Loudoun County Public Schools High School Honors English Curriculum Resource Guide

162 Pages·2014·4.94 MB·English

Loudoun County

Public Schools
High School
Honors English
Curriculum Resource
Guide
2013-2014
“Ad astra per aspera”
(To the stars through difficulty)

Developed by the Honors Portfolio Committee,
the Honors Assessment Revision Working Group,
and the Honors Core Units Committee
LCPS
Acknowledgements
This Resource Guide represents the work of many LCPS staff over the last two years, including
the following:

Michele Schmidt Moore, Ph.D. English Supervisor
Dave Arbogast, English Specialist

Honors English Portfolio Design Committee
Neelum Chaudhry Peter Stephens
Cassandra Donahue Jason White

Honors English Assessments Revision Group
Christopher Cuozzo Larry Hinders Deanna Blackshire
Colleen Dobbs Amy Trickett Eileen Lowry
Marina Levi Emily Everett Lisa Patterson
Nicole Rubloff Patricia Albert Valerie Hargis
Barbara Musselman Sharon Smiley

Honors Core Units Committee
Christopher Cuozzo
Dave Hoffman
Karen Goldman
Gene Legg
Table of Contents
Introduction ...................................................................................................................................1
Habits of Mind ..............................................................................................................................8
Honors English Assessments: Overview ....................................................................................10
Big Question Project
Overview and Rationale ......................................................................................12
Procedures and Timeline.....................................................................................13
Rubrics ................................................................................................................18
Annotated Anchor Essay.....................................................................................22
Resources ............................................................................................................28
Writing Reflection Essay
Overview and Rationale ......................................................................................53
Procedures and Timeline.....................................................................................54
Rubric ..................................................................................................................57
Annotated Anchor Essays ...................................................................................59
Resources ............................................................................................................63
Honors Core Units
Introduction/Rationale/Context.......................................................................................73
Thematic Essential Questions and Multi-Genre Text Sets .............................................74
Stylistic Essential Questions and Multi-Genre Text Sets ...............................................77
Textual Analysis and Analytic Writing ..........................................................................84
Socratic Seminars............................................................................................................98
Reflective Writing .........................................................................................................127
Creative Writing and the Writing Process ....................................................................130
Sample Core Unit ..........................................................................................................150
Introduction
What should critical thinking and intellectual rigor look like in a high school Honors English
class?
In the last 20 years, the percentage of LCPS students taking Honors English in high school
has increased dramatically, from a small minority of our students to a consistent majority of
students. This Resource Guide represents the convergence of two sets of instructional
frameworks developed over the last few years to increase the level of rigor and clarify what the
application of critical thinking skills and higher-order thinking skills should look like in Honors
English classes. Both the Honors English Assessments and the Honors Core Units are designed
to articulate a clear, coherent vision of intellectual rigor and engagement that is not about asking
students to work harder in terms of memorization of more content, reading more books more
quickly, or writing longer essays and more of them, but is about qualitatively reaching higher
levels of cognition. It outlines not simply our goals for student thinking, but mechanisms for
teaching students how to think analytically and creatively and for measuring the degree to which
and the ways in which they have mastered those skills.
We believe that honors students are capable of more than what we currently ask of them, and
while these frameworks are not intended to constrain teacher’s flexibility and autonomy, they
can help provide the support in helping students to achieve higher levels of critical thinking. Our
discipline of English addresses the most basic ways in which we as humans make sense of the
world around us and convey our ideas to others. English classes should be environments in
which students master the tools of analysis and communication and bring them to bear in making
sense of their own worlds and expressing their own ideas. The function of literature in particular
is to make meaning of the human experience, and English classes should be places in which we
explore others’ ideas about the great questions of human existence, as well as help students
develop and articulate their own ideas about these intrinsically relevant and meaningful issues.
Most high school students, and certainly all Honors students, are ready to move beyond
simple comprehension of texts, being able to parrot back author’s ideas (or teachers’ ideas),
memorize a sequence of events in a plot, or recall the definition of a word. They are prepared to,
and should be expected to, do the following on a consistent basis throughout the year:
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 compare and evaluate ideas (and the ways in which those ideas are conveyed)
 find patterns within and among texts (both thematically and stylistically)
 follow their own paths of independent inquiry
 locate and evaluate the quality and reliability of information sources
 synthesize information from a variety of sources
 develop coherent arguments of their own, which acknowledge and address counter-
arguments
 analyze and explain how an author uses literary and rhetorical devices to contribute to an
effect or achieve a purpose
 create works of their own that utilize these devices for their own purposes
These skills are not simply useful in academic settings, or to prepare students for college, but
st
build the intellectual foundation for success in a 21 century global economy. To this end, the
resources in this document are designed not as a prescriptive sequence of lessons, but as an
instructional and assessment framework to guide teachers in creating the most intellectually
engaging and rigorous classrooms possible.

