Unit 1: Cultures in Conflict
In this unit, students will examine social issues of global significance through the application of the feminist and sociological approaches to literary analysis. Students will read a variety of shorter works of both fiction and nonfiction, as well as longer texts. They will examine social commentary and satire to study an issue in contemporary society. Students will compose a response to an AP-style essay prompt describing and analyzing a character's response to conflict caused by a cultural collision such as societal expectations and gender roles.
Text options: A Doll's House, How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents, The Joy Luck Club, Purple Hibiscus, The Stranger
Unit 2: Making Meaning Through Transformation
In this unit, students will develop an understanding of how an author draws on or transforms source material in literary texts and spend significant time analyzing the representation of a subject in differing mediums. Students will consider the author's use of literary elements including point of view, setting, dialogue, mood, manipulation of time, structure, allusion, archetypes, irony, and theme. Students will compose an argument to analyze how two artistic mediums draw on and transform a text from the unit.
Text options: Crime and Punishment, The Inferno, Metamorphosis
Unit 3: Systems of Oppression and Voices of Hope
In this unit, students will examine the effects that oppression has on individuals and how people respond to dehumanizing circumstances through hope, survival, and rebelion. Students will examine how authors develop similar themes by studying the literary concepts of perspective, character motivation, and theme. Analysis of informational texts will allow student to gain historical insight to deepen understanding of major works read. Finally, students will compose an essay synthesizing multiple sources to defend, challenge, or qualify a writer's claim on an issue.
Text options: A Long Way Gone, In the Time of the Butterflies, Night
Unit 4: Fate or Free Will?
In this unit, students read works of fiction to analyze how authors develop themes through tragic, complex characters while using literary devices such as irony, foil, point of view, and symbolism. Students will read various texts using the critical approaches. Finally, they will compose an analysis of the psychological state of a chosen character citing from researched sources and discussing the character's role in the thematic development of the work.
Text options: Oedipus, Siddhartha, Things Fall Apart
Click on the image above to see the Table of Contents for the Collections Grade 10 anthology.
Note: The BCPS ELA curriculum provides teachers and students with choices that allow for personalized, responsive, and engaging instruction. Students should read the majority of the unit's novel-length work(s) outside of class time. The suggested unit sequences and text options may vary.