Not a lot of exposition this week because we’ve turned the corner toward getting ourselves exam-ready — so, straight to the work at hand.:

This Week’s Assignments

1. Come ready and one time your first class this week take the reading quiz on Chapters 21-30 of The Accommodation, then finish reading the book. You’ll be writing a timed essay next week on the book that will require you to employ evidence from every section of the text.
2. Complete Unit 9 in AP Classroom — including watching the videos and answering the FRQ and MCQ — by 1o p.m. Sunday, 4.18.21 for juniors and Wednesday 4.21.21 for sophomores.
3. Complete the reading section of this grading period’s REHUGO project, which I’ll provide an overview for in your first class of this week, by your grade-level standing weekly deadline. This work will be helpful for the entire exam, but particularly helpful for Question 3, the argumentative essay.   Pro tip: Use 1984 and The Accommodation as two your assigned books.

We’re at the point in the year where your attendance and timely completion of assigned work is critical to your success.

This last week before Spring Break, we’re batting clean-up: writing and peer reviewing a timed essay based on our group discussions and your individual analysis of JFK’s April 1962 steel price press conference. If you’re a junior, you’ll write and turn in your essay in class on Monday, then conduct a detailed peer review of work during class on Tuesday (sophomores will write during class on Thursday and conduct a detailed peer review on Friday). If you have accommodations, you’ll write during our hour-long lunch on Monday (juniors) or Thursday (sophomores).  Beyond this, we’ll be kicking off another group reading book, The Accommodation, written by local journalist Jim Schutze.

This Week’s Assignments

As stated above, you’ll write your timed essay during the first class of this week, and turn in both your outline and your essay to this week’s timed writing Google form. You’ll also post your timed essay below as a comment on this blog. As a reminder, you’ll need to keep your camera on during all timed essays.

Then, during the second class of this week, you’ll review the AP Language rhetorical analysis rubric and, then click through and review and attempt to score these released student sample essays for this prompt. When you’re done, you’ll review our standing class peer review sheet and, then, go into the comment thread, below, select an essay that hasn’t received a comment yet, hit reply and identify yourself, and, then, provide one of your peers with detailed feedback on their work by completing — well and thoroughly — all the questions on the peer review sheet. You will be graded on your peer feedback here on the blog, so do your best-possible job.

Beyond this, you’ll start reading our new class reading book, The Accommodation: The Politics of Race in an American City by longtime Dallas journalist Jim Schutze. Long out of print, this book — originally published in February 1987 and immediately purchased and dumped or burned by its opponents, goes a long way toward answering questions you likely have about why Dallas is so different north and south of the Trinity River. It’s such a compelling read that a new publisher is re-releasing it this fall, a development that has drawn national attention, as you can see from this CBS News report. (Note: The PDF I’m supplying you here is a bootleg that circulated once the book went out of print, and so many copies had been destroyed. Taken from an old printer’s galley, it has a few typos, but that in no way diminishes the importance of the story or the quality of Schutze’s writing.)

By Sunday evening, 3.21 (juniors)/3.24 (sophomores), you’ll need to complete the first 58 pages — Chapters 1-10 — of the book, and come ready to discuss what you’ve read in a whole-class seminar. It’s a fascinating read. We’ll have lots to talk about 0ver the next month or so — and we’ll talk a lot in preparation for a Zoom live visit with the writer.

See you in class!

The time has come. The time to begin steeling ourselves for the big exam. The time to start applying what we learned from looking at the award-winning and money-generating strategies of the mad men on Madison Avenue and applying it to the kinds of texts we’ll see on exams. The time to take on your first real rhetorical analysis.

This week, you’ll be working independently to analyze President John F. Kennedy’s 1962 press-conference speech wherein he takes the nation’s top steelmakers to task for colluding to raise prices. More below in in the assignments section. You’ll also continue your work in AP Classroom, taking on Unit 6. Then, as always, you’ll report back on your work in Google.

This Week’s Assignments

Deadline 10 p.m. Sunday, 3.7 (Juniors)/Wed. 3.10 (Sophomores)

First, click through to and listen to Kennedy’s entire press conference, including the questions posed by reporters. (Pay particular attention to his remarks on actions of the steel companies, but listen, too, to his discussion of the draft, among other things. In line with our only class this week, it’s important to remember that other generations faced challenges unimaginable today, including the draft.) Listening to the questions will help you analyze the context of the speech.