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Program Design, Development, and Implementation
Honors English Assessments
In 2010, in response to state requirements that all courses given a GPA weight or “bump”
have a “commonly defined assessment,” LCPS developed an initial set of Honors Assessments
for 9th, 10th, and 11th grade Honors classes, given to students in the spring each year. These
initial assessments were modeled on AP English Literature and Language exams, with close
reading passages, multiple choice questions, and analysis essays. After their implementation the
first year, there were several significant concerns with these assessments from teachers and
department chairs around the county. While they did help us as a department to focus more on
textual analysis and to align our criteria for written communication, there were weaknesses in
their use as standardized assessments. For the following year, the multiple choice sections were
eliminated, leaving only the essays. Even after this change, however, the consensus was that
these were cumbersome and inefficient mechanisms.
In 2011, the English Supervisor Dr. Michele Schmidt Moore, English Specialist Dave
Arbogast, and the department chairs from each of the 13 high schools, decided to shift the
Honors Assessments to year-long portfolio assessments, as they felt these would be more
comprehensive and authentic measurements of students’ work over the course of the year. A
committee of teachers and department chairs researched best practices in this area and built on
the work of an existing county-wide committee that had been exploring these ideas. Over the
course of the 2011-2012 school year, they developed directions, rubrics, and examples for a
Writing Portfolio Reflection Essay and a Big Question Portfolio Reflection Essay. This new
assessment was introduced to teachers in professional development sessions in August of 2012
and implemented in grades 9-11 that year. While teachers generally felt these were an
improvement, there were specific areas that many felt needed to be strengthened. In June of
2013, a working group of 12 Honors teachers reviewed feedback from a county-wide survey and
a set of ideas from department chairs, and made significant revisions to the program, including:
 Increasing the focus on reflection throughout the year in the writing portfolio
 Providing more resources
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 Revising rubrics for both assessments to better reflect curricular goals and to increase the
level of rigor
 Providing annotated anchor essays for both assessments, using student work from the
spring of 2013, in order to clarify expectations for both teachers and students
 Renaming the final products as the “Writing Reflection Essay” and “Big Question
Project” to better reflect the nature of the programs
 Renaming the set as Honors English Assessments, to avoid confusion about the role of
the portfolios themselves (part of the process, but not the final products/performances)
 Differentiating the Big Question Project by grade level, with more structure, support and
th
scaffolding for 9 graders, and increasing levels of autonomy as students progress each
year
 Providing three options for the final product for the Big Question: essay, research paper,
or multi-media presentation
Honors English Core Units – An Instructional Framework
In the fall of 2011, we convened a committee of veteran high school English teachers to
develop Honors Core Units which would demonstrate the application of rigor and critical
thinking skills in instructional and assessment practices in Honors classes. Over the course of
the 2011-2012 school year, this group designed a framework and sample units for English 11
Honors. During the 2012-2013 school year, two members of this committee then led a year-long
professional development cohort of English 11 Honors teachers from 12 of the 13 high schools
to field test the sample units and develop additional units and resources for teachers. The other
two committee members were part of this first cohort, implementing the units in their own
classrooms and developing additional ones, and they in turn were responsible for facilitating
professional development cohorts for English 9 and 10 Honors during the 2013-2014 school
year, where teachers would be developing and field testing 9th and 10th grade units, adapting
them to the needs of students at these grade levels, and developing resources for other teachers to
use.
In shaping the core units, the committee focused on ways to foster higher-order thinking
skills and tasks for students.
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Cognitive Models for Higher-Order Thinking Skills
Two taxonomies of cognition are especially useful in considering the application of higher-
order thinking skills in high school English classes. First, most educators are familiar with
Bloom’s Revised Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, but it worth revisiting this in terms of
the specific content of our courses. The table below illustrates examples of each of the 6 levels
of cognition in a high school English class.
English Tasks in Bloom’s Taxonomy
Evaluation Trade drafts with a partner and score each other’s papers using the rubric,
identifying specific elements he/she did well and specific elements he/she
needs to improve and explain your judgments.
Synthesis Write an essay in which you agree with, refute, or modify the following
claim. Support your argument with relevant and specific evidence and
address any obvious counter-arguments.
Analysis Explain how the author uses diction choices and imagery in the passage
below to convey a certain mood.
Application Place commas in the appropriate place in the sentence below.
Comprehension Compare Beowulf and Superman as heroes: in what ways are they similar?
In what ways are they different?
Which of the following words best captures the mood of the passage below?
What problem does Juliet face in this act, and how does she plan on solving
it?
Knowledge What country was Beowulf from?
What did Scout find in the tree?
What is a noun?

