Advanced Placement English Language and Composition is essentially a course in critical reading and effective writing.  Students will grow more proficient in reading, understanding, and discussing literary texts written in a variety of periods and styles, with particular attention to nonfiction.  Students will also become increasingly skillful in writing three types of papers: an essay of close textual analysis, which will determine a given selection's purpose and use of rhetorical devices; an open-ended argument, which will support, challenge, or qualify a given assertion; and a documented essay, which will synthesize and identify outside sources used to strengthen one's own case. 

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Richard Lederer begins his book The Miracle of Language with this claim:  "It is only through the gift of language that the child acquires reason, the complexity of thought that sets him or her apart from the other creatures who share this planet.  The birth of language is the dawn of humanity; in our beginning was the word."  This gift of language in its many forms is the heart and soul of this course.

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Week of 2/6

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1. You have your debate topic and partner.  Begin research.  Gather data both supporting and opposing your resolution.  Submit as directed two one-page summaries of information from two different sources.  Include an evaluation of the usefulness of the information and citations for the two sources.  Value: quiz.

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2. Read the following essays from Subject & Strategy:

    (A) "iPod World: The End of Society?" 466-468

    (B) "The Real Computer Virus," 471-477

    (C) "Web 2.0," 560-564

    (D) "Blogworld and Its Gravity," 565-569

    (E) "Argument Roundtable: Alpha Wives," 572-583

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3. Assignment

    On a scale from SA (strongly agree) to A to N (neutral) to D to SD (strongly disagree), rank and explain your reactions to the following statements:

    (A) "Americans are beginning to narrowcast their own lives" (Sullivan 467).

    (B) "This is the real computer virus:  misinformation (Cannon 473).

    (C) "If you democratize media, then you end up democratizing talent.  The unintended consequence of all this democratization...is cultural 'flattening'" (Keen 563).

    (D) "With personality and an online audience...comes a kind of reader interaction far more intense and personal than anything comparable in print" (Welch 567).

    (E) Copy what is in your estimation the most significant, interesting, or provocative statement made by any one of the authors included in the "Argument Roundtable" and explain why you chose it.

    Value:  quiz.  We will continue to discuss your reactions to these essays.

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4. Vocabulary.  Bring your packet.  Words 41-50 will be assigned and reviewed.