The Purpose of the new District Curriculum Framework is to increase achievement by aligning curriculum, instruction, and assessments to state standards. Additional reading selections and material will be supplemented on an as needed basis.
Grading Policy:
Classwork and Homework 15%
Quizzes 15%
Essays/Writing 20%
Tests 25%
Projects 25%
Unit #1: From Realism to Naturalism: Approaching the Modern Age
In the textbook:
1. Regionalism and Realism (pg. 481)
2. Big Idea #3 Naturalism (pgs. 492-493)
3. Wrap Up (pg.494)
4. Part II: Realism and Naturalism (pgs.535-537)
5. Before You read: “To Build a Fire” (pgs.601-602)
6. “To Build a Fire” by Jack London (pgs.603-614)
Guiding Questions:
· Can humans ever win a battle with nature?
· What is the human’s place in the world? In society? In the universe?
· What do you think contributes most to shaping a person’s life? Is it environmental? Is it biological? Is it free will? Is it fate?
Unit #2: The Modern Age and the Harlem Renaissance
In the textbook:
1. “Beginnings of a Modern Age” (pg.645)
2. Big Idea #3: The Harlem Renaissance (pgs. 656-658)
3. Part III: The Harlem Renaissance (pg.785)
4. Before You Read: “My City” (pgs.786-787)
5. “My City” (pg. 788)
6. Before You Read: From Dust Tracks on a Road (pgs.790-791)
7. from Dust Tracks on a Road (pgs.790-799)
8. Before You Read: (pgs. 810-811) “I, too”
“The Negro Speaks of Rivers”
(pg.815) “When the Negroe Was in Vogue”
By-- Langston Hughes
9. “I, Too” (pg.812)
10. "The Negro Speaks of Rivers” (pg.813)
11. “When the Negro Was in Vogue” (pgs.816-820)
Guiding Questions:
· What historical, social, and cultural forces shaped the Harlem Renaissance?
· What does Johnson’s poem say about the vitality of the city during the Harlem Renaissance?
· What details of Southern life did Hurston consider worthy of recording and celebrating?
· How does Hughes perceive African Americans and their rightful place in American culture?
· Why was Harlem the center of the renaissance of African American arts in the 1920s and 1930s?
Unit #3: The Modern Age and The Great Gatsby
Core Novel: The Great Gatsby By: F. Scott Fitzgerald
In the textbook:
1. Big Idea #2: (pg. 654)
2. Before You Read: The Great Gatsby (pgs. 752-753)
Guiding Questions:
· What is the American Dream?
· In what ways do the individual characters in The Great Gatsby represent the American Dream?
· How do dreams, love, wealth, and time relate to each other in the novel’s exploration of the American Dream?
· What does F. Scott Fitzgerald suggest about the condition of the American Dream in the 1920s?
· What do you make of the American ideal that every person has a right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness?”