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Fall Session - Reading
Comprehension |
Reading Comprehension
Grades 7-9
Reading comprehension is an essential tool in all academic
subject areas. In this class, students will improve their reading comprehension
proficiency by learning reading strategies for both informational and literary
texts. Students will learn how to make inferences, how to recognize context
clues, how to compare information between sources, how to connect main ideas and
how to answer essential questions. There will be a pre and post reading test.
Literary Analysis Grades 6-8
Middle school students study poetry, short stories, and novels. They are
often asked to write analyses of such literary genre in their English classes.
The Cat 6/Star test also requires that students respond to the deeper meaning of
literary work on a multiple- choice exam. Students in this exciting class will
read and analyze poetry and short stories. This class is also an oral
participation course, as confidence in sharing literary observations is a prized
value in the classroom. This class is not an essay writing class although one or
two written analyses will be assigned or done in class.
Advanced Literary Analysis Grades
9-12
This class
will help students "go deeper" into the literature they are exposed to in high
school by giving them usable tools and methods to do so. We will show them how
to go beyond the surface of literature by teaching them to ask the right
questions before they search for the "right answer". Through a method of
questioning, we will teach the students how to come up with their own workable
thesis statements and support those statements. Students will learn how to be
prepared to use such theses and support them with the essay skills they have
already acquired. This will be a great continuation of our MCA 9th and 10th
grade composition courses in that many of those students understand the
structure of an essay but lack the analysis and critical thinking to produce
impressive content in their essays. Students will analyze poetry and short
stories during the 12-hour course. During the many parent conferences that the
instructors have had throughout the years, they have both observed that the
majority of the "B+" students are the ones who lack deeper insight about the
literature. This class will assist students in developing that insight. There
will be one official paper per session and numerous annotations on assigned
literature. Class is limited to 12 students, as there are two teachers. As an
aside, the instructors have been known to have great fun and humor while having
serious literary conversation.
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