AP English Literature & Composition Teacher: Mary Corey

Classroom Overview

Ms. Corey

Stepping into the classroom, I first gazed upon the diverse rows of desks that took up most of the classroom’s space, where there were two distinct sections of desks facing each other on opposite sides of the room as if they were always prepared for conversation and interaction.

Here, students are able to choose where they would like to sit as long as interactions amongst certain students don’t cause any disruptions to the lectures or during work time, and seating arrangements are consistently being changed throughout the year to be able to have more opportunities to converse and work with new people.

Along the walls and practically scattered around the classroom were numerous artistic creations made by students in all of Ms. Corey’s classes from previous years and even the current school year, which had made the space more lively and a colorful landscape that was welcoming to walk into.

This is especially the case on the left side of the classroom that displayed a majority of the students’ artistic creations, where it was entirely covered by them that almost seemed endless and showcased how creative students can be when actively engaging in literature not only for this specific class but also for Ms. Corey’s other classes too.

Moving further into the room, I came across the front of the classroom, which had displayed a white projector screen in the middle of the wall with whiteboards next to it that exhibited both the date with its respective event as well as the timelines of agendas for each class Ms. Corey taught such as AP English Literature and 10th Grade English. This allows students, especially those in AP English Literature, to be able to have a full grasp at what’s to come for the next week or two in the class in order to be more prepared on doing the work and assignments when the day for them finally comes or even be more prepared on doing them even before the day happens as it also does tend to act like a timeline of due dates for assignments too.

For class, most days are spent with Ms. Corey lecturing on the assigned works of literature given to students to discuss and analyze in preparation for the AP test in May. For some literary works, they take longer to digest and analyze like the books that are read for the class, so there tends to be more and longer assignments for them in order to have better understanding of them to be able to potentially use them when writing part of the FRQ portion of the AP test.

It is usually these periods where students work in groups for the whole class period to work on these longer assignments (as well as for shorter assignments at times when doing shorter literary works like short stories) and discuss amongst one another rather than lectures for a majority of the class time as I witnessed in this specific class period. It’s important that students are able to grasp and understand the literary works being assigned to them in order to not only prepare for the in class essays that are assigned to practice for the AP test, but also to prepare for that test in general as well if they decide to take it.

Overall, AP English Literature is a class that’s worth taking if you want to be challenged by literature or simply want to improve your literary analysis skills. After all, a lively and active environment consisting of constant collaboration from your peers practically encourages improvement in that department, and if you’re especially interested in topics like death, despair, and darkness, then this class is perfect to suit your tastes.