Course Outline

INTERMEDIATE LITERATURE B

Intermediate Literature B sharpens reading comprehension skills, engages readers in literary analysis, and offers a variety of literature to suit diverse tastes. Through a varied selection of stories, plays, and poems, many of which highlight exemplary virtues, students develop skills of close reading and literary analysis while considering important human issues and challenging ideas. They come to appreciate the writer’s craft as they consider the feelings, thoughts, and ideas of characters, and make connections between literature and life. Students also learn to read for information in nonfiction texts.

Literary Analysis and Appreciation

• Identify defining characteristics of a variety of literary forms and genres
• Understand elements of plot development
• Identify cause and effect relationships
• Identify conflict and resolution
• Understand elements of character development
• Identify character traits and motivations
• Recognize stereotypes
• Describe characters based on speech, action, and interactions with others
• Make inferences and draw conclusions
• Recognize effect of setting and culture on a literary work
• Compare and contrast works from different time periods
• Identify and interpret specific literary techniques
• Understand and interpret point of view
• Understand use of language to convey mood
• Understand use of dialect
• Interpret symbolism
• Recognize and analyze use of irony
• Recognize and explain poetic devices
• Identify and discuss theme
• Compare and contrast literary selections and characters

Reading Comprehension/Reading Process

• Establish and adjust purpose for reading
• Predict outcomes
• Articulate an opinion and support it with evidence
• Skim for facts, and take notes
• Recognize author’s purpose and devices used to accomplish it
• Use reading skills and strategies to understand a variety of informational texts
• Differentiate between fact and opinion in informational texts
• Recognize author’s attitude
• Analyze appropriateness of text for purpose

READINGS INCLUDE:

• The Heart’s Deep Core
• “Chura and Marwe,” a West African folktale retold by Humphrey Harman
• "The Tiger's Whisker," a Korean folktale retold by Harold Courlander
• "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," by Robert Frost
• "The Story of Scarface," a Blackfoot Indian legend
• "Sympathy," by Paul Lawrence Dunbar
• "The Happy Prince," by Oscar Wilde
• "Psalm of Life" by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Bible Characters and Stories

• "Belshazzar's Feast"
• "How Queen Esther Saved Her People"
• "The Story of Jonah"

Narrative Poems

• "Casabianca," by Felicia Hemans
• "The Inchcape Rock," by Robert Southey
• "The Listeners," by Walter de la Mare
• "Casey at the Bat," by Ernest Lawrence Thayer
• "The Cremation of Sam McGee," by Robert Service
• "The Highwayman," by Alfred Noyes

Required Novel (choice of one)

• Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson
• The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien

Stories of Scientists

• "Michael Faraday's World," by Nancy Veglahn
• "Marie Curie and the Discovery of Radioactivity,"by Mara Rockliff
• "Nikola Tesla, Inventor," by Shawn Lake
• "Healing a Wounded Heart: Daniel Hale Williams," by William Orem
• "Enrico Fermi: The 'Italian Navigator,'" by Dorothy Haas

Irony

• "Charles," by Shirley Jackson
• "The Gift of the Magi," by O. Henry
• "The Necklace," by Guy de Maupassant
• "The Necklace," retold as a play

Favorites from Famous Books: A Christmas Carol

• A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens (abridged)
• "The Boy of the London Streets," by R.S. Holland

Life Stories (Autobiographical Writings)

• Selection from Homesick, by Jean Fritz
• Selection from When I Was Puerto Rican, by Esmerelda Santiago
• "The Night the Bed Fell," by James Thurber

What's Important?

