Thoreau’s concept of civil disobedience has been labeled “idealistic” and “unrealistic” by many of his critics, and yet we can point to people like Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. as individuals who took his philosophy and successfully used it as a model for social change. What aspects of Thoreau’s argument do you find most interesting or inspiring and do you believe those elements are a realistic avenue for change in the modern world? Cite specific examples when writing any of your posts. (Respond with at least 1 initial post of no less than 10 sentences and 2 response posts of no less than 5 sentences by 7:50 AM, TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 5.)
SENIOR BLOG POST #16: Love and Fear
This prompt is a fairly straightforward one… or is it? Is it better to be feared or loved? Using examples from Machiavelli’s “The Prince” as well as real-world examples, defend your response to this question. Please respond with 1 initial post of no less than 10 sentences and 2 response posts of no less than 5 sentences by 7:50 AM on the due date.
Recommended / Required Reading Lists
Here you go folks. Both lists with their headings so you know which is which.
JUNIOR / SENIOR RECOMMENDED READING LIST
This list of authors and their accompanying works is a list that you may use to choose your Free Read books. You are not required to read any of these books, though these are authors and books that I have either enjoyed (I’ll put a * next to my favorites) or had recommended to me by friends and colleagues. I make no guarantees that these books will not contain objectionable material in them. Each person has their own threshold for what they consider appropriate, and I will leave that decision-making process up to you. Also, there are some books that are a part of a series and should be read in a certain order. I also leave that up to you to explore. That being said, here is my list of recommendations.
Adams, Douglas
Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, The*
Life, the Universe, and Everything
Mostly Harmless
Restaurant at the End of the Universe, The
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish
Bass, Rick
Sky, the Stars, the Wilderness, The
Where the Sea Used to Be
Brooks, Max
World War Z*
Brooks, Terry
Sword of Shannara*
Elfstones of Shannara
Wishsong of Shannara
Magic Kingdom for Sale – Sold!*
Black Unicorn, The
Wizard at Large
Brown, Lester
Plan B
Bryson, Bill
Lost Continent, The
Walk in the Woods, A*
In a Sunburned Country*
Buffett, Jimmy
Tales from Margaritaville*
Salty Piece of Land, A
Chabon, Michael
Wonder Boys*
Douglas Coupland
Generation X
Shampoo Planet
Girlfriend in a Coma
Miss Wyoming
Cory Doctorow
Little Brother*
Neil Gaiman
American Gods*
Fragile Things
Anansi Boys
Laura Hildebrand
Unbroken
Seabiscuit: An American Legend
Nick Hornby
High Fidelity*
About A Boy*
How to be Good*
A Long Way Down
Stephen King
Tommyknockers, The
Misery
It*
Stand, The*
Nightmares and Dreamscapes
Chuck Klosterman
Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs*
Killing Yourself to Live
IV
Christopher Moore
Lamb*
Douglas Rushkoff
Ecstasy Club*
Richard Russo
Empire Falls
Tim Sandlin
Skipped Parts*
Sorrow Floats
Social Blunders
Western Swing
Honey Don’t
Michael Shaara
Killer Angels, The*
Jeff Shaara
Gods and Generals
Last Full Measure, The
Rising Tide, The
Steel Wave, The
No Less Than Victory
J.R.R. Tolkien
Hobbit, The*
Lord of the Rings, The*
JUNIOR / SENIOR REQUIRED READING LIST
Each work is listed by title, followed by the author’s name in parentheses. If there is a number in brackets listed after the title, that is the number of times this work has been referenced in the AP Literature test since 1971. Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man is number one overall, with 25 references. Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights comes in second with 20 references. There are 21 works overall with 10 references or more.
