Course: English III
Kofa High School, Rm 605
Teacher: Kevin Moore
Fall 2010 – Spring 2011
Syllabus
Mission Statement:
We intend to present lessons learned and tolerance of diversity through the recognition
and study of multiple cultural, religious, and racial discrimination fiction and non-fiction
literature themes throughout the history of the United States.
Course Goals and Objectives:
Following successful completion of this class, students will improve AIMS Reading and
Writing performance levels and make gains toward success in pre-college tests such as
ACT and Arizona Western College Placement Tests. Students will be better prepared to
function in workplace environment skills pertaining to reading and writing. Student
skills improvement includes the Arizona Department of Education General High School
Reading Performance Level Descriptors: A basic understanding of both fiction and
nonfiction texts; ability to identify fictional literary elements of character, setting, plot,
conflict, and figurative language; ability to compare nonfiction sources for specific
information, interpret author’s purpose, and identify basic persuasive strategies. For both
fiction and nonfiction, students are expected to use basic reading strategies at a literal and
sometimes inferential level by extracting details, interpreting connecting information to
prior knowledge, and drawing conclusions.
Class Rules, Policies, and Expectations:
1. All Kofa and district rules are strictly enforced. This is a bell-to-bell class; students
must be in their desks with daily materials ready when tardy bell rings. Mr. Moore
dismisses the class, not the bell.
2. It is the student’s responsibility to check his/her missed assignments following
absence from class either on the class website or on the chart in the front of the
classroom. Make-up work will not be accepted after one week from absence.
3. Students must have handbook to receive a pass.
4. Students must be respectful of school, principals and teachers, classmates, school
materials, and themselves.
5. Dress Code in handbook is strictly enforced.
6. Cell phones, CD players, MP3 players, and/or headphones are not allowed. Items in
use or visible will be turned into the administration office for Friday pickup.
7. All class work and supplies must be legible and free of tagging, gang affiliations, or
drawings.
8. No passes are issued during the first 30 minutes of any class. No passes will be given
during 4th period.
9. Water is the only drink allowed in class - no other drinks, food, or gum.
10.Tardies are not acceptable. Procedures of administration detentions explained in
handbook are strictly enforced.
11. Student tutoring for this class is available from 7:15 am – 7:30 am and 2:30 pm –
2:45 pm every school day. Additional time for tutoring, make-up work, and questions
can be arranged by appointment.
12. Late work will be accepted only by previous agreement with me. Late work will
automatically receive 50% of earned grade and will be accepted no more than one week
after assignment due date.
13. Each student must have a binder for this class. The binder should have sections for
bell work, vocabulary, assignments, writing, and notes.
Attendance:
No credit is given for any class in which a student has more than five unexcused absences
during a semester. No more than nine total unexcused absences are allowed per semester.
In accordance with this district policy, only five Saturday school make-up sessions are
offered each semester. Excluding those absences waived or reduced by administrative
review as per Kofa handbook, students must attend Attendance Makeup School to earn
back credit for those classes in which they have more than five absences. No teacher
attendance options will be given for this class.
Materials:
All students must come prepared to work with necessary notebooks, paper, pencils, and
pens. Textbooks and novels from the bookstore include The Language of Literature
(American Literature), Language Network (grammar), The Adventures of Huckleberry
Finn, The Great Gatsby, To Kill a Mockingbird, The Catcher in the Rye.
Types of reading include: short story and novel fiction; biographical, autobiographical,
memoirs, narratives, essays, newspapers/magazines, internet articles,
dictionary/thesaurus, charts/graphs, maps, nonfiction, and poetry
Grading:
Grades are based on the following scale of percentages:
90-100%
A
80-89%
B
70-79%
C
60-69%
D
0-59%
F
Percentages are based on assignment points such as daily class work 10 points, quizzes
25-40 points, essays 50-75 points, tests 100 points, research paper with materials 200
points. These are approximations and may vary according to individual content and
individual class needs. A progress report will be sent home at end of first and second six
weeks period to allow parents to view student’s current progress. The semester grades
are calculated as follows: 30% for Grading Periods 1 and 2, 4 and 5; 25% for Grading
Periods 3 and 6; 15% for the Fall and Spring Semesters’ Final Exams. The two semester
grades are recorded in the student’s permanent scholastic record. It is the responsibility
of the student to satisfactorily complete and turn in all assignments and assessments in a
timely manner even if he/she is absent.
