This course is recommended for students entering Grade 6 or 7. We recommend that students enroll in Language Arts courses at grade level.

An ancient island has been found, and a protected secret is buried under its sand!

Much like real-life archaeologists, students will be tasked with reconstructing a myth based only on material and literary archaeological evidence. Each day in class, students will study myths from around the world and investigate “ancient” artifacts recovered from a long-lost civilization. From shattered mosaics to fragments of ancient poems, students will embark on an adventure of a lifetime to reconstruct the mythic narrative hidden within the artifacts.

By taking this course, students will accelerate their core language arts skills, including:

• Advanced literary analysis: Students will become skilled readers of myth, learning to recognize the function and importance that these stories held for ancient societies. By analyzing and interpreting myths across a range of cultures, students will begin to understand how these ancient stories have influenced modern literature.
• Problem-solving and critical thinking: Each day, students will encounter a puzzling artifact from a fictional ancient society. Their task will be to use their critical thinking skills to form a hypothesis about what the artifact might have been, and how it might have fit into a larger set of values and beliefs held by the society.
• Creative writing: Over the course of this class, students will pull together their interpretations of all the artifacts they've examined and extrapolate a core myth of the ancient society they are studying — just as real archaeologists, literary scholars, and historians have done to figure out the myths of real ancient societies. Students will learn how to effectively implement literary devices typical of the myth-genre (e.g. hero’s journey plot, metaphor, anaphora, epithets, and more) to write their version of this myth.

All materials will be provided.

Reach out to us at virtual@aopsacademy.org for help on finding the right camp!

Our instructors hold classes virtually, in a small-sized (10-16 students) videoconferencing classroom. With a small class size, teachers can give individualized attention to each student, providing real-time verbal and written feedback and supporting students' growth as writers.

Our Language Arts summer courses do not include homework. Students receive frequent feedback on their writing and present their work throughout the course.

If you drop a summer course before the start of your first class session, we'll issue a full refund for the course tuition. No refunds will be issued for withdrawing from a summer course after the start of your first class session. We do not accept Language Arts book returns, since they are purchased from a third party.

Our summer course offerings meet five days a week, Monday through Friday. We offer this course in two timing formats. Both cover the same course material.

• The two-week course meets for 3 hours each day.
• The four-week course meets for 1.5 hours each day.