EKT
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Posts posted by EKT
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My daughter will begin her first-ever AP course in a couple of weeks and will take the corresponding exam in spring 2023.
I need to send a reminder email in September to the school that is agreeing to let her sit for the exam. Do I need to have a College Board account set up for my daughter before that, so they can order her a test? (Is setting up an account just like, entering my daughter’s name and email and basic info, or is it something more involved? Is it something I can go ahead and do now?)
Thanks for your help with my AP newbie questions. 🙂
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7 hours ago, kokotg said:
He's just going into 11th grade, so I haven't done all the course descriptions/transcript yet, but I'm planning to give him 1 credit and call it chemistry with lab. WTMA seems to suggest you can give 1.5 credits for chem with one semester of lab or 2 credits for the full year of lab, but that seems kind of wonky to me, so I'm planning to just do the one credit. But I feel totally fine about that. My husband teaches high school math, and he showed a science teacher at his school what DS was doing in chemistry, and he was impressed and said it looked like a really solid class. I don't think they talked about the lab component specifically, but he was very impressed that they did 2 research papers in the lecture part of the class (1 each semester). I was really impressed overall; like I said, this isn't a science-y kid, but he learned a ton and I think enjoyed it as much as he could given that it was chemistry. I do think that, aside from guidance/experience writing the lab reports, he probably got more out of the lecture part than the lab. But he enjoyed the lab part more (although probably because it was easier!) ETA: he also definitely put enough time into the class to justify the 1.5 credits they suggest. It wasn't overwhelming or anything, but he put in a good bit of time working outside of the live classes every week.
Thank you so much!! I really appreciate your taking the time to respond!
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47 minutes ago, kokotg said:
My son took it last year....I just asked him and she doesn't do the labs during class; it was lecture/discussion during the live class. He sometimes found it confusing/difficult to do the labs on his own, but it always worked out well enough (and she's very good about replying to questions). Beyond just doing the labs, he wrote 2 long lab reports and a mini lab report, kept a notebook which she graded sometimes, and there was some other homework (the example he remembers is analyzing data sets that she gave them). I really liked having him do the lab part of the course (science isn't his thing, so he just did one semester of lab), mostly because we're NOT good at making sure that kind of thing gets done otherwise, and because I liked that he learned how to write a good lab report and ended up with 2 graded ones that he can submit with college applications if needed.
Thank you! This response is so helpful.
I'm very torn; I do like the idea of the two formal lab reports, but I really wish she demonstrated the labs, because that was the support I think would most benefit us.
I have a follow-up question, if you don't mind me asking: Is just the one semester lab course "enough" to call the course "Chemistry with Lab" on your high school transcript? (I find the WTMA credit system for sciences a little weird/confusing, since they break the labs off from the regular course.) I looked at the lab course syllabus online and it shows that students do 8 labs during the semester and then it looks like one or two "extra" labs where they write the long lab reports. Is 8-10 labs "enough"? (We did 20 labs for biology this past year, so I'm concerned that 8-10 labs in chemistry will look "light" in comparison.) I suppose I could sign my daughter up for both the fall and spring lab sections, but that will total like $1500 spent on chemistry (year-long course, lab courses, microchem kit, etc.) and that feels...like a lot. Anyway, would love to know what credits you issued, if you don't mind sharing. Thank you so much, and thank you again for your helpful response!
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Hi! My daughter is currently enrolled in WTMA's upcoming Chemistry course. I am debating whether or not to also enroll her in the corresponding lab course. (I bought the MicroChem kit and am debating between doing the labs ourselves and enrolling my daughter in the formal lab course.)
My main question: In the WTMA lab course, does the instructor perform the labs live on camera each week? Or are the labs just discussed during the classes? Basically, I'm trying to get a sense of how helpful the lab course would be for us. Is there a lot of extra work beyond the labs themselves? (We enjoy science in our house--we did biology labs on our own this past year with the QSL kit and we were super successful!--but my daughter is a prospective fine arts major, so chemistry is not where she wants to devote the bulk of her energy. Her painting is super time-consuming and her year will otherwise be super full; she'll be taking an AP art history course, a French II course, geometry, an intensive English course, doing test prep, starting to drive, etc., so chemistry is more of a "get 'er done" course for us. Plus, our homeschool budget is nearly maxed out as far as outsourced courses go, so I only want to consider the lab course if it's amazing...)
Basically, I'm trying to determine if the lab course would be super helpful to us and make our lives easier (because the instructor provides clear and helpful demos of the labs), or if the lab course would, in effect, just pile extra work on my daughter beyond the labs themselves. We're definitely going to build a solid Chemistry with Lab course either way, but again, science is not a passion area for her, so I'm thinking it might be overkill? Thanks for any info you can provide!