It is important to note the relationship of content and skills at each level. While Bloom
himself strongly emphasized that this was a taxonomy and not a hierarchy, the way we approach
the development of higher-order cognitive processes in the classroom has profound implications
for students. Much of the content of the ELA course of study spirals over time, so that students
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build on basic skills to increasing levels of complexity and sophistication. Students begin
examining basic literary elements of plot, character, and setting as early as the primary grades,
and build on these in increasing levels of depth and sophistication each year, in addition to
learning new concepts each year. In this way, much of the content we cover in our high school
classes “should” simply be review, especially in Honors classes. However, the reality is that we
often find ourselves re-teaching the same core content year after year, as students are unable to
transfer, apply, or retain the skills and concepts they were taught.
Nevertheless, teachers must keep in mind that our goals at this level are the higher-order
application of these concepts: our objective is not simply for students to identify an example of
indirect characterization, or recall the definition of a literary device, but for students to explain
how that indirect characterization contributes to the larger purpose (or theme) of a work. To do
this, we need to ensure that they can perform the lower-order functions early in the units with
clear instruction/review, but quickly provide students with models of this higher-level analysis,
opportunities for guided practice doing this analysis with feedback, and assessments that
measure their ability to explain how an author uses a technique to achieve a purpose.
The second model that is useful for thinking about our larger goals and how we help students
achieve them is Norman Webb’s Depth of Knowledge framework. While this framework
focuses not on the level of cognition, but on the complexity of the task, it can put these student
products and performances in a context, so that we can scaffold students’ progress towards these
more complex tasks.
Webb’s model divides all student tasks into four levels. DOK 1 tasks require students to
recall, describe, or apply basic procedures. DOK 2 tasks require students to organize,
summarize, and identify patterns. DOK 3 tasks require students to develop new questions,
formulate and support arguments, synthesize new ideas, and create new works. DOK 4 tasks are
long-term activities that require students to conduct projects and synthesize ideas from a wide
variety of sources. (Source: http://www.dese.mo.gov/divimprove/sia/msip/DOK_Chart.pdf)

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The table below gives examples relevant to high school English courses.
Depth of Knowledge Relevant Tasks in High School English Classes
Level
4 Describe and illustrate how common themes are found across texts from
different cultures.
3 Determine the author’s purpose and describe how it affects the
interpretation of a reading selection.
2 Identify and summarize the major events in a narrative.
Use context cues to identify the meaning of unfamiliar words.
1 Recall elements and details of story structure, such as sequence of
events, character, plot and setting.
Adapted from: http://www.dese.mo.gov/divimprove/sia/msip/DOK_Chart.pdf)
Again, as with Bloom’s taxonomy, in most cases students need to master skills and concepts
in level 1 and 2 tasks before being able to successfully complete level 3 and 4 tasks. However,
we should not wait until all (or most) students fully master the initial skills before moving
forward, as the more complex tasks can be opportunities to learn and reinforce these skills and
concepts. Teachers should address individual weaknesses, but not keep the whole class from
moving to the highest levels of task complexity. The DOK framework helps us keep our larger
goals in mind and provides a structure for thinking about a progression of skills, instruction,
tasks, and performances that enable students to achieve these goals. Note that most of the
assessment tasks in this Resource Guide focus on DOK 3 tasks (such as textual analysis and
writing reflection essays) and DOK 4 tasks (such as the Big Question Project and Socratic
seminars addressing essential questions supported by multi-genre text sets). This is not to say
that we should not be using DOK 1 and 2 assessment tasks (or lower-order thinking skills on
Bloom’s taxonomy), but that those should always be used as instructional scaffolding or
formative assessment on the path to these larger, more complex, and more authentic goals.

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