Students will be introduced to the expectations for the course, going over classroom rules, the course schedule, and assignments before having an opportunity to introduce themselves. In this class, the main focus will be going over the larger assignments and selecting books for their analysis over the twelve weeks. I will go through the list of selections with students in class. It will be up to the students to make a selection and acquire at least one of their chosen books after this first week 

 students will start reading their first selection and decoding what is being presented to them. First, we will discuss common character types and how they influence the narrative, including protagonist, antagonist, static, and dynamic. We will further discuss in class ways to consider the setting of a piece, examining the surrounding environment, background, historical place in time, and geographic location. 

 Students will discuss points of view and tone to unpack more about the narrative and messaging of a piece. We will discuss strategies for analyzing tones, such as read-aloud, language use, and literary structure. Further, we will spend the bulk of the class discussing how to efficiently track the plot of a narrative and how to identify major plot points and eliminate excessive detail. Students will cover effective summarization strategies and note-taking for literary works. 

 Week 4 focuses entirely on the use of figurative language, with much in-class practice identifying and using this style of language. Language covered includes simile vs. metaphor, hyperbole, personification, onomatopoeia, allusions, idioms, symbolism, alliteration, irony, sarcasm, and more.