• "President Cleveland, Where Are You?," by Robert Cormier
• "Raymond's Run," by Toni Cade Bambara
• "I Have Ten Legs," by Anna Swir
• "Boy Flying," by Leslie Norris
• "The Bat-Poet," by Randall Jarrell
• "The White Umbrella," by Gish Jen
• "The Courage That My Mother Had," by Edna St. Vincent Millay
• "My Father Is a Simple Man," by Luis Omar Salinas

The Language of Poetry

• "Nothing Gold Can Stay," by Robert Frost
• "A Poison Tree," by William Blake
• "Beauty," by E Yeh Shure
• "Barter," by Sara Teasdale
• "All the World's a Stage" (from As You Like It), by William Shakespeare
• "There Is No Frigate Like a Book" by Emily Dickinson
• "The Wind Began to Rock the Grass," by Emily Dickinson
• "I'll Tell You How the Sun Rose,"; by Emily Dickinson
• "Harlem [2,]" by Langston Hughes
• "Hold Fast Your Dreams," by Louise Driscoll
• "Life (is a leaf of paper white)," by James Russell Lowell

Advice and Instruction

• "The Fish I Didn't Catch," by John Greenleaf Whittier
• "Work," by John Ruskin
• "Honest Work"
• "For Want of a Horseshoe Nail"
• "Argument," by Joseph Addison
• "If," by Rudyard Kipling
• "Can't," by Edgar Guest
• "Letter to His Son," by Robert E. Lee
• "Mother to Son," by Langston Hughes
• "Perseverance," by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
• "Rebecca," by Hilaire Belloc
• "The Story of Augustus," by Heinrich Hoffmann
• "Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout," by Shel Silverstein

Stories from Homer’s Epics

• Selections from the Iliad
• Selections from the Odyssey

Nonfiction

• City: A Story of Roman Planning and Construction, by David Macaulay

Shakespeare

• Julius Caesar (Shakespeare for Young People adaptation)

NOVELS

This program allows students to read any three novels of their choice from a selection of award-winning works by renowned authors, from a variety of genres: fantasy, science fiction, historical fiction, realistic fiction, and mystery. These novels are listed in order of increasing difficulty as measured by the Lexile scale, a system that measures reading difficulty by sentence length and vocabulary (see Lexile ratings roughly correspond to grade levels as indicated below.

Approximate Grade Level                                  Lexile Range

             5                                                            750-950

             6                                                           850-1050

             7                                                           950-1075

             8                                                          1000-1100

             9                                                          1050-1150

           10                                                          1100-1200

Lexile levels are only one means of assessing whether a work is appropriate for your student. When selecting a novel, keep in mind that the Lexile rating does not measure subject matter or themes in the work.

Title and Author                                                                                                            Lexile Level

From the Mixed-up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, by E.L. Konigsburg   700

A Wrinkle in Time, by Madeleine L’Engle        740

The Martian Chronicles, by Ray Bradbury       740

The Outsiders, by S.E. Hinton      750

The Bronze Bow, by Elizabeth George Speare     760

Walk Two Moons, by Sharon Creech     770

War Comes to Willie Freeman, by Christopher and Lincoln Collier    770

The Sign of the Beaver, by Elizabeth George Speare    770

The Book of Three, by Lloyd Alexander    770

Tuck Everlasting, by Natalie Babbitt    770

My Side of the Mountain, by Jean Craighead George    810

Johnny Tremain, by Esther Forbes     840

The Fellowship of the Ring, by J.R.R. Tolkein   860

The Cay, by Theodore Taylor   860

Dragonwings, by Laurence Yep   870

Jacob Have I Loved, by Katherine Paterson   880

Old Yeller, by Fred Gipson     910

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, by Mildred D. Taylor   920

The Dark Is Rising, by Susan Cooper    920

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, by C.S. Lewis   940

Bud, Not Buddy, by Christopher Paul Curtis    950

White Fang, by Jack London    970

Anne of Green Gables, by Lucy Maud Montgomery    990

The Door in the Wall, by Marguerite de Angeli    990

Island of the Blue Dolphins, by Scott O’Dell    1000

Ben and Me, by Robert Lawson    1010

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, by Jules Verne    1030

Hound of the Baskervilles, by Arthur Conan Doyle    1090

Across Five Aprils, by Irene Hunt    1100

Catherine, Called Birdy, by Karen Cushman    1170

War of the Worlds, by H.G. Wells    1170

Swiss Family Robinson, by Johann Wyss    1260

The Incredible Journey, by Sheila Burnford    1320

INTERMEDIATE LANGUAGE SKILLS B

Intermediate Language Skills B offers a systematic approach to the development of written and oral communication skills, designed to give students the essential building blocks for expressing their own ideas in standard (or formal) English.