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The (Mark Twain) [14]
All the King’s Men (Robert Penn Warren)
Alias Grace (Margaret Atwood)
American Tragedy, An (Theodore Dreiser)
Angels in America (Tony Kushner)
Anna Karenina (Leo Tolstoy)
Antigone (Sophocles)
As I Lay Dying (William Faulkner) [10]
As You Like It (William Shakespeare)
Awakening, The (Kate Chopin) [11]
Beloved (Toni Morrison)
Billy Budd (Herman Melville) [11]
Bleak House (Charles Dickens)
Bless Me, Ultima (Rudolfo Anaya)
Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
Candide (Voltaire)
Catch-22 (Joseph Heller) [12]
Catcher in the Rye, The (J.D. Salinger)
Ceremony (Leslie Marmon Silko) [11]
Cherry Orchard, The (Anton Chekhov)
Color Purple, The (Alice Walker)
Cry, The Beloved Country (Alan Paton)
Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoevski) [16]
Crucible, The (Arthur Miller)
Death of a Salesman (Arthur Miller)
Doctor Faustus (Christopher Marlowe)
Doll’s House, A (Henrik Ibsen)
Don Quixote (Miguel de Cervantes)
Enemy of the People, An (Henrik Ibsen)
Equus (Peter Shaffer)
Ethan Frome (Edith Wharton)
Farewell to Arms (Ernest Hemingway)
Faust (Johann Goethe)
Frankenstein (Mary Shelley)
Gathering of Old Men, A (Ernest Gaines)
Glass Menagerie, The (Tennessee Williams) [10]
Going After Caciato (Tim O’Brien)
Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
Great Expectations (Charles Dickens) [17]
Great Gatsby, The (F. Scott Fitzgerald) [12]
Go Tell It on the Mountain (James Baldwin)
Gulliver’s Travels (Jonathan Swift)
Hairy Ape, The (Eugene O’Neill)
Hamlet (William Shakespeare)
Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
Heart of Darkness (Joseph Conrad) [16]
Hedda Gabler (Henrik Ibsen)
Henry IV, Part 1 (William Shakespeare)
Henry IV, Part 2 (William Shakespeare)
House Made of Dawn (N. Scott Momaday)
Invisible Man (Ralph Ellison) [25]
Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte) [15]
Jude the Obscure (Thomas Hardy)
Julius Caesar (William Shakespeare)
Jungle, The (Upton Sinclair)
King Lear (William Shakespeare) [16]
Light in August (William Faulkner) [11]
Long Day’s Journey Into Night (Eugene O’Neill)
Lord Jim (Joseph Conrad)
Macbeth (William Shakespeare)
Madame Bovary (Gustave Flaubert)
Major Barbara (George Bernard Shaw)
Mayor of Casterbridge, The (Thomas Hardy)
M. Butterfly (David Henry Wang)
Medea (Euripides)
Merchant of Venice, The (William Shakespeare)
Middlemarch (George Eliot)
Moby Dick (Herman Melville) [15]
Moll Flanders (Daniel Defoe)
Mother Courage and Her Children (Berthold Brecht)
Mrs. Dalloway (Virginia Woolf)
Mrs. Warren’s Profession (George Bernard Shaw)
Murder in the Cathedral (T.S. Eliot)
My Antonia (Willa Cather)
Native Son (Richard Wright) [10]
Native Speaker (Chang-Rae Lee)
1984 (George Orwell)
Obasan (Joy Kogawa)
Oedipus Rex (Sophocles)
One Hundred Years of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
Othello (William Shakespeare)
Passage to India, A (E.M. Forster)
Paradise Lost (John Milton)
Piano Lesson, The (August Wilson)
Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
Portrait of a Lady (Henry James)
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (James Joyce) [12]
Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
Pygmalion (George Bernard Shaw)
Raisin in the Sun, A (Lorraine Hansberry)
Remains of the Day, The (Kazu Ishiguro)
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (Tom Stoppard)
Scarlet Letter, The (Nathaniel Hawthorne) [12]
Sister Carrie (Theodore Dreiser)
Slaughterhouse Five (Kurt Vonnegut)
Song of Solomon (Toni Morrison)
Sound and the Fury, The (William Faulkner)
Streetcar Named Desire, A (Tennessee Williams)
Sula (Toni Morrison)
Sun Also Rises, The (Ernest Hemingway)
Tale of Two Cities, A (Charles Dickens)
Tempest, The (William Shakespeare)
Tess of the D’Urbervilles (Thomas Hardy)
Their Eyes Were Watching God (Zorah Neale Hurston) [11]
Things Fall Apart (Chinua Achebe)
To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
To the Lighthouse (Virginia Woolf)
Tom Jones (Henry Fielding)
Trial, The (Franz Kafka)
Turn of the Screw, The (Henry James)
Twelfth Night (William Shakespeare)
Typical American (Gish Jen)
Waiting for Godot (Samuel Beckett)
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf (Edward Albee)
Wide Sargasso Sea (Jean Rhys)
Winter’s Tale (William Shakespeare)
Wise Blood (Flannery O’Connor)
Women of Brewster Place, The (Gloria Naylor)
Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte) [20]
JOURNAL PROMPTS 2012-13: JUNIORS AND SENIORS
Instructions: Remember that each Journal entry should be 1 page, front and back, in your composition notebook. If your writing is large and takes up more space (e.g. 4-5 words per line), then you need to write a page and a half. All Journal prompts will be labelled as either Junior, Senior, or Juniors & Seniors. Due dates for Journal entries will be posted here.
Week 7: October 22-26
No Journals this week. Mr. Atkins will be grading journals and will hand them back as soon as they are graded.
Week 8: October 29-November 2
#8 – Juniors & Seniors – If you could vote in the upcoming election, who would you vote for for President and why? What issues are most important to you in deciding how you would vote?
#9 – Juniors & Seniors – Free write. Choose your own topic.
Week 9: November 5-9
#10 – Juniors and Seniors – What are the top 10 things on your bucket list (things you want to do before you die) and why?
#11 – Juniors and Seniors – Free write. Choose your own topic.
Week 10: November 12-16
#12 – Juniors & Seniors – Free write. Choose your own topic.
Journals # 8 – 12 are due no later than 10:20 AM on Friday, November 16. If you know you won’t be here on Friday you need to turn your journal in early. No exceptions!
Week 11: November 26-30
#13 – Juniors & Seniors – Free write. Choose your own topic.
Week 12: December 3-7
#14 – Juniors & Seniors – What are the 10 most important things you’ve learned in your life and why?
