Writing II: Logic

OFFERED SUMMER 2024 AND 2024-2025

* Writing II is pre-requisite for most other Scriptorium courses *

  • Time & Tuition:
    • SUMMER 2024
      • Mondays, 10:00 am – 2:00 pm Eastern
      • Seminar with writing tutorial: $400
    • 2024-2025 ACADEMIC YEAR
      • Mondays, 10:30 am – 12:00 pm Eastern
      • Seminar with writing tutorial: $80 per month (10 months, August through May)
  • Location: Signal Mountain, Tennessee
  • Grades: 7th grade/rising 7th grade strong readers and up
  • Prerequisites: Writing I: Grammar, or equivalent writing skills
  • Description: This course provides an introduction to expository and persuasive writing along with instruction in logic, poetry, and basic research techniques. These skills form the basis of writing assignments for most other Scriptorium courses. Persuasive writing – based on classical rhetorical models – requires the student to know and be able to explain both why his own position is strong and why his opponent’s position is weaker. Students will gain skill in identifying and organizing evidence, crafting warrant statements, using concessions, and refuting counterarguments. These skills are essential not merely for effective academic writing but for thinking through complex issues in all areas of everyday life.
  • Assessment:
    • SUMMER: This writing intensive incorporates 2-3 class periods per day with lunch and walking breaks in-between. Morning sessions focus on close reading and outlining; afternoon sessions focus on revision, logic, and research. Most writing will be completed in class; students will have reading and final revision/editing homework. Because of the nature of the course, students should plan to attend every class period. All writing will be done by hand – computers, tablets, smartphones, and smartwatches should not be brought to class. The last class meeting will conclude with a brief practice Defense Day, which parents are welcome to attend.
    • YEAR-LONG: Students complete readings and daily-work/commonplacing. They also make weekly progress on various essays throughout the year; roughly eight essays are completed. In December and May, students present their best essays at Defense Day.
  • Books Needed:
    • Summer 2024 – Final book list will be posted by the end of the spring semester but will be similar to the following
    • 2024-2025 Academic Year – Final book list will be posted in mid-summer but will be similar to the following
      • The Art of Argument (Student Edition) – From Classical Academic Press <= Needed first week of class
      • Gwynne’s Grammar – ISBN: 9781984897961<= Needed first week of class
      • Ramon Lull, Book of the Order of Chivalry – ‎Boydell, ISBN: 978-1843838494 <= Needed first week of class
      • Euripides’s “Iphigenia among the Taurians” in ‎Bacchae and Other Plays – Oxford World’s Classics, ISBN: 978-0199540525 <= Needed first week of class
      • Chretien de Troyes, Arthurian Romances – Penguin Classics, ISBN: 978-0140445213
      • Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1 – Folger, ISBN: 9780743485043
      • Orczy, The Scarlet Pimpernel – Signet Classics, ISBN: 978-0451527622
      • Hope, The Prisoner of Zenda – Penguin Classics, ISBN: 978-0140437553
      • Lewis, Out of the Silent Planet – Scribner, ISBN: 978-0743234900
      • Lewis, Perelandra – Scribner, ISBN: 978-0743234917