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19 hours ago, Arcadia said:
Nope they don’t. ACT is pretty good about announcing on social media (Facebook, Twitter) when registration opens. College Board announces on social media after registration has already opened and I think this year was earlier than the past few years. June would be a good time to start checking this board for people posting about SAT and ACT registration being opened.
Thank you!!
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I currently have a rising sophomore, so she won't be taking her standardized tests until she's a junior (fall of 2023 and/or the spring of 2024). We have not yet decided on which test she'll do, but I'm curious about both. A recent post put the idea of test registration on my radar. Does registration for these tests open at the same time every year? I'd like to make a notes to myself and set Google reminders so I don't forget this next year.... (Any related tips or info re: test registration is much appreciated.) Thanks!
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4 minutes ago, cintinative said:
Awesome, thank you!
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1 hour ago, cintinative said:
I have been listing them in the following school year so if it was the summer between freshman and sophomore year I list it for sophomore year.
I hope that is right?
That is what I was planning to do, too. Thanks!
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I doubt this matters too much one way or the other, but I'm not sure where I should file summer courses on my daughter's transcript. She's currently taking a summer college course worth 3 college credits. She's a rising tenth grader, so I'm not sure if I should include this course with her other ninth grade courses, or if I should list it as a course she completed in tenth grade. (Just wondering if there is a standard procedure for summer classes.) Thank you!
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1 hour ago, Sebastian (a lady) said:
I didn't tend to list the curriculum when it was a course plan & tests.
Example: We used the Kolbe Academy course plan for Biology. I didn't list that, but did list the Miller Levine Biology text used.
I did list curriculum when it was more of a textbook.
Example: I listed the Windows to the World intro to literature text, followed by the longer works read.
I also referenced curriculum if someone else was presenting or grading.
Example: My kids did multiple classes with Lukeion Project. I listed them as the curriculum provider when they issued the grade and as a component when they were one part of the course. An art course included several non-graded workshops on ancient art and architecture. I listed those as separate items. That description also listed the art galleries visited, so it was pretty eclectic.
So helpful! Thank you!
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23 hours ago, Green Bean said:
Paper snob here, too. 24lb paper is my go to. I never paid attention to brand. I buy what CostCo has.
20lb is useful only as young children's drawing paper.
Thank you! The weight # is helpful!!
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5 minutes ago, regentrude said:
I am attaching my transcript scrubbed of personal info.
In the course descriptions, my first section was "English and History", and I listed them there. Following sections were Math; Science; Foreign Language; Music, Art and ElectivesThank you so, so much!!
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Lots of questions today! Trying to bang out these course descriptions and be done!
We don't use much formal curricula, but we use a little. (For math, I'm obviously going to list "Math U See Algebra 1" as the text we used, because that curriculum was literally the only text we used for that course.) But...things get a little murkier for other subjects. For subjects where you used a commercial curriculum, did you list that curriculum by name, or did you just list the topics covered by that curriculum? For instance, I purchased the Oak Meadow World History curriculum to use as a guide for topics to cover in our World History course, but do I need to mention that? Can I just list the actual textbook we used for readings (McGraw-Hill World History and Geography) and the other books we read over the span of the course (Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl, Maus, Night, etc.)? I guess I'm wondering: Does "Oak Meadow" or "Brave Writer" or "IEW" mean anything to admissions counselors? Is it useful information for them that is worth including in a course description, or is it just confusing and unnecessary? (Would they see it and think, "What the heck is Brave Writer?")
In your course descriptions, did you mention specific curricula by name, or did you strictly mention texts read and topics covered?(I hope I'm making sense here.) Thank you!
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30 minutes ago, KSera said:
I did Algebra 1 and Algebra 2.
Will you be doing four years of English all with the same general format? I guess then English 9, 10, 11 etc makes sense. Mine have had two years of literature and composition and then their other classes have either been genre or taken DE so I used the CC course title. I used English in the title for one kid and literature and composition for the other. Will the schools your kid applies to be of the type that will be looking at course descriptions? If they’re just checking a box, I don’t think you should overthink. If they’re looking at descriptions, that’s where they’re going to get the info anyway, so I still wouldn’t overthink.
Good points, thank you! 🙂
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5 minutes ago, regentrude said:
Here are my English course descriptions for our self-designed integrated history & literature courses, in case you find some of the phrasings helpful.
I called the math courses Algebra 1 and Algebra 2.
