Vocabulary focuses on the preparation for college entrance examinations with emphasis on sentence completion, word analogies, synonyms, and antonyms. Speaking and listening skills are included in unit assignments. This class involves close reading and analysis of poetry, drama, fiction, and the essay on the advanced level. There is special emphasis on the refinement of critical thinking and writing skills. AP designation on transcript is given only to those students who complete the entire course.
Summer reading is required.
Some background study of foreign cultures will be integrated into the literature studied. Continued development of critical writing skills for college, vocabulary study, listening and speaking skills will be stressed. This is an interdisciplinary course of contemporary literature and world problems with special emphasis on works from developing regions, which integrates the study of current problems and literature in these areas - the Middle East, Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Eastern Europe. Using specific case studies, students will explore the conflict between traditional cultures and emerging industrialization, the effects of prejudice and poverty, and humankind's continuing search for personal identity and political independence. Literary works will be studied with particular emphasis on the struggles, disappointments and triumphs of human issues which confront us all on this interdependent planet.