9th Grade Honors English Syllabus
Mrs. Leinbaugh
Welcome to Honors English 9! I am looking forward to working with all of you this year. In this class,
we will work on strengthening critical reading, analytical and creative writing, vocabulary, and
grammar skills. Students in honors are expected to keep up with assigned reading and homework,
actively participate in class, and think critically and creatively about all of their work. Below is a very
brief overview of our units.
Overview of Units
Unit One: Introduction to Literary Analysis
Texts: Short stories and poetry provided in
Products: Short analytical and narrative
class, including “The Wizards of Perfil” by
pieces.
Kelly Link.
Unit Two: Analyzing Text for Style and Literary Devices
 Texts: The Odyssey excerpted in our
Products: Analytical essay and narrative.
textbook. The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho
Unit Three: Using Motif and Theme to Compare and Contrast Texts
Texts: Haroun and the Sea of Stories by
Products: Synthesis analytical essay and
Salman Rushdie and Big Fish directed by
script.
Tim Burton.
Unit Four: Making Sense of Challenging Texts through Symbolism and Magical
Realism
Texts: Poetry and short stories.
Products: Poetry and synthesis analytical
essay.
Unit Five: Analyzing Character
Texts: Things Fall Apart by Chinua
Products: Analytical essay, found poetry,
Achebe.
and research essay.
Unit Six: Using Motif, Theme and Character Analysis to Understand Shakespeare
Texts: Romeo and Juliet by William
Products: Short analytical pieces and
Shakespeare. We will watch scenes from
scene production and performance.
both movie versions (Franco Zeffirelli’s
1968 and Baz Luhrmann’s 1996).
Classroom Expectations: In class, I expect students to show respect, solve problems and make good decisions.
Students can expect me to provide clear instructions, answer questions, and give them challenging work to help
them improve their reading and writing skills.
Academic Honesty: Honesty in all work is expected at all times. Students will be taught how, and are
required to, cite ideas and phrases that are not their own. Plagiarism or any other form of cheating is a
serious offense and will result in a 0 for the assignment as well as consequences according to school
policy.
Absences: It is your responsibility to get any work you miss for an absence. If you have an excused
absence, you have the same number of days to complete the work as you were absent. For example, if
you were absent for two days, you get two days to complete the work. However, this only applies to
work that was assigned during your absence. If something is assigned Monday, you are absent
Tuesday, and it is due Friday, your work is still due Friday. If you are absent the day something is
due, it is due the day you return to school. Please check the website for make-up work.
http://leinbaugh.weebly.com
Late Work: Work is due at the beginning of the period. Any work that comes in after that is late. The
work you do for class is important to the larger concepts that you are learning. Completing work late
is very rarely conducive to that learning. If you must turn something in late, each day it will lose 10
points. After five days, you may turn in late work until the end of the grading period for 50% credit.
Extra Credit:
I do not give extra credit on an individual basis to make up for missing work earlier in the grading period. On the
rare occasion that I give extra credit, it will be available to the entire class with the same due date.
Grading Categories:
Grades are based on the following categories. Please check Skyward regularly so that you know right away if you
are missing an assignment that could negatively impact your grade. When students have an excused outstanding
assignment, I will enter it as a “0” so that students and parents always have an accurate display of the grade and
don’t forget about missing assignments.
Test and Papers
50.00%
Reading
20.00%
Daily Work
20.00%
Final Exam
10.00%
Tests and Papers: 50% Includes all formal writing assignments such as essays, research papers etc.
Reading: 20% Includes assignments and quizzes based on reading comprehension or critical reading annotations,
outside reading logs, reading reflections.
Daily Work: 20% Anything we do in class. Daily writing assignments/journals, grammar work, vocabulary
assignments, notebook checks of daily activities.
Final Exam: 10%
A
A-
93-100
90-92.9
B+
B
B-
87-89.9
83-86.9
80-82.9
Grading Scale
C+
77-79.0
C
73-76.9
C70-72.9
D+
D
F
67-69.9
60-66.9
0-59.9
Student work will be graded and entered for students and parents to view in family/student access at minimum after
each grading period:
 October 6, 2015
 March 4, 2016
 November 9, 2015
 April 7, 2016
 December 11, 2015
 May 16, 2016
 January 29, 2016 (SEMESTER 1 FINAL
 June 16, 2016 (SEMESTER 2 FINAL
GRADE)
GRADE)
Contact Information: Please check my website if you are absent and need to get the make-up work,
forgot the homework, or just need a reminder of what to do. An update of what we do in class will be
updated on my web site and a link to the assignments will be there. You can also link to my website
through Issaquah High School’s site.
http://leinbaugh.weebly.com
I want to help you succeed in this class. If you ever have questions or concerns, please let me know.
The best way to get in touch with me is by email.
E-mail: leinbaughH@issaquah.wednet.edu
Mrs. Leinbaugh’s Syllabus
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Anything you want to tell me about your child that would help me become a better teacher to him/her. I
look forward to working with you and your child. Please feel free to contact me anytime about your child,
I am more than happy to help any way possible.
Movies: We will be watching a few school approved movies and a couple are rated PG-13 (Romeo and
Juliet and Big Fish). These movies will help with the speed of using a story to work on Literary Analysis
papers which all three schools have their Language Arts Students write at minimum two papers per
semester. This is a very important skill for your student to master.
I will post a list of the proposed titles on my website. If you are concerned with any of my selections
please look over the list and email me any concerns.