Learning Activities:
Cornell Notes will be required of the student for all class time and homework
assignments. Note-taking enhances comprehension, summarizing, analysis, and critical
thinking inferences and questions.
Motivational activities include brain stretchers to develop higher level thinking such as
summarizing, predictions, inferences, and drawing conclusions. Word builders center on
vocabulary development including context words, prefixes and suffixes, synonyms and
antonyms, multiple meaning dictionary skills, root words and word families. Journal
responses relate to grammar review, current reading, current events, or student’s life
experiences.
Reading methods include read- along (tapes or teacher), guided reading, think-pair-share,
sustained silent reading, choral reading, individual class time and/or homework reading
assignments.
Historical Short Thematic Units where students develop abstract reading skills by
making connections.
Novel Units provide practice with literary concepts such as plot, theme, setting,
characterizations, symbolism, irony, conflict, and foreshadowing.
English III Fall Curriculum Calendar
The fall and spring curriculum schedules may be altered due to individual class needs
and/or materials, library facilities, or computer lab availability.
FIRST SIX WEEK GRADING PERIOD
Historical Background Units:
Accounts of Exploration and Exploitation, First Encounters
The Puritan Tradition, Between Heaven and Hell
Readings:
“Of Plymouth Plantation” by William Bradford
“from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano”
“To My Dear and Loving Husband” and “Upon the Burning of Our House, July
10th, 1666” by Anne Bradstreet
“from Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” by Jonathan Edwards
“The Examination of Sarah Good”
The Crucible
Acts I, II, III, IV
Writing:
Review Cornell Notes
Review Prescriptive Writing
Summarize, Paraphrase, Outline
Compare/Contrast
Connections to history and common themes
Analyze character development
Analyze plot development (exposition, rising action, climax, falling action,
resolution)
Cause and Effect
Key Vocabulary
Content Vocabulary
Character, setting plot , theme, primary sources, slave narratives,
descriptive/sensory details, meter, transcript, bias, loaded language/questions,
persuasive writing, drama, monologue, soliloquy, aside, stage directions
Assessments:
Graphic organizers, Cornell Notes, bellwork, outlines, essays (one paragraph to
five paragraph), Character Analysis, Cause and Effect essay, quizzes (content,
vocabulary, literary terms, grammar) The Crucible comprehension test
Standards:
R1:C6, R2:C1, R2:C2, R3:C1, W1:C1-6, W2:C1-6, W3:C2-5
SECOND SIX WEEK GRADING PERIOD
Historical Units:
Romanticism and Transcendentalism, Celebrations of the Self
American Gothic, The Dark Side of Individualism
The Vanishing Frontier, Tricksters and Trailblazers
Readings:
“The Devil and Tom Walker” by Washington Irving
“from Walden” by Henry David Thoreau
“The Masque of the Red Death,” “The Raven,” “Fall of the House of Usher, “The
Pit and the Pendulum,” “The Cask of Amontillado” by Edgar Allen Poe
Mark Twain Background
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Chapters 1-20
Writing:
Prescriptive Writing
Graphic organizers
Allegorical analysis, Color analysis, Theme analysis, Character analysis
Connections to history
Cause/Effect
Timeline
Key Vocabulary:
Content Vocabulary
Literal language, figurative language, metaphor, simile, personification,
visualization, imagery, observation, inference, macabre, allegory, alliteration,
internal rhyme, end rhyme, irony, implications, dialect
Assessments:
Graphic Organizers, bellwork, quizzes (story content, grammar, vocabulary,
