Humanities II (10th Grade) is the second course in a rigorous integrated curriculum combining studies of content material from the history and literature of the United States after the Civil War. Combining a traditional American history curriculum with a traditional sophomore English curriculum, this course is designed to provide students with a solid foundation in the humanities as well as a deep and intimate understanding of the course material. Emphasis is placed on those aspects of integral knowledge directly bearing on the human experience and what it means to be an “American” during the 20th century.
We will employ a number of techniques to engage students in the content of each course. In addition, we will use the “Multiple Intelligences” approach in order to design a variety of projects and assignments for the class. Course units will culminate in two or three-day seminars that require students to connect literature to a particular historical time period. The idea is to create a fully inclusive and multi-dimensional approach to teaching that appeals to different learning styles. This class is designed to help each student cultivate a multi-layered understanding of the content of American history and American literature based on a critical analysis of primary and secondary resources, narratives and testimonials, as well as personal experience. Additionally, this course will encourage students to develop and express their own opinions and prompt a critical analysis of how history and literature have shaped our nation and world today.
The course begins with a study of the tensions present in America after the Civil War as a new nation was created out of the fragmented culture. Particular attention is given to the symbolic and mythic understanding of the war and the emergence of a distinctive American character. Additional units will focus on the emergence of America as a 'melting pot' and as an industrial and world power at the turn of the century. The devastating crash of the U.S. economy in 1929 will be explored through art, film, and literature. This unit will additionally explore the cultural responses to the economic and political crisis, paying special attention to the ways different groups contended to define the complexities of the Depression years and shape the national future. America's response to the challenges posed by Germany and Japan will also be developed through historical analysis and literature. The connections between the changes in American society through the Cold War and the war in Vietnam will be the focus of the course in the spring, including responses to race, gender, politics, and culture. Students will be asked to grapple with ideas relating to how music, literature, and film document and comment on the social and political rebellions that defined the era.
The literature for this course may include the following texts: Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451; Erich Remarque’s All Quiet on the Western Front; F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby; Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird; Markus Zuzak’s The Book Thief; Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman; J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye; Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried; M.T. Anderson’s Feed.
Both teachers (Social Studies and English) will work together to assign reading and writing material with the other discipline in mind, so that students can benefit from the interdisciplinary relationship between course assignments.
Why does a reader read and a writer write?
What can literature teach us about ourselves and the world around us?
What relationship does literature have to the time period during which it was produced?
How does purpose and audience affect a writer’s writing process?
All students are encouraged to seek honors credit for the Humanities II course. When students successfully complete honors work, they will have the honors designation attached to their permanent transcripts. Students, parents, teachers, and administrators must sign the honors contract. All of the honors requirements must be fulfilled for a student to receive honors credit. Honors work will extend over the course of all three trimesters. Honors assignments are graded as double test grades.
Trimester One: Read Ray Bradbury's Something Wicked This Way Comes. Complete and turn in half-page journal prompts. Participate in book discussion during lunch.
Essential Questions:
How does Bradbury depict technology in relation to the lives of human beings?
What is a human being’s purpose on the planet?
Does a government need to “control” its citizens?
Major Concepts:
Technological advancements do not always lead to advancements in the social, emotional, and political well-being of a nation and its people.
Writers develop multiple lines of theme in a text.
Writers write with purpose.
Fahrenheit 451 relates important ideas about the relationship between the human being, intellectual exploration, and the health of a society that are still relevant today.
Major Content:
Active reading and annotation strategies
Vocabulary development (lists 1 and 2)
Reading strategies
Writing technique: the argumentative essay (introduction, supporting paragraphs, conclusions, incorporating quotes, and MLA formatting)
Revision and editing technique
Grammar and mechanics
Literary devices: metaphor
The use of benchmarks
Unit Assessments:
Unit test (including argumentative essay)
Argumentative essay
Images of Fire and Destruction and Beauty poem
Journals
Quizzes
Participation chart
Seminar One
Major Texts:
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
Tunnel Rat Dreaming by Gary Crew
There Will Come Soft Rains by Ray Bradbury
"There Will Come Soft Rains" by Sara Teasdale
Major Concepts
Despite the fact that countries fight wars against each other, it is the individual soldier who feels the greatest effect.
All Quiet on the Western Front reflects a soldier’s many perspectives on the nature of World War I.
Mankind’s advancements in technology are closely related to mankind’s advancements in the ability to make war.
Those who do not experience war first-hand have only a shallow understanding of the true nature of war.
Major Content:
Active reading and annotation strategies
Vocabulary development (List 3)
Reading strategies
Writing technique (the argumentative essay: introduction, supporting paragraphs, conclusions, incorporating quotes, MLA formatting)
Revision and editing technique: the use of the sound of writing as a revision technique
Grammar and mechanics: homonyms
Literary terms: protagonist and antagonist, round and flat characters, internal and external conflict, dynamic and static characters, imagery
Poetry analysis
Research strategies: using EBSCOhost
Creating a Works Cited page
Unit Assessments:
Unit test (including argumentative essay)
Argumentative essay
Journals
Quizzes
Participation Chart
Seminar (two-day interdisciplinary unit with History class)
Major Texts:
All Quiet on the Western Front by Erick Maria Remarque
“Mental Cases”
“When I’m Killed”
“The Target”
“The Repression of War Experience”
Major Concepts
World War I had a deep impact that resulted in some of the societal changes of the 1920s.
The Great Gatsby reflects a historically accurate depiction of many elements that are characteristic of the 1920s.
The human being controls some elements of his or her life.
The human being cannot control some elements of his or her life.
Major Content
Active reading and annotation strategies
Vocabulary development (list 4)
Writing technique: The Narrative (elements of confining narrative, presenting conflict, dialogue and dialogue punctuation, creating images through detail, character movement)
Revision and editing technique, using printed copy and symbols to revise
Grammar and mechanics: comma rules
MLA citations and formatting: longer quotes and Works Cited pages.
Unit Assessments:
Unit test (including argumentative essay)
Narrative
Journals
Quizzes
Participation Chart
Seminar Three
Major Texts:
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
“The Last Night of the World” by Ray Bradbury