JUNIOR HIGH READING AND WRITING

Syllabus for Junior High Reading and Writing

Summer 2024 class and 2024-25 school year class

Instructor: Mark

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The purpose of this course is to enrich and advance students in key academic skills, and to give them the sort of individual attention that larger classes cannot offer.

 

There are four major areas of instruction:

 

• English grammar for reading and writing

 

• Vocabulary building

 

• Critical reading

 

• Expository Composition

 

Students will be given reading assignments from Alan Gratz’s The Refugee. Additionally, each lesson will include one short nonfiction piece—either a newspaper article or essay—that will deepen their understanding of the novel, which takes place in Syria, Cuba, and Germany.

 

Each class will begin with a sentence-based grammar practice. Students will learn to name the parts of speech, identify the functions of words in sentences, identify clauses, punctuate correctly, and diagram sentences.

 

Each class will also include  vocabulary practice so that students can learn not only meanings of key words, but who to use them correctly in their own writing.

 

Half of each class will focus on reading—reading strategies and critical reading techniques.  Each class will include time for questions and discussion, along with a brief writing assignment. Students will write at least one longer expository composition on the novel after they have finished reading it.

 

By the end of the summer, students will have had the opportunity to improve their grasp of grammar, to increase their vocabulary, and to strengthen their reading and writing skills.