Course Syllabus

Honors English IV Syllabus

Bret Andrews / Room 2506 / bandrews2@wcpss.net / CANVAS: https://wcpss.instructure.com/courses/296189

Course Description: In order to help students become collaborative, creative, critical thinkers who can effectively communicate, students will:

• Engage and interact with complex texts, using academic language.

• Read, write, and speak using textual evidence, from both fiction and nonfiction texts, to support claims.
• Build knowledge through content rich non-fiction.
• Conduct short as well as more sustained research projects, synthesizing information from multiple sources to demonstrate an understanding of the subject under investigation.

Texts: All students will be required to read some of the following works as anchor texts, while others will be dictated by student choice to further enrich the unit of study:

-1984 (Orwell), The Handmaid’s Tale (Atwood) or The Road (McCarthy)

- Pride and Prejudice (Austen), Frankenstein (Shelley),  Wuthering Heights (Bronte) or Dracula (Stoker)

- Excerpts from Beowulf (Anonymous Anglo-Saxon Poet)

- Excerpts from The Canterbury Tales (Chaucer)

- Macbeth (Shakespeare)

- Various Poems & Non-Fiction

*All students will be instructed in active reading strategies and note taking skills; therefore; students will be asked to obtain their own copy of these texts. School copies are available in limited amounts.

Homework: Homework will be assigned on a regular basis and usually involves reading and/or writing.  All homework is meaningful and of value and is expected to be completed before scheduled class time. No late homework will be accepted.

Grading Policy: All English teachers count major assignments as 60%, quizzes as 25%, homework as 10%, and student engagement as 5% of a student’s quarter grade in the honors curriculum.  The North Carolina Final Exam counts for 20% of a student’s final grade. Course grades will follow the ten point scale.

SMART Lunch: Students are expected to attend four SMART Lunches each quarter. Students in Honors English can replace their lowest quiz grade with a 100 by successfully completing four enrichment activities during the SMART Lunch tutorial. Students may only complete one enrichment activity per session, and may not work on enrichment activities until all make up work is complete.  This incentive cannot replace a missing quiz grade. Tutorials are held on Wednesday and Friday.

Policy for Make-Up Work: Student attendance is critical for academic success. If a student misses class, (s)he should refer to the Wake County Student Handbook for the district’s make- up work policy.  Teachers will work with students to create a reasonable timeline to complete make-up work.

Late Work:  If a student is not absent but fails to turn in a major assignment on the day that it is due, the assignment will be graded when it is submitted, but ten points will be deducted from the score of the assignment for each day that the assignment is late (not to exceed 40 points deducted or 4 days late).  If a student fails to turn in a major assignment altogether, then no credit will be issued for that assignment.

Plagiarism: Plagiarism is not permitted at Panther Creek High School.  Students and parents should read the student/parent handbook’s section on integrity found on the Panther Creek website (http://panthercreekhs.wcpss.net).  In addition, the English Department has the following consequences for cheating on major assignments:

1st Offense – Referral, ‘0’ on assignment with option to re-submit for a ’50,’ parent contact

All Other Offenses – Referral, ‘0’ on assignment, parent contact