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In Arkansas, we have to have high school credit in speech/oral communication. (some may call it public speaking) Will HOD cover this in the high school guides? I know my oldest is only in 5th, but the realization she is entering middle school makes me feel like time is flying!!

I'm not sure about high school, but I know R & S English has already been a big help to my ds in this area! Wyatt just finished R & S English 4, and he learned so much about many oral language related skills. One of the earlier lessons was on speaking clearly, another was on choral reading, another on giving an oral book report, one more on giving an oral explanation to another person about how to do something step by step, and also lessons on telling a story, making introductions, and using the telephone. I had Wyatt stand up in front of Riley, Emmett, and I to give his presentations, and we went over all of the tips from the R & S English lesson as well. These lessons - along with oral narrations - are excellent preparations for high school speech. Wyatt also always stands up in front of all of us to recite his poetry he's memorized from HOD, and we often during family nights have the dc stand up in front of our family group and recite their Bible memory work. We do this in our living room, with all of us sitting around, while the child doing the presenting stands in front of the fireplace, and the use of a microphone is optional. I think it feels similar to a setting a person would give a speech. I just thought I'd share this, as I taught college speech for a few semesters as a TSA, and I feel like these early English lessons and experiences with speech topics provide practice and important skills for future speech skills. As far as the high school guides, they are not all planned out in detail as of yet, and I know Carrie is very busy working on RevtoRev right now, so this is one there may not be a set answer for right now. I hope something here helps though!

In Christ,
Julie

That's awesome! My first experience with speaking in front of others was in 10th grade oral comm class! It would be plenty easy to do a community college speech class if needed. We only need half a credit, and perhaps upper level R&S will be enough for that over 3-4 years of High school.

Just some encouragement. We are in AR also and have been homeschooling 11 years. If you are a true homeschooler (not virtual school) you do not have to have oral com for high school graduation. You may need it for the college you are looking at or possibly if you want to do the graduation ceremony with the Education Alliance (Not sure about that one). But, if you are awarding a diploma yourself the state does not require any specific courses. You can design your requirements as you see fit.

Thank you for that info!

Tamara,

The ladies have done a great job of answering your question. With our oldest son we are looking to use The Secret of Great Communicators for speech. I own it and like the looks of it. We will likely do it along with one of the American history years in high school. It has a DVD and a workbook and gives excellent examples of great speeches through history too. We'll see what we think of it, as to whether we go that route within our high school guides or not. We are thinking in that direction though.

Blessings,
Carrie

We are also using The Secret of Great Communicators with our oldest as well. I am scheduling that in for our next year.