AP Language and Composition Assignments
- Instructors
- Term
- 2010-2011 School Year
- Department
- English
- Location
- 307
- Description
-
This college-level course provides students with the tools to critically read and analyze a range of challenging non-fiction prose selections and develop an awareness of rhetoric in the class readings as well as in their own writing. Though we work within the framework of American Literature and connect our readings to periods in American history, our texts and their sequencing are primarily based on the development of crucial analytical reading skills rather than historical timelines. Students will write informally and will have many opportunities to work in shorter forms and to write at-home assignments, but at heart this class is a college composition course, and they will therefore complete many timed essays as well as an argumentative research paper. Revision, including peer and instructor reviews and the writing of multiple drafts, will be an important part of most assignments.
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Upcoming Assignments
No upcoming assignments.
Past Assignments
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Exam on House of Mirth.
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Due: Chapter 12-14. Quiz. Book Check.
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Due: Chapters 10-11. Quiz.
Portfolio Due, Period ???.
*Though this is not a requirement, if you have a chance to turn in written assignments early in the day (before your period) on the day they're due, I would really appreciate it!*
Portfolio Due, Period ???.
*Though this is not a requirement, if you have a chance to turn in written assignments early in the day (before your period) on the day they're due, I would really appreciate it!*
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Chapters 5-9 Due. Quiz.
Portfolio Due, Period ???
*Though this is not a requirement, if you have a chance to turn in written assignments early in the day (before your period) on the day they're due, I would really appreciate it!*
Portfolio Due, Period ???
*Though this is not a requirement, if you have a chance to turn in written assignments early in the day (before your period) on the day they're due, I would really appreciate it!*
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Due: Book II, Chapters 1-5. Quiz.
I'm going to be sitting in my room guarding diplomas during the entire graduation ceremony on Friday. As a result: if you can turn in your portfolio today, I will give you five points extra credit for giving me something to do on Friday.
I'm going to be sitting in my room guarding diplomas during the entire graduation ceremony on Friday. As a result: if you can turn in your portfolio today, I will give you five points extra credit for giving me something to do on Friday.
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Due: Revised UC Essay.
*Though this is not a requirement, if you have a chance to turn in written assignments early in the day (before your period) on the day they're due, I would really appreciate it!*
*Though this is not a requirement, if you have a chance to turn in written assignments early in the day (before your period) on the day they're due, I would really appreciate it!*
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Due: Chapters 13-15. Quiz.
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Due: Chapters 5-12. Megaquiz.
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Due: Personal Statement.
*Though this is not a requirement, if you have a chance to turn in written assignments early in the day (before your period) on the day they're due, I would really appreciate it!*
*Though this is not a requirement, if you have a chance to turn in written assignments early in the day (before your period) on the day they're due, I would really appreciate it!*
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Due: Chapters 2-4. Quiz.
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Read Chapter 1 of House of Mirth. Quiz. You are annotating this book for 50 points.
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Due: Ultimate KPP Reflection. What are ten things you want to remember during your AP test?
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Due: Multiple Choice Exam. This is primarily to practice timing. Make sure you give yourself exactly an hour.
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Due: Three Timed Writings. Keep them stapled separately. Also complete KPP Reflection 12-14.
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Reading Journal Due!
Remember, turning in your journal before spring break is a matter of honor. Don't let me down.
Vocabulary Test 17.
Remember, turning in your journal before spring break is a matter of honor. Don't let me down.
Vocabulary Test 17.
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Due: KPP 10-11. There has been some confusion about dual essay KPPs. You only need to do one KPP reflection. It can touch on both essays.
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Due: Walden reading. A section toward the end of "The Ponds".
Begin at "In such a day, in September or October, Walden is a perfect forest mirror..." and end at "Let our lakes receive as true names at least as the Icarian Sea, where 'still the shore' a 'brave attempt resounds.'"
Reading Journal 9: Write a thesis and do three focused CD-CMs. Your thesis should discuss how Thoreau develops his argument about nature, self, profit, or time. (You should of course state what that argument is.) Alternatively, your thesis may also explore how Thoreau's descriptions of Walden Pond, in particular, relates to what you identify as his larger purpose in going to the woods and writing Walden.