#15 – Juniors & Seniors – If someone walked up to you and gave you $1 million, what would you do with it and why?
Week 13: December 10-14
#16 – Juniors & Seniors – Free write. Choose your own topic.
#17 – Juniors & Seniors – What are your Top 10 favorite movies and why are they your favorites?
Journals # 13-17 are due no later than 10:20 AM on Friday, December 14. If you know you won’t be here that Friday you need to turn in your Journal before leaving the previous day. No exceptions!
JUNIOR HOMEWORK SCHEDULE 2012-13
UPDATED: April 4, 2013
2012-2013 JUNIOR HOMEWORK SCHEDULE
4TH 9-WEEKS
Thursday, May 2, 2013
– Combined class viewing of Death of a Salesman
Tuesday, May 7, 2013
– Read On The Road and be prepared to discuss in class.
Thursday, May 9, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATION WORK DAY
– Remember that Book Report #6 is due no later than Friday, May 10.
Tuesday, May 14, 2013
– Read The Things They Carried and respond to “JUNIOR BLOG POST #16: Telling a Good (‘True’) War Story” by 7:50 AM
– Last official day of class. Please bring any outstanding books or assignments to class with you to turn in.
Thursday, May 16, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
Tuesday, May 21, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
Thursday, May 23, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
Thursday, May 30, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
– END OF 4TH 9-WEEKS
Thursday, June 6, 2013
– Mr. Atkins’ son is due!
2012-13 SENIOR HOMEWORK SCHEDULE
LAST EDITED: April 4, 2013
As always, remember that this schedule will change throughout the year. Make sure to check back regularly, and I will attempt to notify you of any changes as far in advance as possible. If there is ever a discrepancy between the dates on the Homework blog and the dates listed on the actual blog posts, go with the date on the Homework blog. I will try to fix any differences I find as soon as possible.
2012-13 SENIOR HOMEWORK SCHEDULE
4TH 9-WEEKS
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
– IN-CLASS WORKDAY – MR. ATKINS HOME SICK
Monday, April 1, 2013
– NO SCHOOL – SPRING BREAK
Wednesday, April 3, 2013
– Complete “Hamlet: Who is to Blame?” Essay. Essay must be in MLA format and should be no less than 1 ½ pages. No sources required, but you should reference at least one event in the play for each point.
Monday, April 8, 2013
– NO CLASS – COUNTRY PROJECT WORKDAY
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
– NO CLASS – COUNTRY PROJECT WORKDAY
– Read pp. 1475-1483 (“The Renaissance in Europe”), and 1488-1502 (“Niccolo Machiavelli”, Selections from The Prince) in the NAWM and respond to “SENIOR BLOG POST #16: Fear and Love” by 10:20 this morning.
Monday, April 15, 2013
– NO CLASS – COUNTRY PROJECT PRESENTATIONS
– Remember to turn in your Literary Country Project Essay on the day of your presentation.
Wednesday, April 17, 2013
– NO CLASS – COUNTRY PROJECT PRESENTATIONS
– Remember to turn in your Literary Country Project Essay on the day of your presentation.
– Read pp. 1889-1987 (“The Enlightenment in Europe”), and 2027-2037 (“Jonathan Swift”, “A Modest Proposal”) in the NAWM and respond to “SENIOR BLOG POST #17: Baby – It’s What’s for Dinner!” by 10:20 this morning.
Monday, April 22, 2013
– NO CLASS – COUNTRY PROJECT PRESENTATIONS
– Remember to turn in your Literary Country Project Essay on the day of your presentation.
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
– Mr. Atkins will distribute assignment sheets for the final essay and go over them in class.
Monday, April 29, 2013
– Read pp. 2137-2147 (“Revolution and Romanticism in Europe and America”) in the NAWM .
– Read 1984 and respond to “SENIOR BLOG POST #18: Big Brother is Watching You!” by 7:50 AM.
Wednesday, May 1, 2013
– Read Brave New World and respond to “SENIOR BLOG POST #19: Sex, drugs…and then more sex and drugs – It’s a Brave New World!” by 7:50 AM.
Monday, May 6, 2013
– Environmental Science AP Exam
– Possible Flex Day (Depends on how many take the AP Environmental Science Exam)
– If this day is a flex day
Wednesday, May 8, 2013
– Calculus AB AP Exam; Calculus BC AP Exam
– Final day of class. Please make sure to bring ALL remaining textbooks with you to class to check back in. Final grades will be held for students who do not turn in or pay for ALL textbooks.
– Bring final writing assignment with you to class.
Monday, May 13, 2013
– NO CLASS – FINAL RESEARCH PRESENTATION WORKDAY
– AP Biology Exam; AP Music Theory Exam
Wednesday, May 15, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
– AP German Exam; AP U.S. History Exam
Monday, May 20, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
Wednesday, May 22, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
Monday, May 27, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
Monday, June 3, 2013
– NO CLASS – RESEARCH PRESENTATIONS
Wednesday, June 4, 2013
– END OF 4TH MARKING PERIOD
Friday, June 6, 2013
– Mr. Atkins’ son is due!
Mr. Atkins' English Blog 