AP Lang: Feb. 8-12

This week we will dig into argumentative writing and developing a confident, natural voice.  Most of the students are at a point where they are very efficient writers--and that’s great!--but now we need to take it to the next level and help them add some personality to their writing.

To that end, we’ll continue the experimentation we started on Friday. Students practiced mimicking the style of a Chuck Klosterman, a writer who is particularly adept at balancing a humorous, natural style with complex academic argumentative language.  Monday we’ll do some more practicing, sharing and revising in class.

On Tuesday, students will write their first in-class essay of the semester.  In this first nine weeks, we will do six in class essays (2 argument, 2 rhetorical analysis, 2 synthesis) and students will choose their strongest essay to submit. Hopefully, by the end of this nine weeks, writing a complete essay in 40 minutes will feel relatively easy to them.

For the second half of the week, we’ll shift our focus to rhetorical analysis and begin using a text by Mark Twain, “Corn Pone Opinions” to both continue our discussions about the links between pop culture and our values and to begin our practice with rhetorical analysis.

What might you be seeing at home?

• Lots of reading! Students set their own deadlines this semester for independent novels and they have made some great choices in books. Please encourage them to do a little reading of those independent novels outside of class.
• Vocabulary practice-- This card marking I’m asking students to draw our vocabulary lists from our class readings.  Each week they’ll generate a list of at least 10 new words. Ask them which words they’re learning!

I hope you have a great week!