Begin at "In such a day, in September or October, Walden is a perfect forest mirror..." and end at "Let our lakes receive as true names at least as the Icarian Sea, where 'still the shore' a 'brave attempt resounds.'"
Reading Journal 9: Write a thesis and do three focused CD-CMs. Your thesis should discuss how Thoreau develops his argument about nature, self, profit, or time. (You should of course state what that argument is.) Alternatively, your thesis may also explore how Thoreau's descriptions of Walden Pond, in particular, relates to what you identify as his larger purpose in going to the woods and writing Walden.
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Due: Revised Timed Writing, typed. Staple to the front of original draft, and any other drafts.
If you're one of those lovely students who checks this late Sunday night or early Monday morning, please bring Walden so we can find the pages you're reading for tomorrow. Spread the word!
If you're one of those lovely students who checks this late Sunday night or early Monday morning, please bring Walden so we can find the pages you're reading for tomorrow. Spread the word!
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Due: Vocab Test, L14-L15.
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Due: KPP 9.
Also, revised paragraphs (from 6-level AP essay) must be emailed to me by 6:00 pm. You can simply paste the paragraphs into the email. Only one group member must send an email, but make sure it has everyone's name.
Also, revised paragraphs (from 6-level AP essay) must be emailed to me by 6:00 pm. You can simply paste the paragraphs into the email. Only one group member must send an email, but make sure it has everyone's name.
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Due: Read "Mending Wall" (508). Reading Journal 8: Integrate 3 CDs into (3 different) sentences that discuss the ways in which speaker presents and argument about fences.
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Due: Bring an old timed writing that was graded and that you would like to revise.
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Due: "Abolitionist Voices" Tone Assignment. May have been collected by substitute on Friday.
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Bring Big Book and List of Tone Words.
In class, you will read the various excerpts from "Abolitionist Voices" (388-389). For each excerpt, assign and, in a few sentences that reference diction, syntax, devices, etc., justify a one word description of tone. This will either be collected by the substitute or collected on Monday. If you are absent, this is due Monday.
I figured it out! I posted tone words when you did the "Jesus is a Brand of Jeans" Assignment. Here they are again.
In class, you will read the various excerpts from "Abolitionist Voices" (388-389). For each excerpt, assign and, in a few sentences that reference diction, syntax, devices, etc., justify a one word description of tone. This will either be collected by the substitute or collected on Monday. If you are absent, this is due Monday.
I figured it out! I posted tone words when you did the "Jesus is a Brand of Jeans" Assignment. Here they are again.
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Reading Journal 7: 3CD-CMs and thesis focused on the rhetorical value of changes to the Nicene Creed. What elements of doctrine, Church identity, or individual faith do the changes to the Nicene Creed strengthen or promote?
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Due: Reading Journal 6: For multiple choice, explain why each correct answer is correct.
34 - c
35 - c
36 - a
37 - d
38 - b
39 - a
40 - b
41 - c
42 - d
43 - e
34 - c
35 - c
36 - a
37 - d
38 - b
39 - a
40 - b
41 - c
42 - d
43 - e
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Due: Read "Letter from Birmingham Jail" (handout). Annotate thoroughly (you will be graded on your annotations). Identify and evaluate rhetorical devices (there will be many), as well as appeals to ethos, logos, and pathos. Consider audience. Mark patterns, particularly regarding light vs. dark, high vs. low, and sickness vs. health. Lastly, consider its relationship to Thoreau's "Resistance to Civil Government".
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Due: KPP Reflection 7
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Due: KPP Reflection 6.
Also due: Read "Resistance to Civil Government." Reading Journal 5 - Five CD-CMs.
Also due: Read "Resistance to Civil Government." Reading Journal 5 - Five CD-CMs.
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Come to class quickly and immediately pick up your timed writing.
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Due: Grammar Packet.
Bring Big Book.
Bring Big Book.