COMPOSITION

This course builds on the skills introduced in Intermediate Composition A. In this writing program, students continue to practice writing essays in various genres. They analyze the conventional five-paragraph essay structure, and then move on to learn the form and structure of a variety of essays they will encounter in their academic careers including: essays of definition, cause-and-effect essays, and research papers. In writing each essay, students go through a process of planning, organizing, and revising, and they learn to examine their own writing with a critical eye, paying attention to ideas, organization, structure, style, and correctness. Throughout the course, students write in response to prompts similar to those they will encounter on standardized tests.

Introduction to the Essay

• Parts of an Essay
• Essay Decisions
• Essay Conventions
• Writing an Essay

Autobiographical Incident

• What Is an Autobiographical Incident?
• Prewriting: Planning to Write About an Autobiographical Incident
• Drafting: Writing About an Autobiographical Incident
• Revising, Proofreading, Publishing

Definition Essay

• What Is a Definition Essay?
• Prewriting: Planning a Definition Essay
• Drafting: Writing a Definition Essay
• Revising: Revising a Definition Essay
• Proofreading and Publishing

Letter to the Editor

• What Is a Letter to the Editor?
• Prewriting: Logical Thinking
• Prewriting: Choosing a Topic
• Prewriting: Gathering Information
• Prewriting: Planning the Letter
• Drafting
• Revising a Letter to the Editor
• Proofreading and Publishing a Letter to the Editor

Research Report

• What Is a Research Report?
• Covering the Basics
• Prewriting: Finding Information
• Prewriting: Finding More Information
• Prewriting: Taking Notes
• Prewriting: Organizing the Information
• Drafting
• Revising
• Bibliography
• Proofreading
• Publishing

Propaganda

• What Is Propaganda?
• Prewriting: Logical Fallacies and Emotional Appeals
• Prewriting: Planning an Article
• Drafting: Writing an Article
• Revising, Proofreading, and Publishing

Cause-and-Effect Essay

• What Is a Cause-and-Effect Essay?
• Prewriting: Different Kinds of Cause-and-Effect Relationships
• Prewriting: Planning a Cause-and-Effect Essay
• Drafting: Writing a Cause-and-Effect Essay
• Revising and Proofreading
• Publishing: Planning a Presentation
• Publishing: Practicing a Presentation
• Publishing: Delivering a Presentation

Fictional Narrative

• What Is a Fictional Narrative?
• Prewriting: Parts of a Story
• Prewriting: Character Development
• Prewriting: Planning a Fictional Narrative
• Drafting
• Revising
• Proofreading and Publishing

GRAMMAR, USAGE, AND MECHANICS

The Grammar, Usage, and Mechanics program addresses many grammatical topics, with reinforcement activities in sentence analysis, sentence structure, and proper punctuation. Students analyze syntax and diagram sentences in order to understand how words, phrases, and clauses function in relation to each other. Frequent exercises and regular practice help students absorb the rules so they can confidently apply them in their own writing.

