A possible high school plan....

[water2wine]

My oldest is doing BJU physical science with DIVE. It is basically and intro to physics and chemistry. She likes it. I do not have her doing HOD science as well. She sometimes peeks though.

[Carrie]

MrsMandy,

I'm sorry it's taken a bit for me to get back to this thread. As you're pondering ideas, you had asked about DITHR for a 9th grader, for the literature portion. So, here is a link that will help you see how you could easily use that for a 9th grader for literature study if desired. Link: viewtopic.php?f=6&t=7765

The writing that will be within each of the guides actually would be good for your high school student. For example, within CTC Write with the Best does extend up through grade 12 (supposedly, which I think is a stretch), but it would be good for a 9th student who is not strong in writing. It does a good job of strengthening descriptive writing skills. Then, in RTR, you could easily use Medieval History-Based Writing Lessons for your then sophomore student, just following the extensions in our plans. This writing course strengthens the forms of informative, persuasive, and expository writing. When paired with the writing in CTC, you'd have coverage of the various forms of writing.

In Rev. to Rev., you could weigh whether you needed to add something writing-wise to the Exciting World of Creative Writing. Cathy Duffy does say in her review of it that she believes it to be worthwhile for use by high schoolers as well. At that juncture, you may desire a bit more focus on essay writing, using something like The Elegant Essay for a year instead of, or in addition to, the writing portion within Rev. to Rev. Along with DITHR, dictation, the assigned written narrations and other written work in our guides, the writing courses in our guides, vocabulary in DITHR and in other portions of our guide, and Rod and Staff English, you would have a solid English credit for your son's 9th grade year (not to mention a very solid founding in literature/comp./and grammar).

As your son moves into the 10th - 12th grade years, you would want to look at other literature options for deeper study beyond DITHR. Honestly, many of the courses we looked at for high school level literature study were less rigorous in many ways than DITHR, or else spent so long drawing out the study of a novel (albeit with good questions) that the love of reading the work would be lost and the book would be dissected too far! This was my own experience with literature in high school, which did not develop a love for the classics in me! Spending 9 weeks on one work of literature is too long! The other thing that we found is that some literature programs gave almost no guidance in reading a book, leaving much of the interpretation up to the student. For those who haven't had much formal literature study prior to this that doesn't help much either. The last options we looked at had so much composition tied to the readings that the composition aspect took over the program. So, we're still seeking a balance in these areas as we look at high school level literature options for our own son. SMARR and LLATL Gold are choices that we are leaning toward with our own oldest son, definitely with some additions and subtractions to the novels listed in those guides, and with some possible additions or substitutions to the writing portions. Of course, we won't know until we try, so these are just our thoughts at this juncture in the journey.

I do think you could plan to do some beefing up to get .5 up to a full credit of the fine arts for art appreciation in RTR, and .5 up to a full credit of a fine arts for music appreciation along with Rev. to Rev. It would depend on how much you add. So that would help there.

You could use whatever science you felt met your child's needs best. I will mention that we are using Integrated Physics and Chemistry from pacworks this year and really liking it with our 9th grader. For the lab portion he is doing the labs from Exploration Education (just Days 4 and 5 each week), as he had already done the other portions of Exploration Education when he was younger. We do plan to use the Biology and Anatomy and Physiology from pacworks next year for my son in 10th grade, along with some Castle Heights labwork for Biology. I just share this as it may be an option to ponder as well. If you plan to use Apologia, then that would work fine.

Another thought we had as far as Personal Finance credit goes, would be to do the Financial Peace University course, if it is ever offered at your church or one near you. You could add some other material to round it out if needed, but doing Financial Peace is one thing we had considered. We have not gone through the course ourselves yet to fully know whether this is a good option, but we have heard good things about it. So, I share it as something worth pondering too.

Anyway, I'm not sure if I have answered your questions. Hopefully, this will help as you ponder.

Blessings,
Carrie

[MrsMandy]

Carrie,
Your Literature answers were exactly what I needed to know. My only other ? is about notebooking sheets for CTC. I wondered if they are used for the science portion also or just history. Really I guess are they used for all the subjects? Withthe student sheets in our current curriculum they seem more like worksheets than true notebooking pages and I am finding I am having to add to what is being provided for each days work. I prefer my kids to do a notebooking page each day unless they are narrating and what we are provided with now is maybe 1 or 2 a week in 1 or 2 subjects w/ MFW.

[1shortmomof4]

Just a note on the Dave Ramsey course - we are using it for my two high schoolers now - it is well worth over .5 a credit - at least .75 of one and if you add the additional unit on giving (they can't sell this portion to PS schools because of the religious aspect) - you could award a full credit - just do all the assignments, projects, etc. It is a wonderful course. The homeschoolcoop offers special pricing on this program quite often - well worth the cost and it is reusable for younger kids (and they have a Financial Peace Jr. which is great for them in the younger years). If you still feel like it is not enough for a full Finance credit - there is a homeschool mom that wrote a personal responsibility course - can't remember where I found it - but it is a workbook and the child works through typical real-life scenarios - such as how to buy a car, or renting vs. buying, etc. I have found though that when all said and done, Dave's course is plenty for a credit as long as they work through all the assignments.

I am currently using RTR for my dd that is in 9th. I'm awarding one full credit for World History; I'll state the dates of time period covered in a transcript. In my state, I do not have any "rules or requirements" so I follow some guidelines suggested through HSLDA and I looked at some possible colleges that she might attend and we've molded the course from there. She is working through all of the reading, notebooking, and mapping and while she is doing the art appreciation assignments - we've added to that by studying a group of artists and composers from that time frame to round out all that was happening during that time of World History. Just a different perspective on doing high school at home.

Heidi

[Heather4Him]

I am currently using RTR for my dd that is in 9th. I'm awarding one full credit for World History; I'll state the dates of time period covered in a transcript. In my state, I do not have any "rules or requirements" so I follow some guidelines suggested through HSLDA and I looked at some possible colleges that she might attend and we've molded the course from there. She is working through all of the reading, notebooking, and mapping and while she is doing the art appreciation assignments - we've added to that by studying a group of artists and composers from that time frame to round out all that was happening during that time of World History. Just a different perspective on doing high school at home.

Heidi

Heidi--it's so nice to "meet" you on the boards here! We're using CTC for our 8th grader this year, and plan to use RTR for 9th next year. So, it will be nice to have you one step ahead of us, so we can learn from your expertise!

[seekhimfirst]

MrsMandy,
Well, I don't have a high schooler yet but I just can't resist reading these posts! In case you haven't found an answer about the student pages I thought I would share a bit since we are doing CTC. They are absolutely beautiful - and not even close to a simple worksheet! I believe they are used for the history portions - reading about history and independent history. You can look at the sample pages of CTC on the website. The Introduction pdf also gives an idea of things that will be added to the student pages such as a timeline, charts, written narrations, and much more! Instructions are provided in the guide telling children what they need to be doing with the sections of the student pages. Another notebook (or 3-ring binder) is needed for science where notebook entries created by the student and science lab sheets are kept for their experiments. Again, detailed direction is given in the guide on how to do these and they look wonderful. You can even peek at them on the weekly reviews section of the board to get a better idea of what these look like. HTH for now and I'm sure someone else will pop on and give you a better explanation!

[8arrows]

I am glad even Carrie struggles with picking high school literature. I think that this should be a "fun" subject. I have been unable to find a high school literature program I love. Believe me, we have tried a few. We do like Windows to the World quite a bit (IEW). We are currently taking a break from official literature studies and just reading and discussing a couple of novels we wanted to read. It has been a breath of fresh air. We will get back to "official high school literature studies" next week. Of all subjects (well possibly high school science too--but high school science is just plain difficult!!!!), this has been the hardest to find a good fit.

[MrsMandy]

I know with using DITHOR this year and adding books I want him to work on will be good but 10th - 12th is really hard because I can't narrow down what we want to work on, I think I will look at Smarr and LLATL Gold. I guess I am just not sure exactly how much to add for next year without adding too much. Maybe I will look at doing Write With The Best vol 1 & 2 in 1 year by doing it 4 x a week.

[Carrie]

Mandy,

Smarr and LLATL Gold both have their own composition built in, so if you did go either of those routes, you wouldn't need to add comp. We are doing much of Smarr's Intro. to Lit. this year with my oldest son and find many things we like about it. We did substitute for some of the books in the Intro. to Lit. program with a couple different titles from Smarr, which you can do. We are using Smarr's comp. for my oldest son and like much of it too. It definitely is not easy and requires a strong background in grammar, which blessedly Rod and Staff provides.

For either of the LLATL Gold, you would need to add a few additional novels, as there are not enough in them novel-wise in my opinion. However, the poetry and short story sections seem very good in both volumes and the comp. is included. For the British Literature LLATL Gold, I don't care for Frankenstein or The Time Machine, both of which we would omit with our own son and replace with other Brit. Lit. titles. In LLATL Gold American Lit, I do not love Steinbeck's The Pearl with its very graphic ending, so I would omit that as well and replace it and add a few more novels to round Am. Lit. out. Until we use these with our own oldest son, we will not fully know our opinion of them, but we are likely planning to go this route with some tweaking and see what we think. The guides are written from a Christian perspective, move through the books in a timely fashion, incorporate higher level thinking and composition, and do not dissect the book so much that the student loses the joy of reading.

Just some food for thought as we ponder together. Along with DITHR, you could easily use Write with the Best. If your child has already had quite a bit of descriptive writing, you could skip WWTB Vol. I and just do Volume 2. Doing both Volume 1 and 2 in one year would be too much composition in my opinion, as it would be 180 lessons of comp. alone. I would lean toward doing one volume or the other if you do use WWTB. Volume 2 is definitely high school worthy on its own. It covers typical high school level comp. assignments and does it very well.

Blessings,
Carrie

[MrsMandy]

Ok so I tried to find titles that mesh with DITHOR and the CTC time period just because I really want him to have the introduction to the great ancient literature. I would appreciate it if someone could take a look see and let me know if the books are to big of a stretch for Genre or 9th grade reading (my son is 15 1/2 with a 11th grade reading level)

Bio- Nero
Adventure- Beowulf or Gilgamesh
Historical Fiction- Cat of Bubastes (unabridged actual book) or ???
Fantasy- The Odyssey or The Illiad (maybe both to compare as a final project for Lit)
Mystery- The Golden Goblet
Folk Tales- Sure News Up Ahead (Egyptian Folktale)
Non Fiction- First 10 Chapters of Streams of Civilization
Humor- Lysistrata
Realistic Fiction- Silas Marner or ??? (really stumped here)

I also have a few free study guides I found for a couple of these books I may have him do as a more in depth study. I think I either go too light or too heavy on lit because I love it so much and either think what I expect is college level and in trying to temper that do not expect enough.

[Heather4Him]

Mandy--I wanted to ask you, what are you using for photography? Our dd is VERY interested in that, too, so I definitely want to try to include this as an elective. Thanks in advance!

[MrsMandy]

Mandy--I wanted to ask you, what are you using for photography? Our dd is VERY interested in that, too, so I definitely want to try to include this as an elective. Thanks in advance!

I found an online photography for homeschoolers course http://www.photographyforhomeschoolers.com/ and I was either going to use that or a community college course it would be about the same price. I also will be having him participate in Project 365 on his blog (which he will be using to turn in some assignments). I just googled Online Photography course for homeschoolers.

[Heather4Him]

Thanks Mandy--that helps get me started!!

[MrsMandy]

Ok so I tried to find titles that mesh with DITHOR and the CTC time period just because I really want him to have the introduction to the great ancient literature. I would appreciate it if someone could take a look see and let me know if the books are to big of a stretch for Genre or 9th grade reading (my son is 15 1/2 with a 11th grade reading level)

Bio- Nero
Adventure- Beowulf or Gilgamesh
Historical Fiction- Cat of Bubastes (unabridged actual book) or ???
Fantasy- The Odyssey or The Illiad (maybe both to compare as a final project for Lit)
Mystery- The Golden Goblet
Folk Tales- Sure News Up Ahead (Egyptian Folktale)
Non Fiction- First 10 Chapters of Streams of Civilization
Humor- Lysistrata
Realistic Fiction- Silas Marner or ??? (really stumped here)

I also have a few free study guides I found for a couple of these books I may have him do as a more in depth study. I think I either go too light or too heavy on lit because I love it so much and either think what I expect is college level and in trying to temper that do not expect enough.

Alright I am gearing up to do some finalizing of our fall plans and could really use advice on my lit selections. Could someone look through here and see how these sound?

I am so thankful for this discussion because I had all my son's four plan worked out and when I went to finalize things this week and begin trying to figure out our schedule and record keeping I could not for the life of me find it. I had to recreate it all I was so mad!!!

I just read back and saw I had it all on here as we discussed various things, YAY! Now I can rest easier and breathe again.

[water2wine]

For those of you who may wonder like I did what Federalist Papers to have your child read, I found this site http://www.garyrutledge.com/Documents/f ... s_main.htm and went to the ones that are listed here as "cream of the crop".Just thought I would post that in case it helps anyone else.