English 9 Syllabus

“The goal for English 9 is to build a solid foundation of knowledge, skills, and strategies that will be refined, applied, and extended as students engage in more complex ideas, texts, and tasks. In English 9 students will be introduced to the various genre of classic and contemporary narrative and informational texts that will be read and analyzed throughout high school. Ninth graders will connect with and respond to texts by analyzing relationships within and across families, communities, societies, governments, and economies. Through the lens of Inter-Relationships and Self-Reliance, they will consider how they build relationships, how their relationships impact others, and their responsibility to society. “

Making learning relevant for students and instilling in them ownership of the learning process is integral to the success of each student’s experience in English 9. Through reading, analyzing and writing about the literature selections in English 9, students should be able to answer the following questions by the end of the course:

•Who am I?

•How do my skills and talents help to define me?

•How do I relate to my family, my community, and society?

•How do I build networks of people to support me?

•How am I a reflection of my relationships?

•How do my relationships within and across groups affect others?

•What influence do class, religion, language, and culture have on my relationships and my decisions?

•What can I contribute as an individual?

•What is my responsibility to society?

•How do I see my beliefs reflected in government policies and politicians?

Make-up work:

If you happen to have the misfortune of missing my class, you will be expected to check my web page and communicate with me before or after class, or before or after school, on the day you return to take care of missed assignments. You may not use class time to disrupt my instruction by asking about make-up work. This is unfair to your fellow students and myself. It is not my responsibility to track you down with assignments when you are absent from my class; it is yours. If you are absent due to an extra-curricular reason, you DO NOT receive extra time to make up your work. The assignment is due either before you leave or upon your immediate return.

Late work:

If your assignment is not in class on the day and class period that it is due, it is considered late. The new curriculum does not allow extra time for late work. Late work = 0%. If I have no assignment to grade, this means that you have not met the Content Expectations for the particular assessment. You will need to recover your credit on the next assignment.

PRP’s (Personal Responsibility Points):

It is your responsibility as a student to come to class prepared. It is also your responsibility to follow instructions and be ready to learn each day. Each student in my class will be given 50 PRP’s to begin the semester (think: TEST GRADE). Students will receive another 50 points at the start of the next semester. When you fail to be responsible, I will subtract points from this total. You may not earn back PRP’s. Once they are gone, they are gone, but it is in your best interest to resist behavior that would cause you to lose more. Some daily work (not assessments) may count as a PRP grade.

Course Requirement:

You are required to have your own writing utensils, which include both pen and pencil - everyday. In addition you must have a folder designated for English that contains any and all handouts I give you. You must have your own writing paper and your agenda book with you when you enter this class. If one of these required materials is missing, you run the risk of not being able to participate in an assessment which could result in a 0%. You will lose PRP’s if you are found without one of your required materials.

August 30, 2007

Dear Students and Families,

My fingertips have been resting on the “asdf” and “jkl;” keys of my laptop for approximately seven minutes. The digital numbers on my computer’s clock not only mark the time, but they mark the only changes to my otherwise blank screen. My To-Do List rests beside my laptop on the desk on which the phrase “Make syllabus and letter for English 9 and English 10” is highlighted and circled. “This is my seventh year of teaching English. Why can’t I do this?” I mumble aloud to myself.

Maybe my struggles to write this letter stem from the anxious excitement I have about the many changes to Kingsford High School’s English curriculum. Maybe my struggles are more relative to the confusion I have about how these changes will impact students…and me. Or maybe my brain has simply turned to mush over the summer months and I need to get back to work before I incur serious damage.

For those of you who do not know or simply need a refresher, I will highlight some of the changes occurring in education in Michigan, and consequently in KHS’s own English Department. The governing bodies of the State of Michigan signed into law new high school graduation requirements. These graduation requirements are intended to provide students with the knowledge and skills to succeed in the local and global economies of the 21^st Century. The new curriculum is called the Michigan Merit Curriculum or MMC. The High School Content Expectations for English Language Arts are aligned with the MMC and have a stronger focus on informational text comprehension and workplace reading and skills than past curriculums. The High School Content Expectations for English Language Arts are the same for every English student in every English class. The standards are intended to be addressed repeatedly and at increasingly complex levels throughout the units from grade 9 to grade 12.

Scoring and grading will be slightly different this year. Students must meet or surpass 65% of the 91 Content Expectations (C.E.) in English Language Arts in order to receive credit for English. Not every assignment will be graded. Only assessments will be graded. For instance, I may assign students a free-write for homework, but the assessment may not be whether students can write a free-write; rather, the assessment will be two days later when students are evaluated on an in-class oral exercise that relates to the previously assigned free-write. Consequently, if a particular student opted not to do the previous night’s homework, his or her grade on the oral exercise will likely suffer. Completion grades will not be given. Each assessment (assignment, test, project, activity) will list the Content Expectations addressed in that particular task. Some assessments will assess more Content Expectations than others, so some assessments will carry more point value than others. Regardless of the number of Content Expectations on a given assessment, students must receive a 65% or higher on each assessment to demonstrate mastery of the Content Expectations. A score of 65% or higher indicates that a student has met the Content Expectations for that particular assessment. If a student does not earn a 65% or higher on a given assessment, he or she will be offered opportunities on other assessments to demonstrate mastery. In short, some students may fail a few assessments and still pass the course. However, failure is not the expectation, it will be the exception.

Whew!!! I told you there are a lot of changes this year! Because so much is new this year, I anticipate many questions from students and families. I have questions of my own, too. As we wade through uncharted waters together, let’s keep the lines of communication open. With one less hour in my day to make and return phone calls, meet with students, and meet with parents and guardians, e-mail will be my preferred method of communication. I will do my best to respond to e-mails as quickly as possible. I am excited to meet all of you and look forward to this ground-breaking new school year.

Cheers,

Kendalynn Sutton

English Teacher

ksutton@kingsford.org