American Lit Tchr Ed (Daybook Crit Rdg/Wrtg)

Like their middle school counterparts, these high school Daybooks provide excellent literature studies in an engaging and colorful reader-response format. Selections are from a wide variety of sources - recognized authors (such as John Steinbeck), historical figures (such as Harriet Tubman), speeches, poetry, and stories that tell about particular historical events like the Japanese internment of WWII. Selections are self-consciously multi-cultural and to some degree reflect political correctness (for instance, in American Lit, there's a selection from Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth). World Lit selections are global and predominantly modern. Nevertheless, the emphasis is both on reading the selection critically and in eliciting thoughtful analysis and response. The softcover student book (about 285 pgs each) provides amble space for writing those responses as well as organizational charts to help with the analysis. Units include investigating specific types of literature, interacting with the text, making connections, and exploring multiple perspectives. There are also more typical literature study units - studying an author, focusing on language and craft as well as some that are specific to the type of literature - investigating American humor and language. The teacher editions, also softcover and about 330 pgs, feature a wrap around text with a wealth of supplementary material including background and author info, notes about specific readings, thought-provoking questions w/ talking points, vocabulary, writing activities and "Quick Assess" tests. The Teacher book also includes a number of family/classroom reproducible resources - writing prompts for each unit, pre/post tests and reading strategy assessments (with answer keys) and a Reading Assessment Scoring Chart. ~ Janice