World Literature: Ancients / Ancient History
1.0 credit English, 1.0 credit History
This is an integrated course combining history and literature of the Ancient world, with a particular focus on Greece and Rome. Major works of literature studied include The Iliad, The Odyssey, The Aeneid, Herodotus Histories, Greek tragedies, Sappho Poetry, Ovid Metamorphoses, Plato Trial and Death of Socrates. The course has a strong composition component; the student wrote essays about literary and historic topics and gave an oral presentation.
Textbook: A Short History of Western Civilizations by John Harrison and Richard SullivanThe student listened to the following audio lectures by the Teaching Company:
The Iliad (12 lectures), The Odyssey (12 lectures), The Aeneid (12 lectures)
Greek Tragedy (11 selected lectures), Classical Mythology (24 lectures)
Each college level lecture is 30 minutes in length and taught by Prof. Elizabeth VandiverWorld Literature: Medieval and Renaissance / Medieval and Renaissance History
1.0 credit English, 1.0 credit HistoryThis is an integrated course combining history and literature of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, with a particular focus on England and Italy. Major works of literature studied include Beowulf, Canterbury Tales, Song of Roland, Nibelungenlied, Inferno, sonnets and various plays by Shakespeare. The student watched several live and recorded performances of Shakespeare’s plays. The course has a strong composition component; the student wrote essays about literary and historic topics and one research paper.
Textbook: Short History of Western Civilizations by John Harrison and Richard Sullivan
The student listened to the following audio lectures by the Teaching Company:
The Early Middle Ages, The High Middle Ages, The Late Middle Ages (72 lectures, Prof. Philip Daileader)
The Italian Renaissance (36 lectures, Prof. Kenneth Bartlett)
Dante’s Divine Comedy (15 lectures, Profs. William Cook and Ronald Herzman)Each of these college level lecture is 30 minutes in length.
Shakespeare: The Word and the Action (selected lectures, Prof. Peter Saccio)
World Literature: 1800-Modern. 1.0 credit.
This course covers World literature of the 19th and 20th centuries with a focus on British literature. Major works studied include Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, Frankenstein, Oliver Twist, 1984, Age of Innocence, The Master and Margarita, One Hundred Years of Solitude, The Queen of Spades, as well as plays and poetry by various authors.
The student developed familiarity with literary terms and literary analysis in different genres and participated in the Great Books Club of Missouri University of Science and Technology, where classic works of literature were discussed under the guidance of English faculty.
The student watched four live performances of plays.
Textbook: Essential Literary Terms by Sharon Hamilton.
Subject SAT II LiteratureThis is very helpful, thank you!
A follow-up question: Where did you physically list your integrated courses on your transcript and in your course description document? (Did you put them under English, Social Science, or both?) I guess this depends on if you organized your transcript and course descriptions by subject or by grade, but I'd love to know how you structured it (for future reference). Thanks!
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14 hours ago, ScoutTN said:
Dave Ramsey’s online course is $30 and about 50 hours.
We've only done the middle school version of this course so far (my kids do it in seventh grade), but we definitely plan to do the high school course. The middle school course was super straightforward and didn't take a ton of time.
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Two questions:
(1) Roman numerals or Arabic numbers? (Is anyone else driven crazy that on the same transcript, we call one course "French I" (Roman numeral), but then we call another course "English 9" (Arabic number)?! (The inconsistency makes me crazy, but of course writing "English IX" would be ridiculous.) Similarly, did you call it "Algebra 1" or "Algebra I"? (Our Math u See curriculum actually uses the title "Algebra 1"...) So that's making me crazy.
(2) How did you title your English courses? Our English courses are self-designed, but they're pretty standard in that we covered both literature and writing in the one course. Some homeschooling advice I've read suggests just keeping things simple and calling it "English 9" because that is clear to admissions. (Every school will know what "English 9" means, whereas a more flowery title might confuse them. I've heard it's best for the transcript to be skimmable, so admissions officers can just quickly read down and be like, "Check, check, check.") We do a Brave Writer sort of approach to our English courses, in that there is no overall theme to the literature titles we choose; we just select major books that interest us. (So, I can't call the course something like, "19th Century British Literature" because, again, there was no unifying theme like that to our books. Plus, I'm worried a title like that implies it wasn't also a writing course.) Anyway...does anyone have thoughts on this?
The downside of calling it "English 9" is that, to me, it doesn't capture the richness of the work we actually did. (It feels generic?) What did you do? Should I just stop overthinking and call it "English 9"? Maybe "English 9: Language and Literature"? (I feel like that title, at least, makes it clear that both writing and literature were covered.) Please advise. Thank you!
