English

Students acquire and apply the literacy skills necessary for success at the Upper School while studying cultural and literary content in fiction, mythology, poetry, drama and nonfiction from diverse cultures. Reading assignments help students build foundational comprehension and interpretive skills in annotation. Writing assignments, which include personal response and analytical modes, emphasize accuracy of interpretation based on validity of textual support and clarity of expression. Students use textual evidence to support claims, organize paragraphs around unified ideas, and develop clear and complete thesis statements. A cross-curricular project focuses on research, documentation, and public speaking skills and results in a research paper and a presentation.

These classes are designed to enable international students to succeed in their endeavors as they study in a foreign language. The emphasis of this program is the development and refinement of academic skills, particularly reading and writing, to ensure that their English skills are commensurate with their age and grade level. International students will be expected to meet the same demands and expectations as all Park School students. 

Students read various types of fiction and non-fiction including historical fiction, dystopian literature, biography, and memoir. These readings provide opportunities to strengthen vocabulary with activities designed so that students move from passive understanding to active use of target vocabulary.  They also provide ample opportunities for discussion and models for usage and styles of writing. 

This is a course accredited by the College Board and seeks to prepare students for success on the AP exam given in May. Aside from exam preparation, the course’s primary goal is to transform students into keen observers of the formalist aspects of a literary work and how they contribute to the work’s overall meaning. Students also work exhaustively on their writing skills, honing their ability to communicate their observations about the literature they read in a cogent, organized, and insightful way. 

It’s no accident that Stephen King is one of the world’s best-selling authors. He knows what scares us—it isn’t just kids and clowns—and he knows how to use words to invoke that fear in the same way a horror movie director uses lighting and editing. The literary genre known as “horror” has evolved since its beginnings. At the very core, the genre was designed to instill fear into people, by whatever means were thought necessary. Horror masters of the past were generally inspired in their work as they used subtlety and psychology to maximum effect, though more modern horror works rely on more overt attempts to scare. The horror genre is more complex than it may initially seem to be; lurking beneath the bloody surface are unique insights and commentaries on the human anxieties related to common themes of fear.

Though it represents only one of countless systems of religion and spirituality, the mythology of the Ancient Greeks continues to fascinate and influence Western culture today. But why? What is it about these myths that continue to resonate with readers today? In this course we will look at some of the most enduring stories of the Greek canon—stories of gods and humans, of heroes and monsters—and explore how myth helps us explain and explore the world around us. We will also examine critical and adapted works by contemporary writers as we build a shared vocabulary for talking about how Greek mythology continues to shape our world today.

This course will study the Harlem Renaissance, a period of incredible productivity and creativity among black artists and intellectuals between 1920-1940, centered in Harlem, New York. The course considers how concepts -- such as race; the New Negro movement; Jim Crow, segregation, and racism; so-called racial uplift and the Talented Tenth; the Great Migration; the Roaring Twenties, and Modernism were manifested in the works of art, literature, philosophy, film, and music of Harlem's artists and thinkers. Given that the Harlem Renaissance is not characterized by any one style, technique, or manifesto, we’ll pay special attention to connections among the artists in an effort to determine how and whether the Harlem Renaissance is a coherent and unified movement across the arts. 

This course explores the diverse and exciting body of literature by Native peoples of North America, a literary tradition that spans 500+ tribes/Nations, numerous reservations and Territories, and international boundaries. We will emphasize contemporary fiction and poetry by Native American writers from the U.S. and Canada, and we will occasionally fold in oral tradition and other genres to examine their thematic concerns and artistic value. Most importantly, we will think about how Native American writers imagine themselves; how they imagine identity, self, place, nature, and nation; and we’ll look closely at and think about celebration, ceremony, living cultures, cosmologies, and encounters.

This class is about writing.  It’s a way of being committed and motivated enough to take yourself seriously as a writer.  It is also about using writing as a routine, as a way to help you go through life and remain sane.  Creative writing stimulates creativity, improves your writing skills, teaches how to give and take criticism, and helps relieve stress.  The best writers do spend most of their time writing, but they also want to share their knowledge of writing too.  Listening to the advice of these writers, along with reading, sharing, and feedback is the best way to improve your writing.  

What is the role of sports in shaping identity while growing up?  How can sports be a mechanism to improve issues in our culture?  There is no single reason why sports exist in American culture.  For some, sports might be a mirror of society; for others, sports are an escape from the more mundane or uneventful aspects of your day. 

The purpose of this course is to develop independent, critical proficiency in the study of sports literature and other non-fiction works; in addition, fostering a high level of achievement in writing, reading, listening, viewing, and speaking for both college and career opportunities.  This course is a study of sport as portrayed through short stories, poems, essays, works of fiction and non-fiction, and other mediums whose central focus is sport. What are these stories saying about human nature, about life?  

In her 1980 essay, “The Lost Races of Science Fiction,” Octavia E. Butler lamented the pointed absence of non-white characters in sci-fi media. Butler was among the first prominent writers to tackle this issue directly, and since the 1980s, the genre has come a long way, giving a broad platform to authors representing an array of racial, cultural, and embodied experiences. This class looks at recent developments in sci-fi literature and asks the question, “how do multicultural perspectives add to, change, affirm, and subvert our expectations of a genre that has historically understood that white is the default color in space?”

This hybrid writing and literature course will explore the relationship between place, experience, and personal identity. How do places shape us? How do we impact our environments? How do we imagine beyond our own individual perceptions of time, scale, and embodiment? Over the course of the semester, students will read literature—particularly memoir, environmental non-fiction, and poetry—that grapple with questions like this. In turn, students will generate and workshop their own creative writing as they think critically and reflectively about their own place in the world. This course will make extensive use of Park’s 34-acre campus as a site of reflection and inspiration and ask that students engage in a multi-week creative writing project inspired by the work of Environmental Humanities scholar Lawrence Buell. The semester will culminate in a portfolio project and live reading of selected works.