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Due: Read "Solitude" from Walden. Reading Journal 4: Type a paragraph (3/4 of a page to a full page) comparing/contrasting Thoreau's view of solitude, society, or nature with the view of solitude, society, or nature present in another text we've read this year. Use and cite quotations. Highlight one instance of parallel structure.
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Due: Typed list of 25 Things You Know and 25 Texts You Know.
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Due: Read Synthesis Articles. Reading Journal 3: Compose a thesis and directional statement, then outline the points for each of your paragraphs. You should use CDs from at least three sources, but you should not structure your essay outline around their use.
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Read "It's all about the Implication" (handout). Reading Journal 2: SOAPStone
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Due: Read "Shooting an Elephant" (handout). Reading Journal #1: Three CD-CMs.
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Due: KPP Reflection 5.
Bring your big book.
Bring your big book.
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Due: Your edited essay with syntax changes.
Timed Writing #5.
Timed Writing #5.
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Due: Read both "Reading" from Walden and "Learning to Read" by Malcolm X (handout). Then, type 1-2 pages about the purpose/effects of reading. Use both texts as sources to support your claims. Do not, however, structure your argument around the texts (as a comparison/contrast essay, for example).
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Reading Journal Due!
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Vocab L13-L14 Exam.
Bring Big Book.
Bring Big Book.
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Reading Journal #8:
Assign these three essays a score, and -- in three to five sentences -- explain your score.
Assign these three essays a score, and -- in three to five sentences -- explain your score.
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Due: Read "The Death of a Moth" (handout). Reading Journal 7: Complete a Toulmin Analysis of Woolf's essay. (You won't be able to simply label--you will have to infer her claim, warrants, evidence, etc.)
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Due: KPP Reflection.
Also, bring various text books to class.
Also, bring various text books to class.
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Due: Argument Project. Place texts in the following order:
- Classical Model Final Draft (labeled)
- Classical Model Rough Draft, with marks
- Rogerian Model Final Draft (labeled)
- Rogerian Model Rough Draft, with marks
- Toulmin Model Final Draft (labeled)
- Toulmin Model Rough Drat, with marks
- One page typed reflection: Which model did you like best? Why? What elements of each model were most beneficial? Why? Can you think of situations where the each model (or some of its elements) might be useful? What is your ideal argument model? Does it synthesize elements of the models? etc.
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Due: Reading Journal 6: Write a Thesis on "I am Alone" by Cochise of the Apache (page 460 in your big book).
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Due: Read "Where I lived and What I Lived for"chapter in Walden. Start at the paragraph beginning, "Every morning was a cheerful invitation to make my life..." and read until the chapter's end.
Reading Journal 5: Thoroughly answer the questions attached below.
Reading Journal 5: Thoroughly answer the questions attached below.
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Due: Toulmin Argument. 2 pages, typed.
Respond to "Should the Obama Generation Drop Out?" and accompanying Letters to the Editor. Should some jobs eliminate their expectation of a Bachelor's Degree?
Amanda found another article and video with a similar idea.
Respond to "Should the Obama Generation Drop Out?" and accompanying Letters to the Editor. Should some jobs eliminate their expectation of a Bachelor's Degree?
Amanda found another article and video with a similar idea.
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Due: Label Toulmin elements of "Rising to the Occasion of our Death"
Reading Journal 4: List and explain all warrants in the essay.
Reading Journal 4: List and explain all warrants in the essay.
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Due: Read Walden, excerpts from "Economy"
Reading Journal 3: 5 CD-CMs, with each focusing on a different device. (Underline the device.) Try to push yourself out of your comfort zone and choose devices that you're less familiar with or accustomed to discussing in timed writings.
- My pages 1-7: Start of book -"When one man has reduced a fact of the imagination to be a fact to his understanding, I foresee that all men will at length establish their lives on that basis"
- My pages 27-42: "Near the end of March, 1845, I borrowed an axe and went down to the woods by Walden Pond..." - "The human race is interested in these experiments, though a few old women who are incapacitated for them,m or who own their thirds in mills, may be alarmed"
Reading Journal 3: 5 CD-CMs, with each focusing on a different device. (Underline the device.) Try to push yourself out of your comfort zone and choose devices that you're less familiar with or accustomed to discussing in timed writings.
