D" students exhibit these behaviors to an even greater degree, becoming a distraction to the work of the class, having a negative impact on the group's ability to get its work done, regularly coming to class unprepared.
• Read the student handbook statement on attendance policies. After six absences in a class, a letter is sent home. After nine, students and parents meet with the Dean of Students. Also, be aware that beginning with the third unexcused lateness to class, you will be assigned to serve detention for each subsequent lateness. Please be on time to class.

VII. Vocabulary
• Three new lessons in the vocabulary book are assigned every other week.  Quizzes will take place the first 10 minutes of class on alternate Fridays unless otherwise notified.
• For first semester, we will cover lessons 1-15; for the second, lessons 16-30. Quizzes will contain all 30 words from the three lessons.
• Missed vocabulary quizzes must be made up at your earliest possible convenience. After one week, barring extraordinary circumstances, missing scores will be entered as zeroes.



VIII. Grading policy

• Grades are determined on a point system in which each assignment is weighted by the number of points it contains. Points will be totaled at the end of each quarter and semester and grades determined in accordance with the percentages contained in your student handbook.
• Grades from individual assignments are then weighted into categories as follows: blogs (30%), papers (30%), vocabulary and quizzes (20%), participation and attendance (20%).
• Assignments are due at the beginning of class. Work turned in during or after class is considered late and will be penalized. Late work is eligible for a score no higher than 75%, depending on the quality of the assignment and the degree of lateness. If you are absent the day an assignment is due, either have a classmate turn it in or fax the assignment to the Upper School office (602-224-6177).
• Students who miss quizzes or tests because of excused absence must make arrangements for make-up immediately upon returning to school. Missing work (quizzes or assignments never turned in or made up) will result in an incomplete grade for the quarter or semester.
• Any student who establishes a clear pattern of failing to complete the assigned reading according to the prescribed schedule will receive a semester grade of D or F, regardless of that student’s scores on other assignments. Repeated missing or poor written work, failed quizzes or tests, or the inability to supply basic factual information in class will be taken as signs of not reading.
• All assignments must be completed in accordance with the school’s honesty policy. See your handbook for details and be certain you know the difference between plagiarism and acceptable use of source material. Also, any assignments written for other courses may not be submitted without my specific permission.


X. Contact information
• In person—room 311. Stop by to talk or ask a question anytime I’m free. My schedule is posted on the door of my classroom. To make up a quiz, go over an assignment, a speech draft, or a college essay, please make an appointment first.
• By voice-mail—602-956-0253 x4296
• By fax—602-224-6177
• By e-mail—lance.coon@pcds.org

Shakespeare--Final projects

Select a scene from one of the following plays:

Twelfth Night
A Midsummer’s Night’s Dream
Romeo and Juliet
Macbeth
Julius Ceasar
Othello
Much Ado About Nothing
Hamlet
Merchant of Venice

Present the scene either as a live, memorized performance or by some other creative medium that suits your particular talents. Examples: Set the scene to music, create a filmed version of the scene, animate (or stop-motion animation) and provide voice-over for dialogue.

Note: Memorization is required for all options (see “off book” due date).

As this is the final project of the year, expectations are higher than previous presentation assignments. Work toward a complete final product, fully costumed, carefully staged and rehearsed, as though it were being presented to a paying public audience.

Length of scenes will be longer than earlier assignments. If desired scenes are too short, you may prepare multiple scenes from the same play.

Each group must submit a written "script" for its scene, containing all the Shakespearean dialogue plus stage directions, written blocking, full subtext for each character, notes for tone of voice, characters' emotions and actions, goals and motives, etc.

Timeline:
4/22- Project Assigned, begin forming teams and identifying possible scenes
4/23 - Shakespeare's birthday (and Sarah's); announce teams
4/27 - Teams present ideas for possible scenes, create a “short list”
4/28 - Scenes approved, begin work
5/6 - "Script" drafts due and “off book”
5/7-12 - Continue rehearsals; Present scenes for notes and direction
5/11 - "Script" final draft
5/11-12 Dress rehearsals (costumes/props required)
5/13 - THURS - Final presentations: Students and faculty will be invited
(Class rescheduled to block 5, lunch period, 11:30 AM)
5/14 Final class: course evaluation; Mr. Coon’s “Senior Speech" & farewell

SHK--essay assignment--movie review

For this assignment, write a paper of approximately 800-1000 words in length (approximately 3 pages) based on the following prompt. Papers are due Tuesday April 21, both hard copy and to turnitin.com.

Watch a movie interpretation of one of Shakespeare’s plays and write a review. Identify and evaluate the choices the director and actors made in order to bring the text to life. Was the setting changed from the renaissance to another historical period? Did the change add to the effectiveness of the presentation? Did the actors give strong interpretations of the characters? If this is a play you have not read or seen before, what were the most dramatically compelling parts of the story? Which characters have the strongest personalities? If you watched a movie of a play you already know, how successful were the performances in communicating what is essential about the play? What were the most or least effective choices made by the director and actors?

