2025-26 Course Descriptions - Catalog - Page 27
students access, share, and shape stories in ways
that honor empathy, curiosity, and creativity. Our
collective goal is for students to 昀椀nd meaning and
relevance in reading, to develop con昀椀dence in their
unique voices, and to value true self-expression over
AI-developed expedient work. Texts may include
Sharon Creech’s Walk Two Moons, Donna Barbra
Higuera’s The Last Cuentista, Alice Hoffman’s When
We Flew Away along with The Diary of a Young Girl
by Anne Frank, and more.
ENGLISH 8: NAVIGATING INDEPENDENCE
“Lord, what fools these mortals be (A Midsummer
Night’s Dream).” Building on English 7, students in
English 8 consider many big questions: How do we
make decisions as individuals? How is our decisionmaking impacted when we are responsible for
others? What power do we have when someone
else is making a decision for us? How can we avoid
becoming, as Puck famously observes, “fools”? To
respond to these questions, students recognize
the personal challenges literature presents to
readers, adding deeper critical reading, thinking,
and writing skills to compare and contrast
narratives. As students progress through a study
of major works, they build reading stamina, push
their abstract thinking, and develop higher order
analysis by grappling with multiple perspectives
in each text, investigating moral ambiguity, and
recognizing the importance of agency. By deeply
considering characters who 昀椀nd themselves lost,
alone, and independent, tracking their responses to
social pressures, personal motivations, and other
struggles, students realize that people are rarely all
good or all bad. Instead, everyone navigates their
independence as best they can. Texts may include
S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders, William Golding’s Lord
of the Flies, William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer
Night’s Dream, and more.
ENGLISH 9: WRITER’S WORKSHOP
This dynamic, student-driven, and project-based
course allows creativity and collaboration to
take center stage, inspiring a lifetime pursuit of
excellent writing regardless of format, adapting
to circumstances, audience, and purpose. This
workshop replaces formulaic essays with authentic,
engaging writing projects modeled on real-world
publications, developing pieces including pro昀椀les,
reviews, issue explorations, creative pieces and
more. Each unit links literary study with close
reading of exemplar articles, allowing students to
dissect how master writers convey meaning, shape
narrative, and articulate powerful personal ideas.
Working in several roles on a small team — Writer,
Editor, and Manager — students pitch original
ideas, develop drafts, give and receive meaningful
feedback, and polish their work for publication to
the school community. Along the way, they learn
to organize their thoughts, re昀椀ne their voice, and
cultivate writing habits that are thoughtful, creative,
and purposeful. With an emphasis on collaboration,
self-direction, and writing as a process, students
emerge as con昀椀dent communicators and critical
thinkers, valuing their authentic perspective and
voice over the expedience of AI-generated work,
understanding the joy and purpose of sharing their
voices with a real audience.
Curriculum Guide | 27