Then, click through to this packet and find Question 2, the prompt for a rhetorical analysis essay about Kennedy’s speech. (You can also find the packet in the Menu section under “AP Prompts.”) This time, you’re working alone — and you need to put in a complete effort, using all the tools in our Rhetorical Analysis Starter Kit. (Pro tip: You’ll also find this kit in the Menu section under “Rhetorical Analysis Starter Kit.”

You’ll start with our old analytical friend SPACE CAT, but do NOT use the worksheet for anything other than a guideline. This time,  you’ll need to start a Google doc so you have plenty of room to write down your observations. Let me repeat. DO NOT use the worksheet. Further, from this week forward, you need to move beyond writing down a single word or two to writing full sentences and performing a thorough and comprehensive analysis for each letter of the acronym.

In your Rhetorical Analysis Starter Kit, you’ll find support for your work that includes lists of rhetorically accurate verbs and tone words, among other things. Use them. It’s no longer good enough to write down “angry” or “powerful.” You’ll need to talk about tone in every rhetorical analysis essay you write, so its critical that you get comfortable with using a wider variety of more precise words for tone.

As you conduct your analysis and compile your observations, make sure to use the chocolate-chip cookie formula we’ve discussed for crafting analytical statements. Remember, the “formula” is the thing that you see, plus the thing that it’s doing, plus the effect that it’s having, plus the impact on the reader — as in, “My mom’s use of Madagascar vanilla and Ghirardelli chocolate elevates her cookies, creating a dark magic that makes me smile every time.” 

When you’ve completed an exhaustive SPACE CAT analysis of Kennedy’s speech, you need to do one more thing: analyze the Kennedy steel prompt. What is the College Board asking you to do? What recipe are you being asked to bake? As you break down the prompt, review the rhetorical analysis rubric. DO NOT SKIP this prompt analysis and rubric review step; you’ll need to include this in this week’s Google check-in form. Once you’ve completed your work on the Kennedy analysis and prompt review, save it someplace safe. You’ll need it for at least two weeks more.

Kennedy done, go to AP Classroom and work on Unit 6. This will be the last unit due before Spring Break. As you celebrate, please note the following: these have been one-point grades until now, and the quality of your work hasn’t mattered. As we turn the corner toward exam readiness, you need to complete these to the best of your ability. If you blow through the multiple-choice sections answering everything as choice C, you will receive a 0, and there will be no make-up. If you write a single sentence or simply list an idea or a couple of bullet points with thin or no evidence, you will receive a 0 and there will be no make-up. On the FRQ in particular, you need to treat the prompt and your work there as a mini-essay. Use complete sentences, write like you’re in it to win it — make a real effort. Many of you have been doing spectacular work there; keep it up! If you’ve been pretending or phoning it in, the buck stops here. I want you ALL to get college credit!

As your final  step this week, you’ll need to complete this week’s Google check-in form to turn in and reflect upon your work.

We’re moving forward, getting ourselves ready for all that is to come. As Kennedy would say, “Ask not what Lang can do for you, ask what you can do for your Lang exam readiness.”

See you in class for both of this week’s scheduled meetings!

As we’ve discussed a few time in class, if you really want to learn how to employ and analyze rhetoric, study the advertising gurus on Madison Avenue; the experts paid to part you from your money know all the best mind nina tricks to lighten your wallet — and the yearly glut of Superbowl Commercials serves as a master class in tour-de-force rhetoric. This year is no exception and, since for many of us, the commercials are the best part of the de facto holiday that is Superbowl Sunday, it’s worth looking at a few of this year’s standout offerings to study effective rhetorical strategies in the wild. One of the most interesting rhetorical strategies? The decision by Budweiser, Coke, Pepsi and Hyundai to sit the game out, and release their commercials from the sidelines — making room for some first-time Bowl advertisers — like Chipotle — to step up and show out with it’s fascinating “What If I Burrito Could Change the World?” spot.

