Shannon L. Ortiz
This unit will be taught to juniors enrolled in Honors 11 English, and Advanced Placement English Language and Composition. Cooperative Arts and Humanities High School is a college preparatory magnet school. In order to enroll in an Honors course, students must have a B- average or higher previously in that academic field. Consequently, my unit will be taught to highly motivated students, who work well independently and cooperatively. Because of this, students will do most of the reading at home and are expected to come to class prepared to have scholarly discussions about the reading. Students are encouraged to think outside the normal parameters when learning in order to become independent thinkers and learners.
Additionally, this unit could be taught to all level juniors. The reading material is not difficult so that students can focus on analyzing and examining the experiences of each artist rather than attempting to interpret difficult language. This will become very resourceful for teaching classes in urban districts where many struggling readers tend to be Hispanic students with deficiencies in English. These students can then read through the material and still exhibit critical thinking and analytic abilities.
Currently, Cooperative Arts and Humanities High School consists of 450 students with a ratio of 7 to 1 girls to boys. Classroom sizes are approximately 22 students. Coop school is an arts magnet school and all students study traditional academics along with either theater, dance, creative writing, visual arts, strings or choir. Students choose one of these art disciplines and continue studying and practicing it for their entire high school career. Students are encouraged to work across academic and artistic lines and must complete an interdisciplinary project during their senior year in order to graduate. Because of this, students are expected to evaluate both written and visual texts in order experience all types of literature. This includes introducing students to the social and historical climate during the time the literature was written in. Additionally, to promote artistic expression, students will create an artistic piece created based on Gardner's Multiple Intelligences for this unit. This will allow students to incorporate literature with their art discipline.