SHORELINE PUBLIC SCHOOLS

 

COURSE SYLLABUS

“There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed.”                                                                         --Ernest Hemingway

AP Language and Composition Course Expectations

Nate Stearns

Room 1508

nathan.stearns@shorelineschools.org

website: http://nstearns.edublogs.org

Course Overview

This is a course about writing and how we understand it. Writing involves hard work, frustrating distractions, societal contempt, and the constant feeling that everything you create isn’t worth very much. And then you bleed. But, you do get an iPad! Take that, Ernest!

 

On the other hand, writing is one of the most effective ways to send forth your thoughts into the universe, into the future, into some kind of immortality. Your well-rendered ideas and metaphors could outlive you a thousand times and give you the best shot at bugging other people for all of eternity.

 

In the College Board’s description of the AP English Language and Composition class, they describe the purpose of the course:

 

An AP course in English Language and Composition engages students in becoming skilled readers of prose written in a variety of periods, disciplines, and rhetorical contexts, and in becoming skilled writers who compose for a variety of purposes. Both their writing and their reading should make students aware of the interactions among a writer’s purposes, audience expectations, and subjects as well as the way generic conventions and the resources of language contribute to effectiveness in writing.

 

Similarly, in this class we will engage a number of varied texts in order to understand and analyze them, but we will also use those texts as models of our own writing. We will work to become powerful readers—able not only to understand what a writer is communicating, but also to manipulate the English language to achieve those effects. Furthermore, we will take this knowledge and apply it to our own writing. We will have opportunities to write for a number of purposes—to teach, to persuade, to tell a story—and in a number of styles—memoir, editorial, journalistic, satirical. In the end, we will explore what words have the power to do.

Central Texts

• The Language of Composition: Reading, Writing, Rhetoric by Renée H. Shea, Lawrence Scanlon, and Robin Dissin Aufses
• 50 Essays by Samuel Cohen and Everything’s an Argument by Andrea A. Lunsford and John J. Ruszkiewicz
• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain and Fences by August Wilson
• The Internet

Grading System

Essays, Projects, Tests: 80% Essays we write in class involve a multi-step process that goes from pre-writing, research, drafting, editing, and publishing. Some essays will have grades at different parts of the process to assess how well you navigate the demands of writing. Some essays will be edited by peers or outside editors (web editors or guest editors). Most major writing will be graded one-on-one with the teacher and to some extent expectations and grading standards will be negotiated individually according to the needs and abilities of each student. Periodically, we’ll also be learning terminology and concepts necessary for writing and will therefore need assessments to make sure you understand them before we begin integrating them into your writing.

 

Homework and Daily Work: 20% One of the major methods of providing you with the space and opportunity to display your analysis of readings is the blog. Regularly, you and your fellow students will engage with readings and explore the issues, techniques, and purpose behind the writing. The blogs give us the added ability to share these insights with students within the class and outside of the school community. We will also be able to use commentary, hyperlinks, accompanying visuals (charts, photos, illustrations), and RSS readers to broaden the intellectual experience and anticipate the methods the modern marketplace of ideas employs and will employ in the future. I grade every Monday the previous week’s work.

 

Other Policies

Independent Reading: Early in the semester, you’ll choose 4 works that revolve around an interest you’d like to pursue (the French Revolution, neurobiology, the philosophy of memory) and read on Mondays or Tuesdays for about thirty minutes a week as well as the rest of the week on your own. In January, you’ll write a report and give a 4-6 minute speech.

 

AP Practice: Periodically, we’ll practice AP test-specific skills including multiple choice paragraph analysis, synthetic essays, and in-class, timed essay writing geared towards the types of items you’ll see on the AP exam. At times we will work backwards, taking essay questions or multiple-choice questions and diving what is being assessed. Still, there must be balance.

 

Covers down: While we either discuss or I teach, iPad covers will be closed. iPads can be very distracting so we need to work together to make sure that we use these devices for classwork and avoid being distracted while here.

 

Homework and tardy/absence Policy:

First off, I don’t take late homework unless the situation is particularly special (e.g. your family moved to Borneo yesterday and “forgot” to bring you along). For larger papers and projects, I subtract 10% off for every day you’re late. When you are absent—excused—it’s your responsibility to find out what the homework was (it’s on my website) and get it to me the next school day. If your absence is unexcused, you get an automatic 0 for the assignment. Students who are tardy more than 10 minutes are considered absent for that class period and if you are absent more than 9 times in a semester (for any reason) you may not receive credit for my class. I also reserve the right to decrease your grade by 10% for every day you are absent over 9 days.

 

Technology Expectations

Every student will be expected to have their iPads (charged) in class every class period. Also, you will be asked to maintain an academic blog where much of your in-class work will be entered as well as your longer assignments. During class, you’re expected to work only on class work; any time you spend on other sites—Angry Birds, Tower Madness, whathaveyou—I will confiscate your tablet for the duration of class. Also, if you’re unable to resist the siren song of the multitask, of checking your email while comparing prices on shoes at Nordstrom’s while laughing at LOLCATS pics, I might bust you back down to the Stone Age where you will relearn what life is like with only dead tree products and pencils. Similarly, I restrict all uses of cell phones and MP3 players to out of class time. Please keep these devices in your pockets or backpacks. If I see you using one in class, I will confiscate it and take it to the front office.