Parts of Speech Review

• Prepositions
• Prepositional Phrases
• Preposition or Adverb?
• Conjunctions and Interjections

Kinds of Complements

• Direct Objects
• Indirect Objects
• Predicate Nominatives
• Predicate Adjectives
• Sentence Diagramming and Review

Phrases

• Adjective Phrases
• Prepositional Phrases
• Misplaced Adjective Phrases
• Adverb Phrases

Verbals and Verbal Phrases

• Participles
• Participle or Verb?
• Participial Phrases
• Misplaced Participial Phrases
• Infinitives
• Infinitive Phrases
• Sentence Diagramming

Clauses

• Independent and Subordinate Clauses
• Adverb Clauses
• Adjective Clauses
• Adverb and Adjective Clauses
• Simple and Compound Sentences
• Compound Sentence or Compound Verb
• Complex Sentences
• Sentence Diagramming and Review

Sentence Fragments and Run-Ons

• Fragments
• Other Sentence Errors

 

Using Verbs

• Regular and Irregular Verbs
• Principal Parts of Verbs
• Six Problem Verbs
• Verb Tenses
• Uses of Tenses
• Conjugation of a Verb
• Tense Shifts

Using Pronouns

• Pronouns in the Nominative Case
• Pronouns in the Objective Case
• Pronouns in the Possessive Case
• Pronoun Problems and Pronoun Antecedents
• Pronoun Problem: Who or Whom?
• Pronouns and Their Antecedents

Subject and Verb Agreement

• Agreement of Subjects and Verbs
• Common Agreement Problems
• Agreement Problems with Pronouns

Using Adjectives and Adverbs

• Comparison of Adjectives and Adverbs
• Problems with Modifiers

Capital Letters

• Rules of Capital Letters
• More Proper Nouns
• Other Uses of Capital Letters

End Marks and Commas

• End Marks and the Period
• Commas that Separate
• More Uses of the Comma
• More Commas that Enclose

Italics and Quotation Marks

• Uses of Italics and Quotation Marks
• Direct Quotations
• Other Uses of Quotation Marks

Other Punctuation

• Apostrophes
• Possessive Forms of Pronouns
• Other Uses of the Apostrophe
• Semicolons
• Colons
• Hyphens to Divide Words
• Other Uses of Hyphens

VOCABULARY

The Vocabulary from Classical Roots program builds knowledge of Greek and Latin words that form the roots of many English words, especially the polysyllabic terms that sometimes cause students to stumble. Throughout this program, students will define and use words with Greek and Latin roots, and use word origins and derivations to determine the meaning of new words, as they increase their own vocabularies and develop valuable test-taking skills.

Motion

• Latin roots per, fero, ferre, tuli latum; tendo, tendere, tetendi, tensum
• Latin roots sub, torqueo, torquere, torsi, tortum; verso, versare, versavi, versatum

Position

• Latin roots ex, pono, ponere, posui, positum
• Latin roots extra, medius, sequor, sequi, secutum

Joining

• Latin roots cum, teneo, tenere, tenui, tentum
• Latin roots apo, apere, epi, aptum; jungo, jungere, junxi, junctum; stringo, stringere, strinxi, strictum

 

Separation

• Latin roots ab, cerno, cernere, crevi, cretum; frango, frangere, fregi, fractum
• Greek roots luein, lutos
• Latin roots super, caedo, caedere, cecidi, caesum; solvo, solvere, solvi, solutum

Sight

• Latin roots re, ostendo, ostendere, ostendi, ostensum; video, videre, vidi, visum
• Latin roots specto, spectare, spectavi, spectatum; vigilo, vigilare, vigilavi, vigilatum

The Other Senses

• Latin roots ad, oleo, olere, olui; sono, sonare, sonui, sonitum; voco, vocare, vocavi, vocatum
• Latin roots sentio, sentire, sensi, sensum; tango, tangere, tetigi, tactum

Emotions

• Latin roots pro, jocus, suavis, festus
• Greek root zelos
• Latin roots doleo, dolere, dolui, dolitum, ira, volo, velle, volui

The Shape of Things

• Greek root kuklos
• Latin roots circum, orbis, orbita, figura
• Greek root iedos
• Latin roots fingo, fingere, finxi, fictum; rota, rotundus, cavea

You might choose to split the lessons into smaller segments. The online lesson tracking system will allow you to pick up wherever you left off in any given lesson.

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