Pacing Guide for English 12b
Overview: The foci of this semester are analytical reading and writing.
Weeks 1-4: Epics and Archetypes
Topics: Literary criticism and analysis, vocabulary development, essay development, and syntax.
Texts: Selections from Beowulf, the Iliad (Chapter 1 of Holt), The Canterbury Tales (cf Chapter 2 of Holt),
Paradise Lost (Chapter 3 of Holt), and Don Quixote (cf 4 Chapter of Holt).
Standards:
1. Reading Comprehension 3.6, 3.2, 3.3
2. Writing Applications and Genres 2.2, 2.5
Objectives:
1. Students will be able to identify the use of literary archetypes and heroic tropes in the selected
texts.
2. The students will successfully identify the authors’ use of the following: irony, tone, and mood.
3. The students will successfully relate the use of archetypes, heroic tropes, and literary devices as
a method by which the authors illustrate a theme. (synthesis)
4. Students will practice writing resumes.
Activity:
1. Students will read the textual selections and do the following tasks: write guided dialectical
journal entries, create character and concept diagrams, and create thesis statements based
on their understanding of literary tropes.
2. Students will engage in a variety of vocabulary and sentence combining and revision
activities.
Assessments:
1. Students will write one two to three page essay which explores a theme in one of the texts listed
above, which uses textual evidence, quotations in context, and provides analysis of the theme
using a valid method of literary criticism.
2. Students will create a resume for one of the main characters for one of the texts we have read.
3. Students will complete 4 of 5 sentence revision and vocabulary assignments with a 70% or
better.
Benchmark Questions:
Weeks 5-8: The Conscience of the Individual
Texts: Hamlet, A Modest Proposal
Standards:
1. Reading Comprehension 3.6, 3.2, 3.3
2. Writing Applications and Genres 2.2
Objectives:
1. Students will be able to analyze how the theme of the crisis of conscience is developed in
Hamlet and successfully write a response to literature which explores that theme in
relationship to the Shakespeare’s use of tone, mood, and other relevant literary devices.
2. The students will successfully identify the use of irony and tone in A Modest Proposal and
how it makes the text a social commentary, rather than simply an attempt at humor.
Activity:
1. Students will read the texts and do the following tasks: write guided dialectical journal
entries, create character and concept diagrams, and create thesis statements based on their
understanding of literary citicism.
2. Students will engage in a variety of vocabulary and sentence combining and revision
activities.
Assessments:
1. Students will write one two to three page essay which explores a theme in one of the texts
listed above, which uses textual evidence, quotations in context, and provides analysis of
the theme using a valid method of literary criticism.
2. Students will complete 4 of 5 sentence revision and vocabulary assignments with a 70% or
better.
Weeks 9-11: Reactions to Modern Life
Topics Texts: Brave New World (ORB); selections from Island of Dr. Moreau, and Frankenstein.
Activity:
1. Students will read the textual selections and do the following tasks: write guided dialectical
journal entries, create character and concept diagrams, and create thesis statements based on
their understanding of literary tropes.
2. Students will engage in a variety of vocabulary and sentence combining and revision activities.
Standards:
1. Reading Comprehension 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.3
2. Writing Applications and Genres 2.2
Objectives:
1. Students will be able to identify the use of satire and allegory in the selected texts.
2. The students will successfully identify the following themes in the selected texts: the hubris
of science without philosophy, man vs. nature, and the dystopian visions of the present or
future as a reaction to industrial and/or social change.
Assessments:
1. Students will write a three to five page essay which explores one of the themes listed above,
which uses textual evidence, quotations in context, and provides analysis of the evidence
using a valid literary criticism approach (i.e. Deconstruction, Social , Feminist) (1 Credit)
2. Students will turn in a Dialectical Journal that has a minimum of 40 quotations and
responses in them which explores the themes described above and/or identifies the literary
devices described in the objectives. (1 IS Credit)
3. Students will complete 4 of 5 sentence revision and vocabulary assignments with a 70% or
better.
Benchmark Questions: