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We are moving our 4 children to HOD this coming fall (with the hope that we can incorporate our 10th grader as well) - CTC for 7th gr, Beyond for 1st gr, and Little Hands for twin 2 year olds. However, I have a rising 10th grader and am looking for some suggestions from you for 10th grade. Because I love everything I've seen from HOD, I was hoping that you would (please, please) provide your recommendations for 10th grade. He is college-bound, completed Tapestry of Grace, Year 4 (1900 to the present) last year as well as Apologia's Physical Science. He also completed a speech and debate course.

I'm looking for your thoughts on the following for 10th grade: (a) would you recommend he do world history this year and what would you use; (b) we would just continue Rod & Staff book 7; (c) writing - what would you use; (d) what would you recommend for science/biology; (e) what would you recommend for writing; (f) how about government, economics, finance; (g) and what about literature; (h) what are your thoughts of taking a foreign language online or through our local college or do you have another recommendation; (i) recommendations on composers, art, etc.; (j) math we have covered; and lastly (k) do you have recommendations on subjects that would be important that I'm overlooking? I really value your feedback because of my fondness of everything I've seen in HOD. Thank you very, very much!!

By His Grace,
Theresa

I was thinking that being new to HOD, your 10th grader might be able to do Rev to Rev with extensions and maybe a bit more beefing up? It may simplify your search for curriculum It's also quite independent, which would allow you to focus on your younger kids. Perhaps Carrie or Julie can recommend some appropriate additions to make Rev to Rev worthy of grade 10. Oh, welcome to HOD

Theresa,

I'm late to the thread, and I apologize! I'm sporadic on the boards right now at best as I'm in the final push of the new guide.

In looking at what your son did this past year, I'm trying to think through how his high school sequence could be done. Since he did 1900-Present as a freshman that makes the decision a bit more interesting.

Your son will need a world history credit, so I'd be inclined to lean toward RTR to fulfill that. Then, the following year he could head into Rev2Rev and use that for the American History up to 1900 and add government too that year. The following year, he could either do the Modern Times guide (and add economics) or he could do the Geography guide, which will be new that year and add economics to that. Since he's already covered the Modern Times during his freshman year, I'd likely lean toward geography, but you could do either. This is because there is geography/mapping in each of our guides, so you could either do a full year of geography or award .25 of a credit each year of high school and earn the geography credit that way. The sequence I'm mentioning above would give your son a world history credit, an American history credit, .5 government credit, .5 economics credit, and a full geography credit by graduation.

If you did use RTR for his sophomore year, here's a link in how to make that high school worthy. Link: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=7240

I definitely think he could earn .5 of an art appreciation credit with any of the additions suggested in the thread linked above. In Rev2Rev he could earn the music appreciation .5 credit with the additions suggested in the beefing up Rev2Rev thread.

For writing, I would use Medieval History-Based Writing Lessons as scheduled with extensions in RTR. You would also continue on with Rod and Staff 7 as mentioned for part of that English credit too, which is what we recommend.

For literature study, depending on how much study your son has done, you could use DITHR. You would likely want to target your reading to give your son either a British literature credit or a world literature credit. I'd save American Lit. to do with Rev2Rev the following year. Here's a link on some possible titles that could be used with DITHR, just to get you thinking: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=7765&p=56997#p56997

If your son has already had quite a bit of literature study. You could look at doing one of Smarr's Lit. courses or doing LLATL Gold Brit. Lit., but doing some adjusting and adding to it. We used Smarr's Intro. to Lit., with some adjustments, for our son's 9th grade year and liked it quite well. You can do Smarr with or without the writing component. The lit. just becomes part of the English credit, but does need to reflect high school worthy reading material. There are more lit. suggestions in the RTR thread linked above.

For science, if your son is college bound, you'll want to do biology for his sophomore year. If you desire a very rigorous biology path, and your son is headed for a science-related major, then BJU seems to fit the bill best. It is VERY rigorous. If you desire a college prep. science path, but your son will likely not end up in a science-related field, then I'd look at pacworks Biology and consider adding Castle Heights biology labs to it. Other families use and love Apologia, so if that suits your son you could use that instead. We do not have a firm recommendation yet in Biology, as our oldest son is just headed into it next year.

Feel free to pop back and share your thoughts. I realize this advice has quite a bit of leeway in it, but you'll know best what will suit your son. I'm just discussing possibilities as we're still testing things with our own son.

Blessings,
Carie

Carrie, thank you so much for your reply!! I am very grateful for the time you took to respond to my post. You've given me some great leads on ways to use HOD for my 10th grader. I am off to work on seeing what I can pull together for him based on your recommendations. And thank you for giving me links to other notes on the board that I had not seen - they will also help as I try to piece it together. Do you have recommendations for Worldview curriculum for high school? I would really like it if my 10th grader would have the same opportunity as his younger siblings to work with HOD (even if it is his sophomore year! ). It's better late than never!! Thank you Lourdes for your recommendation as well!

There's A Haven wrote:Carrie, thank you so much for your reply!! I am very grateful for the time you took to respond to my post. You've given me some great leads on ways to use HOD for my 10th grader. I am off to work on seeing what I can pull together for him based on your recommendations. And thank you for giving me links to other notes on the board that I had not seen - they will also help as I try to piece it together. Do you have recommendations for Worldview curriculum for high school? I would really like it if my 10th grader would have the same opportunity as his younger siblings to work with HOD (even if it is his sophomore year! ). It's better late than never!! Thank you Lourdes for your recommendation as well!

I think you'll find Carrie's suggestions on how to beef up to work well for your sophomore. We didn't use HOD for high school, but what I pieced together was very similar to what Carrie suggested. It worked nicely (except I didn't have Carrie's awesome plans and recommendations ).

I don't if this is what you're referrint o in the bolded, but-- My ds adores Francis Schaeffer's How Should We Then Live? The Rise and Decline of Western Thought and Culture. He's read the book a couple times and watched the DVDs several times. The DVD series is available on YouTube too. It's, obviously, not a "curriculum", but it did really help my son see why the secular worldview isn't the Biblical one.

ETA: My ds just reminded me about Worldview Weekend books and DVDs. http://www.worldviewweekend.com/secure/store/index.php They might have something along the lines of what you're looking for. We have many of the DVDs and books in our church library. We didn't really use them as a curriculum, just watched together and discussed as a family.

Carrie- If this info is against board rules please feel free to delete. Just trying to give some ideas of things we've used.