Language Arts
Language Arts Department
The Language Arts curriculum at VermontCommons School is integrated: Students concurrently read literature, write creatively and analytically, and study grammar and the mechanics of writing. The course work focuses on developing students' critical thinking and writing skills.
The literature that students study is organized by ecological themes that reflect and explore relationships between people and their environment. Students read a variety of genres (drama, novels, essays, shortstories, poetry), which are both canonical and contemporary. While reading a text, students write journal entries and analytical responses, as well as craft a creative piece of writing that is similar in genre or theme to the text's theme. Students give and receive feedback from their peers, as they develop a piece of writing over a three-week block. In the Spring Semester, students share an excerpt from their work at an Evening of Student Readings.
Place as Identity
7th Grade
During the course of the 7th grade year, students consider the role of the environmentin shaping characters. How does Matt's understanding of the woods through the eyes of his friend Attean help him come of age in The Sign of the Beaver? Does the forest forever alter Demetrius in A Midsummer Night's Dream? Does the island cause Jack to turn savage in Lord of the Flies? The dynamic relationship between people and their landscape is also explored through creative writing course projects and analytical responses. Finally, this course stresses a foundational understanding of the eight parts of speech, punctuation, sentence patterns, and the mechanics of paragraph building inorder to develop the tools necessary to write clearly.
Animals and Myths
8th Grade
Exploring literature ranging from Greek mythology, to beast fables, to Native Americantales, the course asks students to explore a number of questions, including how animals serve as symbols for human personality types and how the structure of myths contribute to their enduring appeal. Students read tales of trick-playing rabbits, of power-hungry pigs, of mouse-eating scientists, of children who live with wolves, of humans who transform into animals, and much more. Inaddition, students craft their own fables, short stories, and poetry, while continuing the study of grammar, including phrases, relative pronouns, and integrating quotations. This course also includes a focus on advanced vocabulary, literary terms, and the mechanicsof writing.
Travel Narratives / Away from Home
9th Grade
If travel encourages us to better understand our own homes and ourselves then sodoes this travel-themed class. Drawing from a variety of genres, the course explores travels into nature, travels intothe past, and travels through our imaginations, as well as more traditional journeys into other cultures and lands. A primary goal of the class is to reflect upon the importance of learning through encounters with difference. Typical texts of the class include The Odyssey, Travels with Charley, The Joy Luck Club, and A Walk in the Woods. Students craft their own travel narratives,as well as compose poetry and write a research paper. Students are introduced to the basics of essay writing and styles of documentation, while continuing their study of sentence patterns and grammar.
Rhetorical Strategies
10th Grade Fall Semester
The goals of the Rhetorical Strategies class are to instill an appreciation for and understanding of different rhetorical strategies, to enhance vocabulary and critical reading, and to develop confident and competent writers. Throughout this course, students read essays and stories that exemplify each of the strategies, and they acquire the skills necessary to compose their own descriptions, narrations, illustrations,comparisons, and arguments. They study and practice writing with varied sentence structures, different points of view, and a variety of tones. The Rhetorical Strategies class empowers students to express their ideas clearly in written form. Their mastery of different types of written communication is vital to becoming responsible, proactive members of the world community.
Genre Elective: Social Commentary
(Current Offering)
10th Grade Spring Semester
In the Social Commentary class, students study a variety of authors' responses to the political and social climates of their times. They read Jane Eyre, Hard Times, The Jungle, Death of aSalesman, and A Raisin in the Sun. Themes in this course relate to those in the students' social scienceclass; therefore, the Language Arts instructor and the Social Studies instructor collaborate to reinforce the ideas from different perspectives. Students discuss the Zeitgeist of the authors' times, and analyze the strategies they use to convey their stories. This course is intricately connected to the Rhetorical Strategies class, as the students now use their own strategies to write about the novels and plays.
Applied Literary Theory
11th Grade
Int his course, students practice applying different literary theories to classical texts, as well as to popular representations such as films. One of the goals of this class is to understand that meaning, at least literary meaning, depends heavily upon the theoretical approach that is applied. Another goal is to use theory to more fully understand ourselves, as well as the world around us. Our text, CriticalTheory Today, introduces students to the complex world of social and literary theory - a world that students will encounter repeatedly in their university studies. Theories covered include psychoanalysis, feminism, new criticism, structuralism, newhistoricism, postcolonial criticism, and African-American studies. Literary texts include The Great Gatsby,a Shakespeare play, canonical novels, and short stories by authors such as Chekhov, Faulkner, Flannery O'Connor, and Alice Walker.
Single Author Study
12th Grade Fall Semester
This course provides students with the opportunity for advanced study of a particular author's body of work. Building on knowledge of literary theory and analytical skills from last year's Applied Literary Theory course, students select a critical approach that they use to interpret the texts of an author of their choice. Students write a 10-15 page, college-level paper that supports a clear thesis, uses secondary sources, and exhibits a thorough knowledge of their author's work. In addition to their analytical paper, students write creatively in this course. In particular, they focus on a story that imitates their chosen author's style, tone, and syntax. At the end of this course, students sit before a panel of faculty members to defend their thesis paper in a presentation/discussion session that counts as their exam grade.
12th Grade Spring Semester
Genre Elective: The Postmodern Memoir
(Current Offering)
In this course, students explore the paradox of the post-modern cultural period and the genre of memoir. In addition to reading, listening, and responding in writing to postmodern memoirs by authors such as David Sedaris and Dave Eggers, students compose their own memoirs, reflecting on their school years and their experiences with friends, foes, and family. Students follow the guidelines specified in "How to Write a Memoir" by William Zinsser; they journal fourtimes a week, recording memories, while working towards assembling their pieces into a larger work, unified by a theme. By the end of the course, students are familiar with postmodern devices such as irony, playfulness, black humor, pastiche, intertextuality, metafiction, temporal distortion, technoculture and hyperreality. In addition, students cull their memoirs and revise to produce their own memoir with the aid of peer and teacher feedback.