Edited to add: If anyone would like to share how they titled their English courses for each grade, I would greatly appreciate it! Thank you!
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56 minutes ago, Farrar said:
Noting that you do not have to use the course descriptions exactly as written for outside providers. I tweaked nearly all of ours. The only ones I don't touch are college courses. And for those, I included a note that they were copied verbatim from the course catalog at the time the course was offered. But most homeschool providers don't provide a course description that's right for colleges. Most of them are partly to sell the class or are overly wordy about the assignments. I condensed most, though for some I needed to add. A lot of math course providers don't seem to do more than list their topics, so then I would standardize it by adding things like that the course included chapter tests and so forth.
Thank you! This is super helpful!
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2 minutes ago, zibby3 said:
I used present tense. The dual enrollment courses and tutorial courses my daughter took had present tense course descriptions, so I just matched mine to be consistent. I do think either way would work. I also had some self-designed classes, and it did feel a little weird, but I just went with it for the sake of consistency. She got into college with no questions asked about the course descriptions, so I would say it all worked out! (But I sure did stress about it before I sent them!)
I know; that's what's making it problematic--her outsourced courses are written in present tense!
I'll definitely pick a tense and make them all the same, I'm just trying to decide what sounds less weird. (I've been starting at it all for hours, so everything sounds bizarre at this point, lol.)
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Hello! I'm working on course descriptions for the school year we just finished. (It's my first time doing this!) A lot of homeschool advice I've read recommends writing course descriptions in present tense ("This year-long course introduces..."). BUT, as I'm actually sitting down and doing this, it feels really weird to me to use present tense, especially for the courses my daughter and I have worked together to design especially for her. (That is, our courses are not ongoing like those of a traditional school, so shouldn't we use past tense to describe them?) What did you do? Please advise! Thank you! 🙂
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I'm seeking recommendations for good home computer printer paper. I've tried so many kinds, but I haven't yet found one that I love. (The cheaper brands tend to be see-through/not great for double-sided printing. Some of the nicer papers I've tried are weirdly slick and the printer ink sometimes smears....)
If you've found paper you love, I'd love to hear about it! Bonus if it is available in bulk. Thank you!
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5 minutes ago, gstharr said:
No experience with either courses. But, if you considerineg 2024 test dates, I would not take the classes now. Colllege Board will start administering the NEW SAT in the U.S. in 2024. the classes will be outdated by then. the NEW SAT will be implemented outside the U.S. in 2023. College Board will probably release practice tests then.
Oh, this is so good to note--thank you. I will keep this in mind!
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We operate like this! Aesthetics are so important to our homeschool life, honestly. Beauty and environment matters! (It doesn't have to cost anything; it's just about intention and set-up, really.) First, I would have her (or help her) clean the room she'll be working in. (I cannot concentrate AT ALL in a messy space, so this is the biggest one for us!) If you don't have time to actually clean, just put all the visible junk in a laundry basket to get it out of the room and deal with it another time.
Other recommendations:
- Set up the workspace as an "invitation" to work: Set out pretty gel pens, sticky notes, highlighters. (Color!) A cup of sharpened pencils, nice pens. Set work out nicely (put assignment sheet on a clipboard, open notebook to fresh page, make space for everything)
- "Reset" the desk for each subject switch or during breaks
- Fill a water bottle with ice water or use a carafe and a pretty glass on a coaster
- Make sure her chair is comfortable (add a cushion or blanket) OR use a lap desk on a bed
- Set out a little tray or basket with tissues, lip balm, and hand lotion (if she has everything she needs, there will be few excuses to get up! lol)
- Set Spotify (or whatever) to a "focus" playlist or find a "music for reading" playlist on YouTube (New Bliss and Cat Trumpet are our favorite YouTube channels for reading music)
- I agree that candles and flowers only ever help!
- Brownies or a snack brought to her while she's working is such a treat
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We took our first WTMA course this past fall and it was wonderful. I am making notes to myself for future reference and I saw that WTMA offers an SAT prep course. Has anyone taken it? Was it "worth" it? (How necessary do you feel formal test prep courses like these are? I vacillate between hating the idea and thinking a formal course would likely be helpful.)
I'm debating between this SAT prep course or possibly the Mr. D SAT math boot camp. (If we decide to do either of them, my daughter would likely take these courses next year--in the summer or fall 2024--but I'm making notes to myself in my new teacher planner now, so I don't miss the sign-up deadlines next year. Figured I'd start collecting info about the courses while it's on my mind.) Thanks for any feedback or advice!
First-ever AP course coming up; do I need to create a College Board account now?
in High School and Self-Education Board
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Thank you; this information is so very helpful!!