Students pursue a balanced, integrated standards-based program of literature and language studies, which is accelerated, enriched and differentiated and designed to prepare for the AP courses. Students will develop strategies to construct meaning and interact thoughtfully with all genres of literature, preparing them for college level work. Students will write analytical, persuasive, expository, narrative-autobiographical and reflective essays. Students also receive instruction in the conventions of written language and effective oral communication, and research techniques. A comprehensive final will be given at the end of the course.

9th graders attending a research skills presentation at the CSULB library.

Students will continue to pursue a balanced, integrated standards-based program of literature and language studies, which is accelerated, enriched and differentiated and designed to prepare them for AP courses. Students will develop strategies to construct meaning from and interact thoughtfully with all genres of literature and non-­fiction texts. Writing activities are informed by interaction with texts, and students will continue to use writing process activities as they compose argumentative, expository, narrative, response to literature, literary analysis, and research essays and papers. Students will also continue to receive instruction in the conventions of written language, reading strategies, effective oral communication and research techniques. A comprehensive final will be given at the end of this course.

English Language Arts 5-6 or AP Language and Composition

English 5-6

Students will engage in a variety of standards-­based academic reading and writing tasks. Students will demonstrate proficiency in a variety of rhetorical modes: narration, exposition, argumentation/persuasion and description to produce texts of at least 1,500 words. Students will engage in a close reading and exploration of themes found in American literature and the American experience through a rigorous, integrated program which balances non-­fiction, literature and language study. Students will analyze historically and/or culturally significant American works tracing the development of American writing from the colonial period to present day. To maintain the Writing Standards Assessment Portfolio students will continue to maintain their collection of works demonstrating excellence in both conventions and rhetoric. This course adheres to the rigorous UC requirements for an honors course and includes a comprehensive end of course exam.

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AP Language and Composition

The Advanced Placement English Language and Composition course is designed to help students become skilled readers of prose written in a variety of periods, disciplines, and rhetorical contexts and to become skilled writers who can compose for a variety of purposes. By their writing and reading in this course, students should become aware of the interactions among a writer’s purposes, audience expectations, and subjects, as well as the way generic conventions and the resources of language contribute to effective writing.

 

CSU-Expository Reading and Writing Course (ERWC) or AP Literature or AP Language and Composition

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ERWC

The goal of the Expository Reading and Writing Course (ERWC) is to prepare college-­bound seniors for the literacy demands of higher education. Through a sequence of fourteen rigorous instructional modules, students in this yearlong, rhetoric-­based course develop advanced proficiency in expository, analytical, and argumentative reading and writing. The cornerstone of the course—the assignment template—presents a process for helping students read, comprehend, and respond to nonfiction and literary texts. Modules also provide instruction in research methods and documentation conventions. Students will be expected to increase their awareness of the rhetorical strategies employed by authors and to apply those strategies in their own writing. They will read closely to examine the relationship between an author’s argument or theme and his or her audience and purpose; to analyze the impact of structural and rhetorical strategies; and to examine the social, political, and philosophical assumptions that underlie the text. By the end of the course, students will
be expected to use this process independently when reading unfamiliar texts and writing in response to them.
Course texts include contemporary essays, newspaper and magazine articles, editorials, reports, biographies, memos, assorted public documents, and other nonfiction texts. The course materials also include modules on two full­-length works (one novel and one work of nonfiction). Written assessments and holistic scoring guides conclude each unit.

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Advanced Placement Literature and Composition is a college-­level course which engages students in the careful reading and critical analysis of imaginative literature. Through the close reading of selected texts, students deepen their understanding of the ways writers use language to provide both meaning and pleasure for their readers. Students consider a work’s structure, style, and themes, as well as such smaller­ scale elements as the use of figurative language, imagery, symbolism, and tone. The course includes intensive study of representative works from various genres and periods from the sixteenth to the twentieth century, concentrating on works of recognized literary merit. In addition to considering a work’s literary artistry, students consider the social and historical values it reflects and embodies. Careful attention to both textual detail and historical context should provide a foundation for interpretation, whatever critical perspectives are brought to bear on the literary works studied.