This Week’s Assignments

First click here (or click through the menu on the left) to pull up the worksheet for this week’s analysis. (Pro tip: Click on “Google doc when it asked you what file format to open the work in.) Then, working with your partner, use this article to link through, select any three of this year’s (non-Budweiser) commercials of your choice, and complete the graphic organizer at the top of this week’s worksheet for each one.

Next, go watch the first of Budweiser’s entries into this year’s unofficial Superbowl commercial sweepstakes, screen it a few times, and work together to complete the “Last Year’s Lemon’s” section of this week’s Google worksheet.

Then, continue with the remainder of the analysis by screening a few times and completing the worksheet analysis for Budweiser’s “Bigger Picture” commercial. When you’ve completed the worksheet, hold on to your work until next week.

Finally, remember that your deadlines for AP Classroom Unit 4 videos and assessments were extended, so they’re due by 10 p.m. Sunday, 12. 14 (juniors) or 10 p.m. Wednesday, 2.17 (sophomores).

Happy viewing, and see you in class!

And so it begins. As night follows day, Semester 2 follows Semester 1, and we begin a new  “Circle of Life” here in AP Language. A circle wherein we hone our hard-fought skills by closely reading, rhetorically analyzing and writing a draft essay about a fresh text each week, even as we pay our respects to and celebrate a text well studied by drawing upon all our learning — and  the spirit of our ancestors — to write our best and final essay for a Townsel rubric score. A cycle in which we gird ourselves for the upcoming battle of the AP Lang exam by examining our opponent, unit by unit, in AP Classroom.

This week, you’ll work with your accountability partner to create a detailed outline for an essay you’ll write collaboratively during your second class of the week, rhetorically analyzing Amanda Gorman’s occasional poem “The Hill We Climb”; you’ll post your partner essay on the blog; and you’ll use your rubric to work with your partner to peer review and assign a rubric score to two other essays. Separately, you’ll work independently to write your best and final Locavore essay and  complete Unit 4 in AP Classroom. Stick with our cyclical battle plan all spring, and you’ll be singing “Hakuna Matata” on our May game day!

This Week’s Assignments

First, you’ll work with your accountability partner to create a detailed outline between your first and second class of this week for a rhetorical analysis of Ms. Gorman’s poem; I’ll review your prompt with you on Monday (juniors) or Thursday (sophomores). Pro tip: An effective outline comprises the full Aristotelian argument, the specific text evidence you intend to employ, and your thinking about where — and ideally what — you plan to include to satisfy Townsel’s required writing elements.

Then, you and your partner will work with your accountability partner during scheduled class time on Tuesday to write an effective rhetorical analysis of Ms. Gorman’s poem, capable of scoring at least a 5 on the six-point AP rhetorical analysis rubric. You’ll turn in last week’s Gorman SPACE CAT analysis and worksheet analysis, and your outline, to this Google form and post your essay in on the blog. Then, you’ll both collaborate again to review, comment upon and rubric score two posted essays.

Separately, you’ll write and turn in on this Google form your best and final locavore essay, taking into account all the feedback you received in blog comments and addressing all the issues raised in peer review by your accountability partner. This one’s for a test grade, so make it count!

Finally, you’ll go to your favorite home away from home, AP Classroom; per usual, you’ll watch and take notes on the assigned videos FOR UNIT 4 ONLY; then complete the assigned FRQ and MCQ assessments BY SUNDAY, 2.14 (JUNIORS) AND WEDNESDAY, 2.17 (SOPHOMORES). YES! I’m giving you two weeks to complete Unit 4 on Facebook. You’re welcome.

We’re pushing forward here in this new semester. And, in the words of Mufasa, “Believe in yourself and there will come a day when others will have no choice but to believe with you.” We’re getting there!

As we round the corner for a new semester, we begin reviewing all we’ve learned so far this year and deepening our skills. We’ll start with rhetorically analyzing Amanda Gorman’s stunning poem “The Hill We Climb,” recited at the presidential inauguration, working in pairs to break down the poem line by line and, then, complete a SPACE CAT analysis to get ready for writing a rhetorical analysis essay. You’ll also work with a partner to conduct  thorough peer reviews of each of your locavore synthesis essays, conduct a peer conference to discuss each others’ constructive criticism and reflect on the blog feedback your essay received as a jumping off point to rewrite and resubmit your essay for a quality grade next week. Finally, you’ll work in AP Classroom again to extend your exam-readiness, watching the videos and completing a couple of culminating assessments for Unit 3.

