English IV Course Overview

English IV continues to build on the sequential development and integration of communication skills in four major
areas—reading, writing, speaking, and listening. It most specifically focuses on deepening and furthering students'
understanding in the following ways:

• Reading–reinforces reading comprehension skills by teaching students comprehension techniques for literary
fiction, poetry, and drama, including discussion of common literary devices; shows students how to analyze,
evaluate, and interpret a text; reinforces awareness of the elements and structure of narrative and expository
prose; guides students through English literary history, including readings of Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Milton’s
Paradise Lost, Beowulf, Bunyan’s The Pilgrim’s Progress, and other selections of and excerpts from major
English literary figures.
• Writing–develops students’ writing skills by teaching about clauses and phrases in sentence structures;
reviews common sentence and paragraph construction errors and methods for avoiding them; teaches Greek
and Latin roots and prefixes to enhance vocabulary and spelling skills; expands students’ abilities to write
cohesive and coherent expository prose; gives students the opportunity to develop their abilities in writing
literary critiques, poetry, short stories, and expository prose.
• Listening–teaches effective listening comprehension skills, weaving these throughout the lessons; builds
upon students' study skills as well as helps them to become reliable and efficient note takers.
• Special Topics- incorporates research skills, including internet, library, and reference material use, throughout
the curriculum.

Curriculum Contents

Reading Comprehension Skills

• Context, Denotation, Connotation, and Symbolism
• Phrase Recognition Drills
• Reading Drama
• Reading Poetry—Reading Aloud and Recognizing Scansion
• Reading Skills—Analysis, Evaluation, and Interpretation
• Strategies for Comprehension—Making Inferences, Identifying Main Ideas, and Reading for Details
• Word Recognition Drills

Composition

• Diction Errors—Trite Expressions and Stilted/Vague Language
• Essays—Planning, Outlining, Writing, and Revising
• Sentence Construction Errors—Fragments, Dangling Construction, Parallelism, Reference, Agreement, and
Logical Errors
• Paragraph Construction—Coherence, Transition, and Unity
• Paragraph Construction Errors—Coherence, Transition, Shift in Person, Shift in Tense, and Shift in Number
• Subordination
• Writing a Brief Biography
• Writing about British History
• Writing a Character Study
• Writing a Character Sketch
• Writing a Compare/Contrast Essay
• Writing about Literary Forms
• Writing a Literary Critique
• Writing Poetry
• Writing about Poetry—Analysis, Interpretation, and Evaluation
• Writing a Short Story

Grammar and Usage

• Approaches to Grammar—Generative, Structural, Transformational, and Traditional
• Levels of Language Use—Slang and Colloquialisms
• Linguistic Theory
• Mechanics—Abbreviations, Capitalization, Hyphens, Italics, and Numbers
• Parts of Speech—Adjectives, Adverbs, Infinitives, Nouns, Pronouns, and Verbs
• Semantics
• Sentence Structure—Clauses, Conjunctions, Interjections, and Phrases
• Word Choice

Literature Studies

• Drama
  o Elements—Structure, Theme, Setting, Style, Character, and Literary Device
  o Genre/Type—Medieval Drama and Elizabethan Drama
• Fiction
  o Elements—Structure, Theme, Mood, Point of View, Character, Dialogue, Setting, Style, Satire, and
Literary Device
  o Literary Device—Alliteration, Allusion, Imagery, Metaphor, and Personification
• History of English Literature—from 1000-1800
• Poetry
  o Elements—Structure, Meter, Rhyme, Symbolism, and Subject Matter
  o Literary Device—Alliteration, Apostrophe, Assonance, Caesura, Consonance, Hyperbole, Kenning,
    Metonymy, Metaphor, Onomatopoeia, Paradox, Personification, Simile, Sprung Rhythm, and Synecdoche
  o Genre/Type—Sonnet, Dream Vision, Ballad, Elegy, Brenton Lay, Epic, Gnome, Free Verse, Blank Verse,
     Dramatic Monologue, Mock-Heroic, and Satire

Vocabulary Building
• Context Clues
• Etymology
• Greek/Latin Prefixes and Roots

Special Topics
• The Bible as Literature
• Listening Skills
• Origin/Development of Language—Old and Middle English
• Research Skills—Internet, Library, and Reference Materials
• Study Skills—Note Taking