The Final Exam and the AP Exam

First, I encourage all students to take the AP exam; the exam is a difficult, exhausting ordeal, but one that I truly believe can be useful. The final exam will be a major part of the final grade for the class and will mirror the AP exam: a persuasive essay, an analytical essay, a synthetic essay, and a multiple-choice section. Everyone will be required to take my Final Exam, but those who take the official AP exam will be able to miss the 2^nd day of the exam if they choose.

Other Behavior Expectations

I am not OK with students disrespecting or belittling other students. The first time this happens, expect to be asked out of class or sent to the front office. I take it very seriously. Besides that, I hope for a classroom of mutual respect where I treat you with the dignity and honor you deserve and you do likewise. Education has such a potential to be a force fro good in the world and I expect all of us to treat it that way.

 

 

 

Building:                 Shorewood                                                   Year: 2017-2018

 

Name of Course:     AP Language and Comp                          Instructor: Stearns

 

Semester: ___                                                                                Year long: _x_

 

Concepts/Themes (Concept or theme followed by a simple explanatory sentence)	Power Standards (List of Power Standards in student friendly language)	Approximate Time Frame (Sequential, measured by unit, time, or calendar)
Write well: Arguments (11-12.1)	I can write an effective argument.	Sept/October
Write well: Expository (11-12.2)	I can write a clear nonfiction essay.	Sept/November
Write well: Audience (11-12.4)	I can adapt my writing for diverse audiences.	December
Write well: Revise (11-12.5)	I can revise my writing with input from students and teachers to make it stronger.	September—Personal essay
Write well: Technology (11-12.6)	I can use many different types of technology to communicate effectively.	All year but esp. December Pecha Kucha
Write well: Research (11-12.7)	I can write research essays that use information from many different types of sources.	All year but esp. 30 futures (Jan)
Write well: Bias/Authority (11-12.8)	I can evaluate information and decide if it’s credible or sketchy when I use it in my writing.	All year but esp. 30 futures (Jan.)
Write well: Evidence (11-12.9)	I can use credible and specific evidence to support my claims in my writing.	All year but esp. Sept-Nov (MLK)
Read well: Evidence for analysis (11-12.1)	I can read arguments and select textual evidence to support my interpretation of them.	All year but esp. Sept-Nov (MLK)
Read Well: Complex texts (11-12.10)	I can read and comprehend literature at the high end of complexity.	All year, but esp. Nov (Huck) and June (Fences)
Read well: Rhetorical Analysis (11-12.5)	I can analyze multiple methods of rhetorical strategies writers use in constructing arguments.	Oct (MLK) and March (Rhetorical essay)
Read well: Multiple sources (11-12.7)	I can read from many different types of texts (written, oral, visual, charts, etc.) and synthesize their information together.	Feb (Synthesis Essay)
Read Well: Trace ideas (11-12.3)	I can follow 2 or more ideas throughout a piece of writing.	All year
Read Well: Old stuff (11-12.9)	I can read and understand works from the 16-19th centuries.	Feb (DWM section)
Speak Well: Presentations (11-12.4)	I can clearly and effectively present information to an audience.	All year (Semester Nonfiction proj)
Speak Well: Speeches (11-12.5)	I can speak persuasively to a variety of audiences.	All Year (Pecha Kucha)
Think Well: Academic/Rhetorical Vocab (Language—11-12.6)	I can name, recognize, and explain the thinking behind a number of rhetorical strategies. I can write in an academic style.	Arguments (Sept-Nov)
Think Well: Logical thought and Critical Thinking (R 11-12.8)	I can think logically and rationally and understand how cognitive bias can derail the thought process.	All year (Sept-Nov)
Assessments: (List major assessments and assignments – not exhaustive, but the primary pieces used as the basis of the course)   MLK Essay Personal Essay Object Lesson Research Essay Pecha Kucha Speech/Debate Creative Nonfiction Article AP prompts
Possible Curriculum/Textbooks: (List of core, articulated (or to be articulated) texts in the course)   The Language of Composition Everything is an Argument Fences
Additional Resources/Technology: (List of other resources used prominently in the course, along with technology resources)   Student presentation software

 

Shorewood Classroom Expectations

Name: __________________________________________ Department: ________ Class: _________________________

 

To be a successful T-Bird…	Be Engaged	Have Integrity	Show Respect	Be Determined
Expected Classroom Behaviors	1. Arrive in class prior to the bell ringing. 2. Come with materials out, start warm-ups or entry activities. 3. Have your homework ready and finished. 4. Be in your seats, waiting for instruction when the bell rings. 5. Follow the rules and expectations set by the teacher.	1. Do your best work. 2. Use appropriate language. 3. Use appropriate voice          level. 4. Help each other. 5. Extend courtesy to guests and to one another.	1. Ask permission to use teacher’s class materials. 2. Keep hands and feet to self. 3. Use class materials appropriately. 4. Use appropriate language and voice level. 5. Be considerate of others’ ideas and opinions.	1.  Persevere through work completion. 2.  Ask for help if needed. 3.  Strive to grow and learn something every day. 4.  Set personal learning goals and celebrate when you reach them!

 

 

Classroom Routine/Expectations

Late Policy	In order for students to participate in a community of learning, homework and classwork is expected on time with no credit for late work. Major work and projects lose 10% for every day it’s late. Homework can’t be made up unless student has an excused absence.
Technology Policy	To ensure student engagement with the classroom community, cellphones will stay invisible and silent in class unless there is teacher permission. Charged IPads should be brought to class every day.
Plagiarism Policy	Integrity is very important to make sure that all members of the classroom community can trust each other. All work from students should be their own creation for this class; work that is either quoted or used from other writers should be clearly credited.