This Week’s Assignments: deadlines 10 p.m. Sun. 1.31 (Jrs.)/10 p.m. Wed. 2.3 (Sophs)

First, you’ll  watch the amazing Amanda Gorman deliver her poem “The Hill We Climb.” Then you’ll pull up the full text of the poem and download this analysis worksheet to deeply analyze the text. Once you’ve completed the analysis sheet for the poem, you’ll then work as a pair to complete a thorough SPACE CAT analysis of the poem. Keep your work handy; you’ll be working with in class for at least another week in preparation for writing a rhetorical analysis essay about her poem. That done, working with your accountability partner, pull up these student essay samples for the Locavore prompt and the official AP synthesis rubric, then read, discuss each sample essay with your partner, and assign each a score. This is called range-finding, and it helps you determine where you and your partners’ essays might have fallen on a six-point scale if you had written the essay as part of an actual exam. Once you’ve read, applied the rubric and agreed on scores for your sample essay, use our standing course AP synthesis peer review checklist to conduct a thorough peer review (in a google doc) of your partner’s essay. When you’re done, you’ll share your peer review with your partner and cut and paste it into this week’s Google check-in form.

Finally, you’ll work independently in AP Classroom to complete the videos and assessments assigned for Unit 3 — not just because of the May AP Language exam, but because of the upcoming March administration on campus of the SAT. Pro tip: The College Board is in charge of both the SATs and AP exams, so the work you do in AP Classroom is directly aligned to improved reading and writing scores on the SAT exam as well.

We’re picking up steam, making sure we’re ready for all that comes ahead this spring, making sure we’re ready to brave, as Amanda Gorman wrote so beautifully, “the belly of the beast.”

This week, our blog work is all about exam readiness — and our work will be so straightforward I’m not going to spend a lot of time setting up here.

First, you’ll be turning in your locavore synthesis outline as you turned in your timed writing. If you haven’t prepared your outline for an Aristotelian essay yet, go get that done. Second, in your first period of this week, you’ll be writing the essay in 40 minutes — 60 minutes if you have extended time — and turning it in IMMEDIATELY with your outline — when you’re done. I’ll provide you with links to a Google form to turn in your work, then you’ll come here and post it as a comment. 

Second, you’ll review the AP synthesis rubric, then come back TO THIS BLOG POST and use the  rubric to peer score two of your peers.

Next week, you’ll use the AP Synthesis rubric, to conduct a detailed peer review for an accountability partner of your choice and, then, conduct a one-on-one conference with that peer.

Pro tips for timed writings, which we’ll be doing regularly from this point forward:

• Do the outlines in advance. They help, and for the next several timed essays, you’ll be allowed to plan in advance and use them as you write.
• If you miss a timed writing, you’ll need to arrange with me to make it up within three calendar days.
• The process we set this week for writing, reviewing and rewriting will be our process for timed essays the rest of the year.
• Your peer review score is not your grade — I will assign your grade. And if you’re not happy with your grade, you’ll be allowed to rewrite for consideration for a higher grade.

This Week’s Assignments:

1. Bring your completed locavore outline to your first class of the week for the timed writing. You’ll be turning it in for a grade, along with your timed essay, via a google doc I’ll supply to you during class.
2. When you’re done turning your work into the Google form, you’ll then cut and paste your essay as a comment, HERE, below. As you turn it in, make sure that it’s formatted properly before you hit submit.
3. By your Sunday night, 10 p.m. deadline (juniors) or Wednesday night, 10 p.m. deadline (sophomores), come back to this blog post and use the rubric to score two of your peers and comment, providing the following information: give BOTH of the people you comment on a suggested score, broken down by the rows of the rubric, provide a few sentences explaining the score you assign, then tell them 3 SPECIFIC things they did well in their essay and 3 SPECIFIC things you think might improve their score.
4. Go to AP Classroom, complete for a late grade any Unit 2 work you have not yet completed. I’ll be assigning work on Unit 3 next week, and you don’t want this work to stack.

