Topics/2001
2001 USAD Topic: Understanding the Self
Next year’s overarching theme is “Understanding the Self.” This is the first year of a three-year framework on Dimensions of Understanding. (Years two and three are “Understanding Others” and “Understanding the Natural World” respectively.)
Once again, USAD will provide an integrated Academic Decathlon curriculum including curriculum guides in the subject areas plus the Resource Guide, music CD and ancillary materials.
USAD will be packaging their materials similar to the way they did last year to offer as many resources as possible for the lowest possible cost. They are reducing the cost of their primary curriculum materials and practice test materials by at least 10 percent.
Language and Literature
To further ease the cost and time required to participate in the program, there will only be one novel next year, which once again will be made available at a discount. The title and edition of the novel will be released with the Study Guide in mid-May. There will be six poems included in the Language & Literature Curriculum Guide.
The outline for Language and Literature: Reflections of the Self is as follows (percentages approximate):
Critical Reading: 20%
Novel: 50%
Poetry: 30%
Novel
- Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
Poems
- Sonnet 14 by John Donne
- Andrea del Sarto by Robert Browning
- There Was a Child Went Forth by Walt Whitman
- My Name and I by Robert Graves
- Theme for English B by Langston Hughes
- Mirror by Sylvia Plath.
Super Quiz
The Super Quiz theme is Concepts of the Self, Philosophy, Psychology, and Religion. Articles will focus on how the Self is viewed from multiple perspectives within these three disciplines. The Super Quiz topic fulfills social science next year so there will be no Social Science Event.
There will be approximately six articles per discipline. The outline for Concept of the Self is as follows (percentages approximate):
Philosophy: 33%
Psychology: 34%
Religion: 33%
Mathematics
The math curriculum is Mathematics: Gateways to Logical Thinking. The math outline is as follows (percentages approximate):
Logic and Set Theory: 24%
Numbers: 40%
Combinatorics and Probability: 24%
Applications: 12%
Science
The science curriculum is Science: The Biological Self. The science outline is as follows (percentages approximate):
Biology of the Cell (Building Blocks of the Self): 33%
Molecular Genetics (Defining/Creating the Self): 34%
The Immune System (Protecting the Self): 33%
Economics
The economics curriculum is The Economics of Business and Entrepreneurship. The economics outline is as follows (percentages approximate):
Fundamentals of Economics: 38%
Business Organizations: 38%
Profiles in Individual Enterprise: 24%
Art
The art curriculum is Art: Images of the Self. The outline is as follows (percentages and number of works approximate):
Fundamentals of Art: 20%
Artists, Background, Selected Works (18 works of art anticipated): 80%
Pieces
Paintings
- Fray Hortensio Felix Paravicino by El Greco
- Artist in His Studio by Rembrandt van Rijn
- Pat Lyon at the Forge by John Neagle
- Edmondo and Thérèse Morbilli by Edgar Degas
- La Japonaise by Claude Monet
- Madame Cézanne in a Red Armchair by Paul Cézanne
- In the Loge by Mary Cassatt
- The Daughters of Edward Darley Boit by John Singer Sargent
- Ellen Day Hale
- Postman Joseph Roulin by Vincent van Gogh
- Where Do We Come From? What Are We? Where Are We Going? by Paul Gauguin
- Portrait of a Woman by Pablo Picasso
- Schiele's Wife with Her Little Nephew by Egon Schiele
Sculptures
- Portrait of a Man from Rome (c. 50 BCE)
- Guanyin from China (c. 580 CE)
- Walking Woman (Femme qui Marche) and Annette, both by Alberto Giacometti
Masks
- Deangle from the Dan people
- Kifwebe from the Songye people
Music
The music curriculum is World Sacred Music: Sounds of the Soul. The music outline is as follows (percentages and number of music selections approximate):
Music Fundamentals: 20%
Selected Works, Artists, and Traditions (14 music selections anticipated): 80%
Songs
- El Melej by Alia Musica
- Al-'Ada by La Sulamiyya
- Wir setzen uns mit Tranen nieder by Netherlands Bach Society
- Bluebird Song by Lena Clark
- Quen a Virgen Ben Servira by Ensemble Alcatraz
- Nyamaropa yeVana Vava Mushonga by Muchatera
- Arrullo San Antonio by BMOSA
- Ngoma ra Mrongo from Kenya & Tanzania
- Kriti: Ninnadanela by Ramnad Krishnan
- Kecak by Music for the Gods
- Move on up a Little Higher by Mahalia Jackson
- O Magnum Mysterium by Choir of Westminster Cathedral
