Course Syllabus

English Studies 12

Day Two: Block G

“Destiny is no matter of chance. It is a matter of choice. It is not a thing to be waited for, it is a thing to be achieved.” William Jennings Bryan

Faculty: Dwight Hillis and Jeremy Sayers.

Please contact me at dhillis@stgeorges.bc.ca between 7 am and 7:30 pm if you need to reach me.

If you need to talk to me in person, I can be available from 8:30 am to 8:55 am in my office or during the second half of lunch in my office.

This is a paperless classroom.  All daily lesson plans, assignments essays, quizzes, and tests will be posted on the Assignments window and appear on your calendar.  Anything that is listed on the Pages window can be used at any time to assist your work.  

Course Description

            English Studies 12 is designed to develop those skills necessary for university success and to provide an enriching exposure to both historical and modern literature, and non-print media.  The course is organized by genre and theme; an exploration of at least one novel, a play, poetry and short fiction are also key components of the course.

Core Competencies:

  • Communication-The communication competency encompasses the set of abilities that students use to impart and exchange information, experiences and ideas, to explore the world around them, and to understand and effectively engage in the use of digital media.
  • Thinking- The thinking competency encompasses the knowledge, skills and processes we associate with intellectual development. It is through their competency as thinkers that students take subject-specific concepts and content and transform them into a new understanding. Thinking competence includes specific thinking skills as well as habits of mind, and metacognitive awareness.
  • Personal and Social- Personal and social competency is the set of abilities that relate to students' identity in the world, both as individuals and as members of their community and society. Personal and social competency encompasses the abilities students need to thrive as individuals, to understand and care about themselves and others, and to find and achieve their purposes in the world.

Literacy

            This course embeds literacy practices within every lesson. You’ll learn critical reading skills to help you critically read, interpret, and analyze prose. You’ll observe how the literary techniques you’ve explored in prior units unfold over the course of longer works and analyze how characters develop and interact over the course of a narrative.  You’ll delve deeper into the roles of character and conflict in fiction and explore how a narrator’s perspective can colour storytelling.

            Students will be asked to demonstrate understanding through comprehension, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation tasks. You’ll develop your interpretation of literature further by examining how contrasts, ambiguous language, and various other techniques can add layers of meaning to a literary work.

You will also be asked to share ideas using oral, written, and visual communication in both formal and informal settings.

Resources are all Online with PDF:

Course Novels and Resources:

Titus Andronicus                                                                        William Shakespeare

Frankenstein                                                                              Mary Shelley

All Quiet on the Western Front                                                   Erich Remarque

Fight Club                                                                                  Chuck Palahniuk

Poems:

Metaphysical Poets

Romantic Poets

WW I Poets

Indigenous Poets

Contemporary Poets

Instructional Aims.  Based on the B.C. Ministry of Education curriculum, students will learn through the following experiences:

  • Read for enjoyment and to achieve personal goals
  • Construct meaningful personal connections between self, text, and world
  • Transform ideas and information to create original texts, using various genres forms, structures, and styles
  • Use metacognitive strategies to think about our own thinking, strengths, and weaknesses
  • Demonstrate an understanding of multimedia, formal speech, discussion, and performance presentation

Learning Outcomes. Based on the B.C. Ministry of Education curriculum, students will learn and be evaluated on the following knowledge and skills:

  • Evaluate the relevance (using credibility and significance of purpose) and reliability (using bias, propaganda, and excluded voices) of texts
  • Analyze a text based on its purpose (audience and theme), structures (organization), features (diagrams, maps, charts), and literary elements
  • Analyze the social and/or cultural values and perspectives that are communicated through the author’s use of language
  • Analyze multiple texts to justify a nuanced, unifying theme
  • Demonstrate strategic speaking skills (volume, pace, inflection, and emphasis) for the appropriate text
  • Demonstrate strategic body language skills (gestures, stance, movements, eye contact) for the appropriate task
  • Effectively use rhetoric, literary devices, style (implicit or explicit thesis), and descriptive language to craft a composition appropriate for its purpose
  • Create effective, informative written work by using conciseness of language, logical development of ideas, use of transitions, and development of the thesis
  • Communicate clear opinion support with specific evidence in a given style
  • Use the conventions of Canadian spelling, grammar, and punctuation correctly given the context
  • Use diction (connotation, verb choice) and syntax (parallelism, modifiers, sentence types) according to communication style and audience
  • Correctly cite sources of information using MLA style for both in-text and Works Cited citations

English Department Course Weighting Descriptors:

Writer’s Craft                                     25%

  • Grammar and editing skills: Coordination, Subordination, and Conjunctive Adverbs
  • Take-home assignments and/or multi-day assessments, group or individual
  • Multiple-literacy representations
  • Peer/self-editing
  • Metacognitive responses to personal work

In-class Writing                                   25%

  • In-class writing: essays, free writes, stand-alone responses
  • Timed responses and performance tasks
  • Cross-grades

 Reading and Viewing                          25%

  • Reading comprehension, interpretation, reflection
  • Multiple choice and short answer assessments
  • Bloom’s sheets
  • Canvas discussions

Oral Language                                    25%

  • Presentations
  • Harkness, Socratic Arguments, debates, discussion-based assessment
  • Student self-assessment of engagement during small/full-class discussions
  • Poetry in Voice

Each category is weighted as 25% of your final year mark.

Course Summary:

Date Details Due