English IV-SE

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Course Overview

Acellus English IV-SE focuses on providing students with a deeper understanding of the most important Language Arts concepts needed to succeed in life. It is particularly effective for Special Education students. Course topics include:

• Reading for Comprehension
• Organizing and Writing a Resume
• Overview of Types of Writing
• Persuasive and Scholarly Essays
• Research Papers
• Grammar and Vocabulary
• Making Effective Presentations
• Writing Opinions and Technical Papers
• Writing Reports
• Writing Effective Emails

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This course was developed by the International Academy of Science. Learn More

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Scope and Sequence

Unit 1 – Reading with a Purpose This unit discusses annotations of written words and of visuals, summarizing for the main point, comparing and contrasting for theme, author’s purpose, using context clues, and tone versus mood. Unit 2 – Resume This unit discusses the format and look of a resume, and the reasons for creating a resume, as well as the objective statement, summary, work and volunteer experience, selected achievements, specific skills and job training, school organizations, and references. Also covered are interview skills and thank-you notes. Unit 3 – Types of Writing This unit covers tips for writing under pressure, for discerning the actual assignment, and for writing a narrative story, a descriptive paragraph, a process essay, a definition, an illustrative piece, a compare/contrast paper, and a persuasive essay. Unit 4 – Persuasion This unit covers techniques of persuasion, including referring to an authority, using examples, predicting the consequence, and answering the opposition. Also included are writing a topic sentence and organizing and writing a persuasive piece, as well as audience and transitional expressions. Unit 5 – Scholarship Essay This unit discusses how to write a scholarship essay, including selecting a topic, the uniqueness of the topic, tips for keeping your essay within specified length limits while maintaining quality, focusing on a point, and writing to make your essay stand out among others. Unit 6 – Research Paper This unit covers how to write a research paper, including selecting and narrowing a topic; evaluating resources; taking notes; organizing a paper; writing a thesis statement, an introduction, and supporting paragraphs; quoting in your text; avoiding plagiarism; and using citations. Also discussed are point of view and appropriate language, sentence structure, using active versus passive voice, transition statements, the conclusion, and works cited. How to review and revise a research paper are also included. Unit 7 – Grammar This unit discusses punctuating quotations and citations, using commas, subject/verb agreement, semicolons, prepositional phrases, and parallelism. Unit 8 – Vocabulary This unit discusses commonly misspelled words and words that are commonly mistaken for each other, including a/an/and, accept/except, affect/effect, been/being, buy/by, it’s/its, know/knew/no/new, lose/loose, past/passed, quiet/quit/quite, rise/raise, sit/set, suppose/supposed, their/there/they’re, then/than, through/though, to/too/two, use/used, weather/whether, where/were/we’re, whose/who’s, and your/yours. Unit 9 – Presentations This unit covers making presentations, using PowerPoint, non-verbals, note-cards and pre-written speeches, movement, eye contact, and taking notes from a speech. Unit 10 – Practical Writing This unit discusses four practical types of writing with pertinent tips for each, including five steps for writing, topics for, and support of opinion writing; planning, clarity, brevity, simplicity, complexity, ambiguity, and verbs/voice in technical writing; types of, stages in, planning of, collecting/organizing information for, structure of, layout of, and illustrations in reports; and tone and subject lines in, limiting topics in, specifying a response to, and writing a personal versus a professional email.