313 Final

Dear Prospective Language Arts Teachers, I write to you with a request for help. Last year, our school did not meet Annual Yearly Progress in accordance with the national No Child Left Behind legislation. Because of low attendance rates and Schools of Choice, which allows parents to remove their children from a failing school, our numbers have dwindled. As you can see from the attached Standards and Poors data, our writing scores are especially low in relation to the district and state. Our only hope is to improve our Language Arts program by establishing a rigorous curriculum that is also motivating for students. As pre-service teachers, you are poised on the boundary between the world of students and the world of educators. Who better to advise us as we decide what is of value in our Language Arts curriculum? Below are two resolutions we are considering for Grades 9 and 10 as part of this revision process. We hope you will take the time to share your suggestions and your reasoning with us. For your reference, we have attached a list of our last year’s required curricular texts for these grade levels. •

Resolution 1: Writing curriculum will emphasize timed writing to commonly-used test prompts

•

Resolution 2: Grade levels will adopt common writing assignments and standardized rubrics

Thank you for your input; we look forward to your responses! Sincerely, Sherry Michaels Vice-Principal Detroit Area Middle/High School ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Detroit Area Middle/High School▪2009 Spartan Street▪Detroit, Michigan 40780

From http://www.schoolmatters.com/...

9th grade required texts, 2004-2005 Animal Farm - Orwell Antigone - Sophocles Fahrenheit 451 – Bradbury Of Mice and Men - Steinbeck Romeo and Juliet – Shakespeare 10th grade required texts, 2004-2005 Macbeth - Shakespeare The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Twain The Crucible - Miller The Great Gatsby - Fitzgerald