Literature
Short Stories
This half-credit course guides the student through the elements of the short story. The 17 short stories are grouped according to themes such as detective stories, suspense, science fiction, "Boy Meets Girl," courage, loneliness, and relationships between the generations--the "Generation Gap." The authors of these stories include Agatha Christie, Shirley Jackson, Robert Louis Stevenson, Arthur C. Clarke, Isaac Asimov, O. Henry, Katherine Mansfield, Jack London, and Eudora Welty. Graded coursework includes writing assignments and tests for each of the 17 stories.
Elements of Fiction
This half-credit course uses chapters from classic novels to provide in-depth study of the basic elements of literature. Each of the 12 units focuses on one of the following elements of literature: setting, point of view, characterization, conflict, plot development, figurative language, tone and mood, symbolism, humor and satire, allegory, theme, and discussion of literature (review of all elements). The chapters included in the units are taken from the following novels: Ragtime, Roots, Wuthering Heights, The Chosen, Great Expectations, An American Tragedy, Babbitt, The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, Lord of the Flies, Catch-22, Animal Farm, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and The Grapes of Wrath. Graded coursework includes assignments and tests for each of the 12 units.
Novel Study
This half-credit course is available to students who have successfully completed Literature III. The student selects two of the novels covered in Literature III to read in their entirety. Then, the student writes a detailed analysis of each, based on the elements of literature covered in Literature III and including specific details from the novel to support the analysis. This course is for students with strong writing skills. The student's grade is based on the scores of the two papers.
Writing
Introduction to the Writing Process
This half-credit course provides practice in a variety of basics skills of the writing process: parts of speech, composing effective sentences, subject-verb agreement, combining sentences, and perfecting paragraphs. The course includes many writing assignments that focus on the writing skills covered in the chapters. This course differs from the Writing I course in that this course emphasizes including the basic skills in writing rather than recognizing the proper use of parts of speech, punctuation, capitalization, etc. Graded coursework includes practice exercises in eight chapters of the text, writing assignments in eight chapters of the text, additional worksheets for seven of the chapters, and quizzes for five of the chapters.
Writing Paragraphs and Essays
This half-credit course focuses on how to write a variety of types of paragraphs and essays. Topics include writing topic sentences, organizing coherent paragraphs and essays, and writing thesis statements. Students write how-to, descriptive, persuasive, classification, definition, comparison/contrast, and narrative paragraphs and short essays. All assignments are graded. This course does not include tests.
Writing the Research Paper
In this half-credit course, the student works through all of the steps involved in writing a 2,500-word research paper: choosing a topic, conducting research (including locating a variety of sources, writing bibliography cards, and writing note cards), writing an outline, writing and revising a rough draft, writing endnotes, and writing the final paper. Graded assignments include textbook exercises and all steps of the research and writing process.