Honors English III at Suffield Academy
Course Overview for 2009-2010:
Mr. Sullivan is experimenting with the use of a wiki to foster more collaboarative work; students can think of it as a digital workbook in this course. http://sullivan-f-09-10.wikispaces.com/
Honors English III is for students who read rapidly with enough understanding and insight and who write about literature with enough ease that basic English III would not challenge them. The ability to write well organized, correctly punctuated, and grammatically correct papers is a definite prerequisite. Students are expected to sustain a minimum average of a B to stay in the course.
Basic goals of the curriculum:
Students are expected to develop understandings of fiction as fiction, drama as drama, and poetry as poetry, but this is not the primary focus of the course.
The primary goal of the course is on learning to read works of literature analytically in a larger context than just that of the individual work. For the fall term this context is the developing history of ideas from classical times through the middle ages; for the winter term the context is the ideas and ideals of the English renaissance; and for the spring term individual poems are read in the context of the poet's whole body of work and the even larger context of lyric poetry in general.
Of almost equal importance is a goal of developing student ability to write mature analytical essays on a variety of kinds of subjects relative to the literature.
A third goal is to develop student vocabulary and ability to manage words appropriately. This is done with particular attention to the fact that students take the SAT test, and as a result they are constantly quizzed with questions in the format of SAT questions.
A final goal, one that is focused on primarily in the spring term, is to prepare students to take the CEEB Advance Placement Test in Literature and Composition in May.
AP Literature and Composition (click here for more information from the College Board site).
The advanced Placement Test in Literature and Composition is a three hour test:
60 minutes of multiple choice questions that count 40%
120 minutes of essay questions that count 60%
The multiple choice portion of the test consists of substantial passages of prose and poetry, each with multiple choice questions to answer after it. The prose portions may be fiction or essay or both. About one half of the questions will relate to poetry and about one half will relate to prose.
The essay portion of the test consists of three questions. One question will provide a poem and then ask an essay question about it. One question will provide a passage of prose and then ask an essay question about it. And the third question will ask you a question that requires you to write an essay on a work that you have studied.
Some samples of questions asked on a work you have studied include:
A critic has said that one important measure of a superior work of literature is its ability to produce in the reader healthy confusion of pleasure and disquietude. Select a literary work that produces this "healthy confusion." Write an essay in which you explain the sources of the "pleasure and disquietude" experienced by readers of the work.
Choose a distinguished novel or play in which some of the most significant events are mental or psychological; for example, awakenings, discoveries, changes in consciousness. In a well organized essay, describe how the author manages to give these internal events the sense of excitement, suspense, and climax usually associated with external action. Do not merely summarize the plot.
Choose a novel or play that depicts a conflict between a parent (or a parental figure) and a son or daughter. Write an essay in which you analyze the sources of the conflict and explain how the conflict contributes to the meaning of the play.
ENGLISH III HONORS -- SPRING TERM -- TERM PAPER
A major exploration of the work of any poet whose work was originally written in English, but who is not one of the poets studied in this course.
(Note: Those who took English II Honors may not use the same poet that they wrote a major paper on for that course.)
Basically, what you are to explore and write about is what the poet does, how he or she does it, and how well he or she does it.
Requirements
1. Meet the step by step due dates outlines on separate sheet. Failure to do so will adversely affect your grade each time it happens.
2. Have a bibliography that includes the following:
A. a substantial collection of the poet's work
B. some sort of biographical information
C. two critical commentaries on the poet
NOTE: an encyclopedia entry will not fulfill any of these requirements. One book may fulfill more than one requirement, particularly a collection of poetry with a substantial introduction.
3. Correct and complete annotation
4. Detailed examination of two representative poems as an organic part of the paper.
Expectations
1. That there will be references to a number of poems beyond that two that are closely examined.
2. That there will NOT be a biography of the poet in the paper, but that the paper will demonstrate enough knowledge of the poet's biography to reflect how much the facts of when, where and how he or she lived may have impacted his or her work.
3. That the paper will NOT be a recapitulation of one or two critic's views of the poet, but that it will have used the views of at least two critics to synthesize your own ideas.
4. That the paper will be in the range of 6 to 10 typed pages with additional title page, annotation, and bibliography.
5. That the paper will have been carefully proofread for spelling and grammatical errors.
6. That the paper will have something intelligent to say and will say it well enough to keep me interested.