12+Grade+World+Lit+honors

=12th Grade=

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Spoken and Written Language. Students adjust their spoken and written language to communicate effectively with a variety of audiences for a range of purposes and practical applications. ======

Writing Process. Students use the writing process for both informal and formal writing.
Language Skills. Students use appropriate language, mechanics and style in their written work (e.g. rich vocabulary, grammar, proofreading and editing, varied sentence structure).

__**1. Description of 12th Grade Writing Program**__ (Reflect upon goals and aims, or describe how the writing and language skills standards are applied at this grade level.) World Literature Honors students use language and writing skills in the context of high level critical and analytical thinking about texts and films across a range of genres. Students write in a range of contexts – formal papers, reading response journals, creative pieces, blog entries, in-class responses, and timed essays. The students keep film logs and learn basics of film studies and engage in technological projects that yoke the visual, audio, and written: projects include the Dante’s //Inferno// Prezi, Sixties Album Project Blog and/or Podcast, Screenwriting etc… The class is discussion based, emphasizing oral expression/presentation, listening, questioning and commentary. Writing tasks engage both close reading of texts and films and reading via context (Historical, mythic, psychological etc…). While the content of this course changes from year to year, these writing and language skills have been a part of the whole. __Trimester 1 __ -- Content: Short Essays of Focused Literary Analysis (usually two of them). We work on both close analysis, building on early work on 10th and 11th. Analysis also involves and deepens aptitude for contextual reading (ie. Historical, mythic, psychological etc..) __Trimester Two __ – In past years, we have done a longer creative piece (a memoir or short story) in the fall. More recently we are moving the creative piece to trimester two and shortening it. We continue deepening literary analytical writing skills and timed essay writing skills. __Trimester Three __-- Short Analytical Essay, timed essay writing, and Larger Multimedia project
 * **Audience and Purpose **. What is the audience and purpose of an essay vs. journal and blog post.
 * **The Writing Process. **What is prewriting? Attitudes toward writing; steps for generating ideas and organizing ideas; freewriting and focused freewriting; effective journaling
 * **Thesis Construction. **a) Basic Assertion/Elaboration structure of thesis statement.; b) Focus on thesis as guiding/orienting statement for whole essay; c) Characteristics of a successful well-crafted thesis statement on 12th/college level.
 * **Body Paragraphs. Emphasis on Topic Sentences and Use of Supporting Details and Examples ** . Strong emphasis on proper quoting and analysis of quoted passages.
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Taking Times Essay Exams. **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">skills etc…
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Deepen thesis construction. a) **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Reviewing various thesis models (Brufee’s four models); b) Exploring Types of thesis based on mode of essay; c) Deeping ability to elaborate in theses
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Creative writing **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> – constructing short story or short memoir with economy.
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Essay shaping **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> – using rhetorical strategies to keep focus etc…
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Argument/ persuasion **
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Sentence Issues **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';"> – addressing persistent problems such as vague pronoun reference, run-ons, agreement, tense shift etc..
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Sentence conciseness. **
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Reinforce Skills from earlier Trimesters **
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Online and Blog Writing – Blog **
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Writing about film **
 * **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Argument/Analysis **

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Our signature strengths are many but they involve the yoking of visual, oral and written communications skills in the context of complex, college level material (across genres). We develop these skills through a range of signature strategies and methods: 1) writing about complex texts – both less formally in journal and formally in papers and timed essays. 2) Honing analysis skills in terms of kinds of assessments in college: close reading, complex thesis construction, contextual reading, depth of engagement with text. 3) Timed essay writing; 4) short story/memoir writing 5) Introduction to Film Studies and writing about film; 6) Regular blog. forum writing and student blog construction. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">The course reinforces and culminates the departments approach to writing as process, the use of a range of writing practices (i.e. journaling) and the centrality of students to construct knowledge and ask questions orally in the classroom. The topics for this course are wide ranging and student selected, changing from the first to second half of the year (the offerings this year are “Literature and Myth” and “The Sixties through Literature, Music and Film).
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Signature Strengths **<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">:
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">New Directions/Areas for Growth: **
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">More time and fewer interruptions in the schedule needed for coverage of texts and skills teaching.
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Class Size is often large. The last few years, I have had several classes of 16 and larger.


 * __4. Addenda (we can collect samples later on)__**
 * Course Description
 * Syllabus
 * Sample Handouts | Lessons
 * Samples of Student Work