See you in class Tuesday (juniors) and Thursday (sophomores) for our first timed writing!

Relationships are complicated — good, bad, weak strong, ugly, pretty. When they’re good, there’s nothing better but, then, when they’re bad, they suck all the air out of the room. Some of the strongest rhetoric in history has been applied in the name of wooing great loves and, conversely, ending toxic relationships. There is, then, lots to be learned by looking at writing and rhetoric through the relationship lens.

We spent most of our fall sharpening our argumentative skills by learning and applying the Aristotelian argument. This week, you’ll wipe the Winter Break dust off the Aristotelian structure to argue passionately about a relationship that took its toll, in different ways, for man of us. Then, in class and with a group, you’ll write another letter — this time, synthesizing some information to proffer some much-needed relationship advice.

This Week’s Assignments:

1. I took the break, the entire break, and nothing but the break to sleep, read and binge-watch “Bridgerton,” so I’ll be updating grades to input your Santa efforts this week. If you still owe me work, GET IT IN. Progress reports go out at the end of the week. Some credit is better than NO credit.
2. Read the love letters linked above, and the breakup letter examples here. Refresh your understanding for what typically goes into a killer love letter or a cutthroat break-up letter, then pick one of each and conduct a formal SPACE CAT analysis for both. Use the linked worksheet as your guideline, but be THOROUGH, be SPECIFIC, and use complete sentences. Don’t limit yourself to the tiny space on the worksheet, write what it takes to get the job done. (You’ll turn your work in to this week’s Google self-report.)
3. Employing all parts of the Aristotelian argument and all of Townsel’s required writing elements, write a letter either a) breaking up with 2020 or b) flirting with 2021. Your choice. We’ll talk about this assignment in class, but your work should channel all that you learn from reading and rhetorically analyzing great love and effective break-up letters.
4. You’ll build on our newfound appreciation for relationship rhetoric by working with a team to kick off our collective effort to synthesize at set of supplied “documents” and provide a fellow BTW student with relationship advice. More on that in class.
5. You’ll turn in all your work via this week’s Google form, due by 10 p.m. Sunday evening, 1.10.21. TWENTY-ONE! So glad to be moving forward!

I look forward to seeing you on Zoom this week on Tuesday/Wednesday (juniors) and Thursday/Friday (sophomores)!

So…the turkey is eaten, Black Friday is in the books, Cyber Monday happens any second. No doubt about it, the holidays are here — and with them, the perennial question that has haunted mankind for close to a couple of hundred years, and will serve as our guiding query the next three weeks: “Is there really a Santa Claus?”

It’s a question the New York Sun famously attempted to answer in 1897 in the world’s most reprinted editorial in the world, the iconic “Yes, Virginia, There IS a Santa Claus,” a piece that has appeared in dozens of languages and is referenced in movie after movie. and it’s a topic that has routinely obsessed historians, theologians and pop-culture enthusiasts f0r centuries. And this month, it falls to you and a team of your peers to debate and decisively answer.

Over the next three weeks, you’ll work with a group on a research-centered debate to determine the existence of Santa Claus; you’ll write the you’ll learn a lot about logical fallacies (and ideally learn how to avoid them); and you’ll work independently to write an essay arguing the other side of case you’re assigned to make.

Nov. 29-Dec. 20:  The Big Debate

During the first week of December, I’ll assign you to a team of your classmates, and to the “Yes, There Is A Santa Claus” Team or “No, There is NO Santa Claus” side of the debate. Then, working with your team, you’ll build your research-supported primary case answering this burning seasonal question.

The requirements?

Most scholars consider Jonathan Swift’s  “A Modest Proposal For Preventing the Children of Poor People in Ireland from Being a Burden to Their Parents or Country, and for Making Them Beneficial to the Public” (1729)  to be the most brilliant satire ever written, addressing as it does the injustices the English had heaped upon the poor Irish — in particular, poor Irish catholics — for centuries. In the nearly 300 years since its publication, “A Modest Proposal” has inspired countless films (including this short offering out of Norway, numerous rock songs and a rap version) and, quite recently, served as the subject of a BBC podcast that should listen to at least the first 10 or so minutes of before you engage in your project work this week and next.