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Read "Games" (handout). Then, write a Rogerian Model essay, addressing whether or not video games are (or could potentially be) as intellectually stimulated and/or challenging as books. Approximately two pages, typed.
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Bring Walden to class.
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Due: Read and Label Rogerian elements of "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?"
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Due: Classical Argument, typed, approximately two pages. Should be a response to article on bowdlerization of Huck Finn. Is changing every occurrence of the N-word to "slave" a positive, effective, or warranted change? Label parts of your argument.
Also due: KPP Reflection 2.
Also due: KPP Reflection 2.
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Read and label the parts of the classical argument in "Our Vanishing Night"
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Vocab Lesson 11-12 Exam. Bring a scantron.
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Due: Read The Onion articles (handout). RJ 2: Choose the article that you think presents the most effective satire and write a paragraph reflection explaining how its satire is effective.
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Due: Read "Wiley v. Acme". Reading Journal 1: 3 CD-CMs focused on satire.
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Due: KPP Reflection. Typed.
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Assign yourself 2-3 KPPs and explain why you need to work on them. Typed.
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Due: "A Modest Proposal" (handout). Complete SOAPStone. Typed. Include cited quotations to back your analysis.
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Bring Big Book
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Due: Read "Aint I a Woman?" (350). Quiz.
Bring Big Book.
Bring Big Book.
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Choose a Christmas movie, commercial, advertisement, or song. By closely examining the "text," identify how it defines Christmas. How does the text's style and the author's choices convey this definition? One typed page.
If you can include the text, please do so. If not, please supply an additional (1-2 sentence) description or summary of your text.
Also: Vocab L9-L10 Exam. Bring Scantron.
If you can include the text, please do so. If not, please supply an additional (1-2 sentence) description or summary of your text.
Also: Vocab L9-L10 Exam. Bring Scantron.
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Read "Jesus is a Brand of Jeans," paying particular attention to tone. Quiz.
The link below includes the article with pictures of relevant advertisements.
The link below includes the article with pictures of relevant advertisements.
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Due: Finish Woman Warrior. Book annotations due. Timed Writing on text.
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Due: Woman Warrior, Chapters 1-2.
Reading Journal 8: Do a close up/zoomed out analysis of five CDs. It will be in this format:
CD: "Quote" (Kingston #).
Close up: Analyze details of quotation, focusing on devices used.
Zoomed out: Describe how quotation works in establishing greater themes, motifs, style, symbols, etc. in text.
Reading Journal Due!
Reading Journal 8: Do a close up/zoomed out analysis of five CDs. It will be in this format:
CD: "Quote" (Kingston #).
Close up: Analyze details of quotation, focusing on devices used.
Zoomed out: Describe how quotation works in establishing greater themes, motifs, style, symbols, etc. in text.
Reading Journal Due!
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Due: Read "Turkeys in the Kitchen" by Dave Barry (handout)
Reading Journal 7: Write 5 CD-CMs, all focused on humor. What makes each quote funny?
Reading Journal Due!
Reading Journal 7: Write 5 CD-CMs, all focused on humor. What makes each quote funny?
Reading Journal Due!
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Due: Rhetoric Show and Tell. Bring in an article, advertisement, object, or picture that has rhetorical value and that can be thoroughly analyzed in class.
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Read "The Million Pound Bank Note" on pages 53-74 of The Mysterious Stranger.
Reading Journal 6: Write an essay starter (a thesis and 2-3 main points, which included concrete details, cited, and brief commentaries) on how Twain uses to the story to contrast English culture and American culture.
Reading Journal 6: Write an essay starter (a thesis and 2-3 main points, which included concrete details, cited, and brief commentaries) on how Twain uses to the story to contrast English culture and American culture.
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Test on Huckleberry Finn and "On the Decay of the Art of Lying." Bring both to class.
Book annotations due.
Book annotations due.
