Course Description
The honors English track begins with English 1 [Honors], a course which introduces students to great works of literature such as Shakespeare’s classic tragedy Romeo and Juliet, Mary Shelley’s Gothic novel Frankenstein, and Voltaire’s satire Candide. Throughout this course, students will learn to actively read, study, and analyze both fiction and nonfiction. Additionally, students will write essays and complete projects that meet a range of purposes in order to demonstrate their understanding of the concepts taught in the course.

Course Breakdown

“The Myth of Sisyphus” by Albert Camus
A Room of One’s Own by Virginia Woolf
“Prologue” by Anne Bradstreet
Haiku by Matsuo Basho and Issa Kobayashi
“Personal Helicon” by Seamus Heaney
“Dulce et Decorum Est” by Wilfred Owen
“For My People” by Margaret Walker
“Changgan Memories” by Li Po
“I Am Offering This Poem” by Jimmy Santiago Baca
“The Latin Deli: An Ars Poetica” by Judith Ortiz Cofer
“Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” by Wallace Stevens
“Romance Sonumbulo” by Federico García Lorca
“Ode to My Suit” by Pablo Neruda
“Musée des Beaux Arts” by W. H. Auden
“If You Forget Me” by Pablo Neruda
“Poetry” by Pablo Neruda
“When You Are Old” by William Butler Yeats
“The Second Coming” by William Butler Yeats
“Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night” by Dylan Thomas
“Ode on a Grecian Urn” by John Keats
“Cleis” by Sappho
“The Black Cat” by Rainer Maria Rilke
“The Swan” by Rainer Maria Rilke The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
“The Garden of Forking Paths” by Jorge Luis Borges
Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
“Any Human to Another” by Countee Cullen
“Patterns” by Amy Lowell
“The Battle of Agincourt” by William Shakespeare
“In Westminster Abbey” by John Betjeman
“Devonshire Street W1” by John Betjeman
Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare
Sonnet 130 by William Shakespeare
Sonnet 06 by William Shakespeare
Sonnet 02 by William Shakespeare
Sonnet 141 by William Shakespeare
Sonnet 97 by William Shakespeare

Course Goals
Write a research paper about a career.
Write a compare-and-contrast essay.
Read and analyze the literary elements of various poems and haiku.
Examine elements of various nonfiction texts. Examine the style, structure, and form of various sonnets by William Shakespeare.
Read and analyze the plot structure of The Metamorphosis.
Read and analyze Frankenstein.
Write a persuasive essay that convinces the audience to live in a particular neighborhood or city.
Write an essay that focuses on either the causes or effects of a specific environmental or health issue.