2016 Keyport High School AP Language & Composition Summer Reading Assignments

The AP Language and Composition Course emphasizes nonfiction writing, language awareness, close reading, and analysis of nonfiction prose. While you need to continue reading important and distinctive fiction, you begin to need working with quality nonfiction as well. All students are required to complete the summer readings and assignments prior to the first day of class. Students must have joined Mrs. Sproat’s Google Classroom prior to starting the assignments. Students on the AP roster will receive an email invitation to join Classroom in their school email. Students must read three books this summer and complete three assignments which will be graded as major assignments for the 1st marking period. Follow all tasks precisely. Students who fail to complete all or part of these tasks or turn in incomplete work may be removed from the AP Language class. Assignment #1 - Thank You for Arguing - Jay Heinrichs Thank You For Arguing covers the core rhetorical teachings of Aristotle and Cicero, but Heinrichs does it entirely using modern examples, drawing on political, marketing, workplace, and cultural references, as well as his own family arguments. One paragraph discusses Socrates; the next discusses Sherlock Holmes. Heinrichs’ text enlightens the novice rhetorician about the strategies and techniques involved when creating and sustaining an argument.The balance between formal lessons and practical examples makes the book highly valuable and applicable to everyday speaking and writing. Among other things, you will learn:

• A deeper understanding of ethos, pathos, and logos • Many figures of speech • How to recognize strong and weak logical arguments • How to recognize (and use, or defend against) persuasive techniques • How to construct a persuasive language in speaking and writing

Task: Read and annotate chapters 1 - 17 of Jay Heinrichs’, Thank You For Arguing, FIRST.

Part 1: Select 12 out of the 17 specific techniques for effective argument that you learned or understood better because of reading this book. Describe each technique in a separate paragraph. Make sure to give the name of the technique, an explanation of what it means, and an example. Cite page numbers for each technique.

Part 2: Recall an argument from your past that you “lost.” (This could be an argument with a friend, a sibling, a teacher, a parent, etc.) Briefly rewrite the argument in dialogue form (like the script of a play.) First, show how the argument went originally. Then rewrite it to show how the argument could have ended differently, had you known some of the techniques or skills that you have read about in TYFA. Label the techniques/skills you use in the rewritten version in the margin.

Because this is the first graded assignment in the course, it should be an example of your best work. First impressions are important!

• Type the written assignments 1 ½ - spaced in 11 pt. font with 1” margins. • On the first page, your student heading should appear in the upper left hand corner:

Your name Teacher’s name AP Language and Composition Date (29 July 2016)

• On the second page and every page thereafter, the pages should be labeled in the upper right hand corner of the header area with your last name and the page number.

This assignment is due on or before Friday, July 29th at midnight. Please do your work in Google Docs and turn in in Google Classroom. Assignment #2 - Where You Go Is Not Who You'll Be: An Antidote to the College Admissions Mania - Frank Bruni. Task: Read and complete a dialectical journal for Where You Go Is Not Who You’ll Be. You should have a dialectical journal page for each of the ten chapters, hence, your complete dialectical journal will be ten pages long (at least). You must have at least five bullets on the left side of each journal (the information that comes from the article, such as direct quotes and phrases).

• You may choose to handwrite your journal as you read, but your final dialectical journal must be typed. Type the written assignments in 11 pt. font. •On the first page, your student heading should be in the upper left hand corner:

Your name Teacher’s name AP Language and Composition Date (19 August 2016)

• On the second page and every page thereafter, the pages should be labeled in the upper right hand corner of the header area with your last name and the page number.

This assignment is due on or before Friday, August 19th at midnight. Please do your work in Google Docs and turn in in Google Classroom. Please see the attached instructions on how to set up a dialectical journal. Assignment #3 - Me Talk Pretty One Day - David Sedaris. Task: This is a collection of autobiographical essays. Read only the following titles and annotate (with post-its). Pay close attention to Sedaris’s humor and how it is conveyed (via hyperbole, understatement, irony, incongruity, etc.) and how his style (specifically tone and diction) changes according to the topics and purpose. Therefore, the annotations on your post-its should reflect examples of humor and style along with your commentary/analysis. You are expected to have a minimum of five post-its per title. Your post-its will be collected on the first day of class. In advance, you may put each set of 5 post-its on a separate sheet, labeled with a heading and the title of the essay. Go Carolina Giant Dreams, Midget Abilities Genetic Engineering Today’s Special City of Angels Me Talk Pretty One Day Remembering My Childhood on the Continent of Africa The City of Light in the Dark Picka Pocketoni I’ll Eat What He’s Wearing This assignment is due on the first day of school. As the assignment requires you to write on post-its, they may be handwritten.

Little Notes, Big Ideas (Close Reading Strategies) ● Post-its may help you remember what stood out to you while you were reading. ● You may have a great thought, but it is easy to forget that as you move on with

your reading. ● Post-its also show your teacher evidence of your thinking. ● They serve as a record of something you can share with the whole group. ● Using post-its allows you to be an active, rather than a passive reader. ● Some ways you can use your post-its are to write down: (Keep in mind that all of

the suggestions below might not be appropriate for non-fiction texts.) (Also, what you can write down on your post-its is not limited to the list below.)

○ Predictions; ○ Interesting, unusual or insightful quotations; ○ Patterns you notice and your thoughts about why the patterns are

occurring; ○ Symbols and what you think they mean; ○ Instances of foreshadowing; ○ Reactions and impressions; ○ Little pictures or sketches if they help you visualize something; ○ Questions when you are unsure of something or need clarification; ○ Contradictions your find when you run across something you didn’t expect; ○ What the book makes you wonder about; ○ An aha moment; ○ Connections you make between what you have read and something else; ○ Why you think it is important that the writer interrupts the action to tell

you a memory. ○ The author’s claim; ○ The author’s purpose;

○ Rhetorical strategies used by the author and a comment about the effect of the rhetorical strategy.

○ Comments about the writer’s style.