Course Objectives:
The purpose of this course is to help students “write effectively and confidently in their college courses across the curriculum and in their professional and personal lives.” (The College Board, AP English Course description, p. 6). The course is organized according to the requirements and guidelines of the current AP English Course Description, and, therefore, students are expected to read critically, think analytically, and communicate clearly in both writing and speech.
Primary Learning Goals:
AP English Language and Composition is a college-level course examining rhetoric as “the art of finding and analyzing all the choices involving language that a writer, speaker, reader, or listener might make in a situation so that the text becomes meaningful, purposeful, and effective for readers or listeners, and examining the specific features of texts, written or spoken, that cause them to be meaningful, purposeful, and effective for readers or listeners in a situation” (David Jolliffe, former AP exam creator). Therefore, students will become mature and sophisticated consumers and creators of a variety of texts. By the end of the course, students will understand:
• what they read: the main point or thesis, the occasion or context, the author’s motivation for writing, the tone and style;
• how a text is created to develop meaning and purpose including genre, organization, paragraphing, syntax;
• the relationship of the text’s creation to its accomplishment, the purpose of academic intellectual prose, its meaning and effect;
• how to articulate their analysis of what they read; how the organizational structure , diction, syntax, imagery, figurative language flesh out a text;
• how to create, develop and support an argument; acknowledging the complexities and nuances of important issues that adults argue about in contemporary intellectual circles;
•how to become good citizens through awareness of public discourse issues;
• how to enter into a conversation with sources and develop a thesis and argument or exposition by synthesizing conversations into their own writing;
• how to analyze and incorporate their analysis of visual texts into their writing;
• effective research skills and proper MLA citation;
• how to read a question, so they know exactly what and how to approach it;
• how to enhance their vocabulary as a means to effective writing; how to grapple with archaic prose;
• strategies necessary for success on the AP English Language and Composition exam
Students should become aware of how writer’s linguistic choices create effective writing and achieve stylistic effects as well as how to incorporate many of these techniques into their own writing.
AP Testing Information and Fees:
For the 2019-2020 school year, AP Exams will cost 92 dollars. Free or reduced lunch students will have a different fee, but all fees are paid in advance or become a school based fine. AP students are expected to take the AP exam. A list of all course exam dates is available at http://professionals.collegeboard.com/testing/ap/about/dates/next-year, but the AP Language exam is May 13.
AP Course Specific Information:
AP courses will bear a 5 pt scale, or weighted scale, for GPA calculation purposes. This is mainly due to the difficult nature of AP material and the rigorous expectations of AP classes. AP students should expect to complete a full year of the course and not switch levels at a semester change. Students may drop a course without penalty within the first 6 classes. Students should expect a competitive grading of all work and “average” or “good” work for regular or honors students is not considered “average” or “good” for an AP student. Reading will be independently done without significant support by mid October and with minimal support by February. Much of the reading will occur outside of class, and preparation is critical to success.
Course Plan:
Students will read numerous portions of The Language of Composition learning the key elements of rhetoric, the rhetorical triangle and the concepts of ethos, pathos and logos. They will also begin learning how to annotate their reading and develop a an understanding of analysis and argumentative strategies. Critical evaluation and independent study will occur with the use of 100 Great Essays. After reading, we will discuss the reading and writing skills and concepts needed for success on the AP exam by encountering practice exam materials and AP style questions. Research and secondary sources to confirm beliefs will occur between the second and third semester. By the end of the course, students will:
• Identify and evaluate purpose, tone and audience
• Distinguish main ideas from supporting details
• Identify and create thesis statements
• Distinguish author’s rhetorical purpose
• Discern and use specific organizational patterns
• Infer implications
• Derive meaning from context
• Find multiple meanings
• Understand irony
• Understand a wide variety of literary terms
• Use footnotes and bibliographic information to further research
• Create sentences of varied length and structure
• Construct coherent paragraphs with specific organizational patterns
• Make effective word choices
• Offer a unique voice to a specified audience
• Gather and utilize source material to support arguments