3rd Year Program: World History & British Literature

PLEASE NOTE: 8th graders entering North Fork School programs will start in the 2nd Year program. The 3rd Year comprises a ninth-grade curriculum that feeds directly into 10th grade English II. Students beginning North Fork School English classes do not typically have the skills to begin in the 3rd Year. Exceptions will only be made for years in which the 2nd Year Program is not offered.

3rd Year English (grades 8 & 9) hones literary analysis through more in-depth development of essay forms, beginning again with paragraphs using citations (comparative descriptive, evaluative, interpretive, satire), timed essays (using citations, as in short exam essays, and SAT timed essays without revision), and an increasing focus on developing essays beyond the formulaic five-paragraph essay form. Students must complete at least 36 revisions and 6 peer edits each Quarter.

Typical 3rd Year students will complete 31 pieces, each comprising 5-10 drafts, for a total of 155-310 pieces of writing, just in English class, during the school year.

Reading in the 3rd year comprises British authors who affected ideas during the period from 1450 to 1950. Selections from Sir Thomas More's Utopia, Thomas Hobbe's Leviathan, and John Locke's essay, Of Civil Government, reveal Man's view of humanity and how it has shaped the world; Well's story, The Time Machine, Swift's Gulliver's Travels, Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, and George Orwell's Animal Farm all continue variations of this theme.

Shakespeare's exploration of human nature adds yet another element to our understanding of history in the third year. Beginning with a comedy, either As You Like It, or Taming of the Shrew, we read selected sonnets; Romeo and Juliet; Henry IV, Part I; Henry V (film); Othello; and The Tempest. Our study of poetry and satire includes the "Metaphysical" poetry of Donne, Marvell, Herbert, Herrick, Crashaw, & Vaughn.

Required written pieces include:

1st Person Narratives
A satire paragraph
An application essay
Five timed essays, some SAT format, and some using quotations from a text or a poem (short exam essays)

Four poem forms specific to 3rd Year >>> 5 Heroic Couplets; Sonnet; Paradox; Synesthesia

A Master Schedule detailing the use of all time each week, and locating available slots even in the busiest schedules
March Self-evaluations on time management and progress since September

Six different analytical paragraphs (3 descriptive/comparative of characters in a Shakespeare play, 2 interpreting the political philosophy of writers Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, one interpretive on H.G. Wells' themes in The Time Machine)

Three eight-paragraph essays on:

Romeo and Juliet, Bible selections, and The Masque of the Red Death (essay citing a play, Bible verses and a short story on the theme of creating Utopias)
Metaphysical poets or Shakespeare's sonnets (essay citing poetry and class notes)
One final exam essay incorporating novels (Brave New World; Animal Farm) and short stories.

Pink poetry (Free verse; figurative language) if unfinished from 1st Year
Green poetry (figurative language, rhythm, rhyme, meter) if unfinished from 2nd Year

Blue poetry: uniting meter with free verse or other verse structures >>> five metered poems, including: Interpreting poetry; two nature poems; Ballad; Narrative

A personal SKILLS LIST, which contains 60-75 stylistic and grammatical writing skills by the end of the 3rd Year