literary terms), timeline, one paragraph to five paragraph essays
AIMS Writing Test October 26; AIMS Reading Test October 27; AIMS
Math October 28
Standards:
R1:C1, C4, C6; R2:C1, C2; W1:C1-5; W2:C1-6; W3:C2, C5, C4
THIRD SIX WEEK GRADING PERIOD
Historical Unit:
The Vanishing Frontier, Tricksters and Trailblazers
Readings:
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
Chapters 21-29, 30-38, 39-43
Writing
Cause/Effect
Theme, Character, Self Connection Analysis paragraphs and essays
Key Vocabulary
Novel Specific Content
Literary Terms review
Assessments:
Cornell notes, grammar quizzes, vocabulary and comprehension quizzes, End of
Novel essays, Final Comprehension Multiple Choice Test on novel, Character
analysis essay
Standards:
R1C4, C6; R2C1,C2; W1:C1-5; R2:C1,C2; W1:C1-5; W2:C1-6; W3:C1-5
FINAL EXAM
Final Exam Character Analysis Essay and Final Exam Semester Comprehension
Multiple Choice Test
English III Spring Curriculum Calendar
FOURTH SIX WEEK GRADING PERIOD
Research Paper
All students will choose an approved American Literature author and read
a variety of that author’s works (books, short stories, poems, and/or essays). The students
will then analyze features found of that author’s writing style. The final research project
must be MLA format and at least five type-written pages in addition to a title page and a
Works Cited page. All body paragraphs must be prescription writing 2, 2:1 chunk
structure. Source cards, note cards, an outline, and a rough draft will be due at specified
times prior to the final draft.
Key Vocabulary
Primary and secondary sources, bias, plagiarism, source cards, note cards,
outlines, rough drafts, final drafts, MLA format, Works Cited page
Readings:
Individual student’s approved American Literature author’s materials for research
paper.
Historical Unit:
The Modern Age, 1900-1940
Modernism, Alienation of the Individual
Reading:
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Key Vocabulary
Novel specific content words
Literary terms: conflict, figurative language, form, imagery, modernist
characters and techniques, persuasion, point of view, setting, style, theme, tone
Assessments
Research Paper source cards, note cards, outline, and rough draft
Research paper final draft with title page and Works Cited page
The Great Gatsby chapter, vocabulary, literary terms quizzes
Standards
Reading: S1 C4. C6; S2 C1, C2; S3 C1, C2; S3
Writing: S1 C1, C2, C3, C4, C5; S2 C1, C2, C3, C4, C5, C6; S3 C2, C4, C5, C6
FIFTH SIX WEEK GRADING PERIOD
The Great Gatsby
Completion of novel with associated essay and final test
Historical Unit:
Postwar Society 1950 – Present, American Contemporary Literature
Reading
The Chosen by Chaim Potok
Key Vocabulary
Novel specific content words
AIMS Literary Terms review and application
Ironic humor, implied social criticism, anti-hero
Assessments
The Great Gatsby chapter, vocabulary, literary terms quizzes; final novel essay,
final novel multiple choice exam
The Chosen chapter, vocabulary quizzes, final novel essay and multiple
choice quiz
AIMS Writing Test March 1, AIMS Reading Test March 2
Standards
Reading: S1 C4, C6; S2 C1, C2, S3 C3
Writing: S2 C1, C2, C3, C4, C5, C6; S3 C2, C4
SIXTH SIX WEEK GRADING PERIOD
Historical Unit:
Continuation of American Contemporary Literature
Reading
The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
Key Vocabulary
Novel specific content words
Literary Terms review and application to novel
Assessments
The Catcher in the Rye chapter, vocabulary, and literary terms quizzes; final novel
multiple choices test and essay
Standards
Reading: S1 C4, C6; S2 C1, C2; S3 C3
Writing: S2 C2, C2, C3, C4, C5, C6; S3 C2, C3. C4
SECOND SEMESTER FINAL EXAM
Comprehensive semester essay and multiple choice exams