Transcript question - Eng/Language Arts

[lagirl]

I've read where it is better to be specific when listing your

Eng/Comp/Language Arts class on a high school transcript.

I have no idea how to list dd's class, as we are using a variety of materials. Any ideas?

 

Also - this is our first year to homeschool.

Does the amount of material we are studying

sound like a well-rounded class?

 

This is what we are studying: (10th gr)

 

1st Semester:

"50 Great Short Stories" w/workbook

(workbook includes writing prompts)

 

2nd Semester

Unit study: reading Jane Eyre

in depth study of Jane Eyre, to include writing

 

Wordly Wise

 

Grammar by the Book

 

reading another novel (TBD)

but will probably not have time for

indepth study

[Ellie]

On the transcript, it's just "English." You only need to list any materials or methods if you need, for some reason, to write out course descriptions (some colleges ask for those, usually after transcripts have been submitted) (although not always:-)

[Chris in VA]

I've read where it is better to be specific when listing your

Eng/Comp/Language Arts class on a high school transcript.

I have no idea how to list dd's class, as we are using a variety of materials. Any ideas?

 

Also - this is our first year to homeschool.

Does the amount of material we are studying

sound like a well-rounded class?

 

This is what we are studying: (10th gr)

 

1st Semester:

"50 Great Short Stories" w/workbook

(workbook includes writing prompts)

 

2nd Semester

Unit study: reading Jane Eyre

in depth study of Jane Eyre, to include writing

 

Wordly Wise

 

Grammar by the Book

 

reading another novel (TBD)

but will probably not have time for

indepth study

 

We did 50 Great Short Stories also--I paired it that semester with the Progeny Press Poetry Guide, and we had a really great semester.

I think you need to add more lit to the second semester. Perhaps taking 4-5 weeks for Jane Eyre, and then adding 3 more.

 

One thing that helped me plan was asking the question, Is this study taking me INTO the book, or OUT OF the book? INTO studies look at the structure of the book, the literary elements, etc., and analyse the book itself. OUT OF studies look mostly at the surrounding times--think something like Prairie Primer, where the Little House books provide a spine for a study of the times, not so much a study of the actual books (although there is overlap).

 

For literature in high school, as high school becomes a more specialized time, I believe INTO studies are more appropriate. Certainly it is important to get the context of the book--that's why SWB has students do context pages (one reason, anyway). It is very important to see what historical and life experience influences affected the writer. But it is more important, in my opinion, to read the text of the book and analyse it. (That naturally brings in some of the OUT OF elements--it is impossible to fully understand a work without those elements--but they are not the main point.)

 

So, if by Unit Study you mean you are using Jane Eyre as a sort of spine in an OUT OF way, then I'd encourage you to add some works you study in an INTO way.

 

:lol:

 

Does any of this make sense? :D

[emubird]

I did both specific and non-specific titles on the transcript. For courses that were just a list of random stuff that didn't have much theme other than "English" I just listed it as "9th grade English" or "10th grade English".

 

However, my daughter also did a lot of things that could be considered a "theme". I grouped those (whether she did them in the same year or not), so she had a few courses titled: American Lit, British Lit, Detective Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Writings on Nature.

 

You could do either or both. I don't think it really matters.

 

Jane Eyre was a pretty easy read for my daughter, so you might want to put more into that semester if your focus is going to be literature analysis. Jane Eyre is long, and it looks (at the beginning) that it's going to be quite a slog, but my daughter found it really picked up. (FWIW it's worth, I read it in one day my first time through.) I might add a number of shorter novels to get more variety.

 

However, if the focus of your class is going to be more on composition than literature (and if a lot of time is going to be spent on composition), then I wouldn't worry too much about adding a whole lot more literature. You might throw in some poetry or plays.

 

For composition, for my younger daughter, I think I'm going to have her read a lot of shorter non-fiction works, to give her some ideas for writing -- both style and content. We've got a book called Reading Well, Writing Well (ok, I'm not sure of the exact title) that has a lot of examples of this. Writer's, Inc. might also have some. I'm not sure I could get my kids to spend a full semester writing about Jane Eyre, but perhaps that wasn't your intent.

[In The Great White North]

I read somewhere that the NCAA is very particular about names of courses, and may not accept something too specific but will accept something vague like English 9.

[lagirl]

I understand what you're saying about INTO and OUT OF the book.

Thanks for your insight and direction.