Avoid movies which are loose adaptations of Shakespeare’s stories (O, Ten Things I Hate About You, etc) done in modern language. Choose a film which contains the original language and story.

Suggestions (N.B. the PCDS library has over a dozen Shakespeare films, and I have several as well.)
Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo and Juliet
Michael Hoffman’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Kenneth Branagh’s Henry V
Laurence Olivier’s Henry V
Laurence Olivier’s Hamlet
Franco Zeffirelli’s Romeo and Juliet
Franco Zeffirelli’s Hamlet
Trevor Nunn’s Twelfth Night
Richard Loncraine’s Richard III
Laurence Olivier as Richard III
Kenneth Branagh’s Much Ado About Nothing
Roman Polanski’s Macbeth
Ian McKellen as Macbeth
Ethan Hawke as Hamlet
Kenneth Branagh’s Hamlet
Al Pacino as Shylock in Merchant of Venice
Al Pacino as Richard III in Looking for Richard

(Simply identify in the text of your essay which film you are referencing and you will not need a works cited page for this assignment, since the text of your essay will contain only your own thoughts about the movie.)

AP--Poetry

For some thoughts on my way of approaching the study of lyric poetry, look here.

AP--Reading list for final paper

Select a novel for independent reading during the month of April. You may choose from the list below or another novel of “comparable literary merit.” Also, look for three critical analyses of the novel in a local library or JStor. Write a paper of 1500-2000 words (5-7 pages) developing in some depth one key aspect of the novel’s meaning, using both direct quotations and your 3 outside sources. You must bring five typed pages to class Monday, April 26. Papers are due Wednesday, April 28, both hard copy and turnitin.com.

Things Fall Apart, Chinua Achebe
Reservation Blues, Sherman Alexie
Handmaid’s Tale or Cat’s Eye, Margaret Atwood
Persuasion or Emma, Jane Austen
Go Tell It on the Mountain, James Baldwin
Jane Eyre, Charlotte Bronte
My Antonia; O Pioneers!, Willa Cather
The Awakening, Kate Chopin
Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoevski
Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison
Absalom! Absalom!, William Faulkner
Tender is the Night, F. Scott Fitzgerald
Madame Bovary, Gustave Flaubert
A Passage to India, E.M. Forster
Return of the Native, Thomas Hardy
Catch-22, Joseph Heller
A Farewell to Arms, Ernest Hemingway
Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, James Joyce
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Ken Kesey
Obasan, Joy Kogawa
Lady Chatterley’s Lover, D. H. Lawrence
Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel Garcia Marquez
All the Pretty Horses, Cormac McCarthy
Song of Solomon, Toni Morrison
Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov
We Were the Mulvaneys, Joyce Carol Oates
The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien
Wide Sargasso Sea, Jean Rhys
Crossing to Safety, Wallace Stegner
Grapes of Wrath, John Steinbeck
Anna Karenina, Leo Tolstoy
Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh
All the King’s Men, Robert Penn Warren
Age of Innocence, Edith Wharton
Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf
Native Son, Richard Wright

Juniors--course requests

AP vs. English IV

• Year-long course or two semester courses (World Lit + Shakespeare or Composition or African-American Lit); AP requires permission
  
• More reading in AP
• More difficult, challenging texts
• Faster pace
• More papers, blogs, and other writings
  
• More responsibility for leading class discussion approx. every other week
• Tough multiple choice quizzes every other week
• More demanding grading scale
  

Who should take AP?

• People who like English better than any other subject, love to read and discuss
• B+ or better grades in English II and III
• Careful readers, logical thinkers, strong writers
• Highly motivated, always prepared for class (especially important)
  
• Like to participate in discussion
• Highly recommended by Ms. Driscoll

Who should take English IV

• English class not your highest priority
• Taking 3 other AP's in Math, Science, Foreign Language
• Thought the Emily Dickinson questions on the semester exam were impossible
• Cut corners on daily reading assignments this year
• Think Beloved is boring and confusing
• Writing essays not your strength

My selection policy is explained in slightly more detail in this link.

If you think you are right for AP and AP is right for you, see Ms. Driscoll first, then see me for my initials on your course request form.

AP--link

An essay from Midsummer, the publication of the Utah Shakespeare Festival, which staged a revival of Death of a Salesman in 1991.

AP--March 6 - 20

For March 9/10--Day 1--Write a brief blog, approximately 400 words, commenting on an idea raised during class discussion of Death of a Salesman, trying to take that idea a little further and giving your own take. Also, please read pp. 1833-35 for our discussion.

Day 2--We'll go into the computer lab and post comments on one another's blogs and watch a brief video on the career of August Wilson.

Day 3--Fences, act 1--pp. 1996--2026

Day 4--Multiple choice quiz; continue discussion of Fences

Week of March 16
Day 1--Fences, act 2, pp. 2026-2047
Days 2 & 3--finish discussion of Fences
Day 4--Enrichment day/ IFF/ last day before spring break