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Due: Finish Huckleberry Finn. Reading Journal 5: Write a paragraph in which you evaluate the maturity (intellectually, physically, morally, or otherwise) of Huck at the end of the novel.
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Vocab Test L7-L8
Also due: Write a story about a day (or part of a day) in which people (or one person) cannot lie, illustrating the points made by Twain's essay, "On the Decay of the Art of Lying". Should be 2-3 pages typed, double-spaced.
Also due: Write a story about a day (or part of a day) in which people (or one person) cannot lie, illustrating the points made by Twain's essay, "On the Decay of the Art of Lying". Should be 2-3 pages typed, double-spaced.
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Due: Huckleberry Finn, Chapters 24-35.
Reading Journal 4: Write a structured, argumentative paragraph that identifies and analyzes the rhetorical purpose of some sort of pattern (a recurring image, stylistic choice, element of diction, motif, etc.) heavily featured in chapters 24-35.
Reading Journal 4: Write a structured, argumentative paragraph that identifies and analyzes the rhetorical purpose of some sort of pattern (a recurring image, stylistic choice, element of diction, motif, etc.) heavily featured in chapters 24-35.
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Bring big book.
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Due: Read Twain's "On the Decay of the Art of Lying."
Reading Journal 2: Write a thesis on Twain's use of rhetoric.
Reading Journal 2: Write a thesis on Twain's use of rhetoric.
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Due: Typed KPP Reflection on Wednesday's in class essay.
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Bring Big Book.
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Due: Read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, chapters 12-23.
Reading Journal 2: Three paragraph-length CD-CMs.
Reading Journal 2: Three paragraph-length CD-CMs.
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Vocab Test L5-L6. Bring Scantron
Bring Huckleberry Finn.
Due: Typed sentence samples. Compose and label two original sentences for each of the the sentence types presented on Tuesday.
Bring Huckleberry Finn.
Due: Typed sentence samples. Compose and label two original sentences for each of the the sentence types presented on Tuesday.
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Due: Read chapters 1-11 of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Reading Journal 1: Type 10 CD-CMs, highlighting three diction, rhetoric, or logic terms. Quiz.
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Unit I Test: Covers diction, rhetoric, logic, and fallacy terms.
Bring Scantron.
Bring Scantron.
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Due: Read "Letter to John Adams" (171-173). Quiz. Bring big book to class.
Also due: Logical fallacies worksheet.
Also due: Logical fallacies worksheet.
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Due: A typed, 1-2 essay imitating the style of Francis Bacon's "Of Studies." Choose a topic (so that your title is "Of _________") to define and praise. You should use plenty of parallel structure.
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Completed, typed reading journal. The journal should start with the earliest assignment and progress to the most recently assigned, finally ending with the blue rubric.
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Reading Journal 6: Read and grade the sample Lincoln essays based on the AP Scoring Guide (posted below). Type a 4-5 sentence explanation for each essay's score.
Also: Bring big book to class.
Also: Bring big book to class.
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KPP Reflection #2 Due. Type a half page to full page reflection evaluating the strategies that you used to improve on your key progress points during your in class essay on Friday. Evaluate your success. Based on your Friday essay, what do you identify as your key progress points for next time?
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Rhetoric Project Due. Make sure your rubric is attached.
Also due: annotated The Scarlet Letter.
Also due: annotated The Scarlet Letter.
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The Scarlet Letter final draft due.
Turn in, stapled in this order:
Turn in, stapled in this order:
- Final Draft (on top)
- Rough Draft and peer editor comments
- In class Essay
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Bring Big Book to class.
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Bring typed rough draft of The Scarlet Letter essay to class.
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Read Patrick Henry's Speech.
Reading Journal 4: Identify and explain the effects of five rhetorical devices within the speech.
Reading Journal 4: Identify and explain the effects of five rhetorical devices within the speech.
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Bring The Scarlet Letter to class for an in class essay.
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Finish reading The Scarlet Letter.
Reading Journal 3: Write a structured paragraph assessing how well the novel's conclusion supported its theme.
Reading Journal 3: Write a structured paragraph assessing how well the novel's conclusion supported its theme.