When I began piecing together a 9th grade English class, I found it a challenge to select the number of books for my ds to read in a year, and to determine a logical order (not just time, but genre, themes, etc.) for the choices. I would suggest that the easy part is finding worthy books. The WTM, Tapestry of Grace, Sonlight, the College Board web site, and a myriad of other sources and internet sites offer a wealth of choices of worthy classics for high schoolers. So I think the challenge is to narrow down the lists to a reasonable number, and provide some sort of organization and order to the four high school years. I took a bit of an easy way out, and used the rhetoric-level lit selections recommended by TOG in the 3rd and 4th years (basically 19th century and 20th century) and, with a little substitution here and there, used those lists as my 9th grade and 10th grade lit selections. The benefit of at least looking a rigorous curriculum like TOG -- and I believe it is top notch -- is that it helps with pacing. Trying to determine how many books to read in a year is difficult, since we don't want to overwhelm our kids, but we also want to provide a suitable rigor. By using TOG's list (and we studied 19th and 20th century history in parallel), I felt a bit more secure when my ds would "appear" inundated with work. I found that by sticking to my guns, my ds rose to the challenge. He and I found that he was capable of stepping up -- which is part of what high school requires -- in the quantity and quality of reading. So whether you USE TOG or not, I think it is a good model of what it is reasonable to expect from a high performing high school student. A caveat to TOG -- it tends to assign more books than most programs, so there is less analysis time per book. I like that approach. I think we get enough time on each book. But if you want to spend more time talking about and writing about books, then you would want to pare down the number of books. My philosophy is "so many books, so little time," so in 9th and 10th we only spent one to three weeks on each book. ;) We have cut down the number of books a bit in 11th -- and are spending a little more analysis time on each. I hope this helps. Best of luck! ~Brigid

My 11th grade ds, who is a science-guy, used all of the Apologia science texts, from Gen Science in 6th through Physics in 10th. While I also thought that the texts looked incredibly boring initially, my kids found them engaging. I found them extremely easy to use as the teacher/mom. We have not used the advanced texts, opting instead for community college classes. My ds just completed his first semester of General Chemistry at the CC, and did well. So I think that speaks well for the Apologia chemistry text. I will say that we chose to use co-ops or paid labs for most of the lab work with Apologia, but my first ds did all the General Science and Physical Science experiments at home with no problems at all. I know you want comparisons, but we have not used anything else. I have a second ds who has used Gen Science, Physical Science, and is now in Biology -- and is enjoying the same success as my first ds with the series. I would strongly recommend Apologia to home schoolers. With the Apologia texts, I have found that science is one area I don't have to "tinker" with year-to-year, and that has been a huge help. Good luck! ~Brigid

If you are not using a literature program (such as Sonlight, Tapestry of Grace, etc.), but are piecing together your own literature selections for high school English classes, what resources have you found valuable for class preparation and evaluations? Please only share the links, guides, and materials that you have experience with, and have found valuable for background info, class discussion questions, and quizzes/tests on novels, poetry, and plays. :) I'm sure we all have plenty of "good looking" materials that just sit on the shelf, because they never quite work for us. I know I do! I'll go first. Don't gasp. I use SparkNotes. It is a FREE on-line resource at http://www.sparknotes.com. So you don't have to buy the guidebooks. I have found this site to be particularly helpful for tests. I copy and paste the quiz for a book onto my own Word document, and use some of the essay/discussion/quotation questions for the short answer or essay portion of my tests. I have found it easy to use the Sparknotes template and create tests to suit my own needs. I think creating tests is a huge time pit, and this has helped me to streamline the process. I hope others will share resources and tips for developing high school literature classes. ~Brigid

Willow Spring, south of Raleigh.;)

How about a play? "A Raisin in the Sun" was set in the 1950s I think. ~Brigid

I do wonder about testing overkill. If my kids were testing-averse, I would definitely pull back. The PSAT is a really short test. It is not the marathon that the SAT is. Plus, no essay. If your kids have scored consistently in the 95th percentile or better on annual standardized tests, then they have a shot at doing well on the PSAT. :) If you think your kids might score well enough for National Merit consideration (seems like it is roughly the top 1-2% of PSAT test takers), you might consider having them take the PSAT in 10th grade. The way I look at it is -- I would hate for my kids to miss the National Merit cutoff by a point or two if there had been something we could have done relatively easily. ~Brigid

My junior took the PSAT last year (10th) and this year -- and we switched the schools. Boy did we learn our lesson from that! The gracious private school that allowed my 11th grade ds - and lots of other homeschoolers - to take the test had desks that were so small, the kids could not fit their test book AND the answer grid-in sheet on the desktop together. Much less a calculator. The desks were the wrap around arm-type desk tops. So my ds said it definitely slowed him down on the math portion to have to juggle the test book/answer sheet/calculator between the desk and his lap. :rolleyes: I would suggest that you test in 10th so that the unknown factors might be minimized. ;) ~Brigid

My 17 yo ds is reading The Screwtape Letters. Just finished Great Expectations (a HUGE hit!). :D My 14 yo ds is reading the Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and is about to start Red Badge of Courage. I thought he would love TS -- a fun, easy read. He did like it -- but it wasn't the sheer fun that I imagined it would be for him. I can only guess that he is too far removed from the kinds of activities and antics kids used to enjoy before video games and other electronics. :( ~Brigid

The "Instructor's Manual" as it is titled is definitely not an easy turn-key answer book. There are no answers laid out in 1., 2., 3. form. For each poem there is a dialogue about the poem, which in some cases does answer some of the questions. I think it will be helpful, but it is not an answer key. I am using the 7th edition. I needed to buy a "class set" for the co-op class I teach, and there seemed to be plenty on Amazon for $.01 or a bit more (plus $3.99 shipping:cool:) I have one copy of the 5th edition. There is not much difference in the two. I think Sound and Sense is like Perrine's Literature - Structure, Sound, and Sense -- they have both been around forever. Perrine actually passed away in 1995, so revisions are by others who have taken up the task. http://blog.smu.edu/smumagazine/2007/12/33_million_gift_extends_profes.html ~Brigid

I found mine on Amazon, used. I bought the 7th edition -- titled Instructor's Manual to Accompany Sound and Sense. ISBN 0155826093. ~Brigid:)