A complete and extremely effective Aristotelian argument, Swift’s satirical work still looms large, regularly making its way into modern-day political headlines — most notably, perhaps, a decade or so ago when Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich suggested that schools could save money by replacing their custodial staffs with their poorest students. The quintessential example of Juvenalian satire,  Swift’s hyperbolic essay suggests that the impoverished Irish might ease their economic troubles by selling their children as food to rich gentlemen and ladies — in the process mocking heartless attitudes towards the poor as well as British policy toward the Irish in general. Published anonymously, “A Modest Proposal” sparked outrage in England and Ireland by readers who failed to appreciate his satiric intent — and at least one of his contemporaries turned the tables, suggesting that the proposal would be a way he could alleviate a debt he owed Swift.

Between now and the start of the Thanksgiving break, we’ll be working with satire generally and Swift’s essay specifically, collaborating in groups to identify all nine components of our classical, Aristotelian argumentative structure in his work as well as a late-breaking 10th component, digression;  we’ll examine the key elements of satire and examine a view brief video and printed satires to understand and hone our analytical vocabularies; and you’ll work — either solo or with a group of your choosing  — to make a commercial or advertising poster inspired by Swift’s classic essay.

Assignments for This AND Next Week

FIRST: Plan on attending class every day on Zoom — cameras on — for this week and next. There’s a lot to learn between now and the break, and it’s critical that you come. I’ll be taking grades on survey and groupwork in class, so DON”T MISS! We’ll start by reviewing this basic introduction to satire, then working our way together  through the materials in this unit to build our academic vocabulary for analyzing and writing about satire.

SECOND: Click through and read all the materials linked in this post, above. “A Modest Proposal” is an essential part of our Western canon of literature, so you’ll want to understand it completely. It WILL come up again in college English, history and economics classes. You may wish to add some of your learnings to your annotation of the text.

THIRD: Select a group of up to 4 partners — or opt to work alone if you prefer — on a video commercial  or electronic poster for a product, idea, or social concept inspired by Swift’s essay. Opt for the commercial, and you’ll need to upload your work to YouTube, make it viewable so I can take a look, and provide me with a link when you’re done; opt for an electronic poster, and you’ll create your work in Canva,then share it with me.

Some things to consider as you decide how you’ll work and who you’ll work with: 

• It’ll be challenging to get together for a video shoot — and there’s no need to include yourself or members of your group in the video you create; you can collaborate remotely using video shot separately, stock footage, stock sound, etc.
• Carefully consider your action plan. Make sure you can work with the people you choose to work with. Pick your unreliable friend, and you’ll be stuck with the lion’s share of the work. Elect to work alone, and you may end up feeling a bit overwhelmed.
• As you commit to a plan, IMMEDIATELY set up your systems for communicating and collaborating.

Your requirements for either deliverable:

1. In a comment at the bottom of this post (pro tip: everyone needs to comment individually to get credit), list the names — properly spelled and capitalized — of all members of your group, or tell me that you’ll be working alone. If you elect to work in a group, everyone in your group must participate equally and be able to explain their specific role in the project.
2. Your project must be CLEARLY inspired by Swift’s satire in an immediately obvious way.
3. Your submission MUST include every part of the Aristotelian argument — and every one of Townsel’s required writing elements — to persuade your audience to do something specific — for example, buy a product, support a cause, join a group. It’s up to you, but from exordium to peroration, appositive phrase to power sandwich, ethos to pathos, it all needs to be there.
4. If you use graphics, video, sound our sources that aren’t your own work, you need to credit every bit of what isn’t you or your group’s original work or brainwave.
5. You’ll submit the link to your group’s work in this week’s Accountability Check and Reflection form, linked below in Part 4.

FOURTH: When you’ve completed the project, a) go to Flipgrid and report back individually on what you’ve learned about satire, generally, and your role in completing your project, specifically, then b) hit this week’s Accountability google form and work your magic.

Complete the form, and you’re free to enjoy a worry-free Thanksgiving...unlike our small friend, below…