2012 FPHS PRE-AP NINE SUMMER READING
PURPOSE OF SUMMER READING
Registering to take a Pre-AP or AP course in high school proves that you are a learner dedicated to
scholastic excellence, and eager for academic challenge. Your AP teachers share your passion for
knowledge and dedication to excellence, and they look forward to working with you next year.
In order to be a successful AP student, it is important for you to be intellectually engaged even in
summer so that you continue to grow both as a scholar and as an individual. Therefore, FPHS highly
recommends that all high school Pre-AP students participate in a summer reading program. The titles
you read during the summer are a way to begin the new school year with a shared experience for
discussion and writing, and the books will be required reading by the third week of the school year.
Based upon that reading, students will be tested and can expect a Socratic seminar. Inspiration from:
http://schools.roundrockisd.org/chisholmtrail/docs/RRHS_summer-Reading.pdf
ASSIGNMENT:
The theme of the assignment is Borders and Boundaries. Students will examine the presence of
borders and boundaries in the two books listed below, pondering the question: How and why do
people create physical and metaphorical boundaries for themselves? The comments by John Sayles,
an American independent film director, may clarify this question for you:
“In a personal sense,” Sayles comments, “a border is where you draw a line and say
‘This is where I end and somebody else begins.’ In a metaphorical sense, it can be any
of the symbols that we erect between one another – sex, class, race, age.”….When you
cross the border and go into some kind of new territory, you don’t necessarily have the
power that you had on your side of it….I think that’s one of the reasons that people like
borders – they can say, “South of this line, I’m a big guy, and I run things here.”
http://www.en.utexas.edu/Classes/Bremen/
DIRECTIONS:
Create a dialectical journal (see attached), typing a quotation from the book on the left, and an
explanation of its relationship to the above assignment on the right side. Your dialectical journal will
have 15 entries per book for a total of 30 entries. Entries should be typed and written in full
sentences and should clearly explain their relevance to the theme, Borders and Boundaries.
This assignment is due the third week of the school year for full credit. If the project is turned in
late, the highest grade that you can earn is a 70%.
BOOKS ASSIGNED:
NONFICTION
Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin
FICTION
The Help by Kathryn Stockett
OVERVIEW OF DIALECTICAL JOURNALS
The term “Dialectic” means “the art or practice of arriving at the truth by using conversation
involving question and answer.” Think of your dialectical journal as a series of conversations with the
texts we read during this course. The process is meant to help you develop a better understanding of
the texts we read. Use your journal to incorporate your personal responses to the texts, your ideas
about the themes we cover and our class discussions. You will find that it is a useful way to process
what you’re reading, prepare yourself for group discussion, and gather textual evidence for your
Literary Analysis assignments.
PROCEDURE:
o As you read, choose passages that stand out to you and record them in the left-hand column
of a T-chart (ALWAYS include page numbers).
o In the right column, write your response to the text (ideas/insights, questions, reflections, and
comments on each passage)
Sample Dialectical Journal entry: THE THINGS THEY CARRIED by Tim O’Brien
Passages from the text
“-they carried like freight
trains; they carried it on
their backs and shouldersand for all the ambiguities of
Vietnam, all the mysteries
and unknowns, there was at
least the single abiding
certainty that they would
never be at a loss for things
to carry”.
Pg#s
Pg 2
Comments & Questions
(R) O’brien chooses to end the first section of the novel
with this sentence. He provides excellent visual details
of what each solider in Vietnam would carry for day-today fighting. He makes you feel the physical weight of
what soldiers have to carry for simple survival. When
you combine the emotional weight of loved ones at
home, the fear of death, and the responsibility for the
men you fight with, with this physical weight, you start
to understand what soldiers in Vietnam dealt with every
day. This quote sums up the confusion that the men felt
about the reasons they were fighting the war, and how
they clung to the only certainty - things they had to carry
- in a confusing world where normal rules were
suspended.
RESPONDING TO THE TEXT:
The most important thing to remember is that your observations should be specific and detailed.
You can write as much as you want for each entry. You may create your own form for your
dialectical journals or download as many copies of this template as needed. Then you are to analyze
a passage and its relationship to the overall theme of borders and boundaries.
Source Material
Page Respond, Analyze, and Evaluate
(Provide a direct quotation; you
may use an ellipsis to shorten a
long quotation.)
No.
(Explain why you find this passage
Important as an example of the theme of
Borders and Boundaries.)