English credits and the WTM

[Kate in Arabia]

Ok, I have posted a few times in different threads on this topic but haven't gotten any comments to my comments, so now I'm feeling paranoid.

 

If you look at the wtm recs there is clearly more than 5 hours, closer to 10 hours, per week of work in English. Are people not doing this much? Doing this much and still counting it as one credit? No one is following the recs in this area?

 

I *think* we would easily meet that amount of time. I'm adding in a writing program (WWS) and thinking of a literature analysis one (WttW?) as well since we've not done much in that area. This is on top of the recs.

 

The fact that no one in these particular threads seems to be doing anything similar is making me second-guess myself..

[LunaLee]

Well, I'm not sure if this will set your mind at ease, but I'll give you my .02...

 

It was my full intention to use the WTM recs for dd and not only would I have given her full credit, I would've desginated it honors- as long as you are doing the writing with the reading, I don't see why you wouldn't give a full credit. I might think about using Elegant Essay instead of WWS, but that's just me. I'm using WWS with a 7th grader, but it might be too easy for a high schooler.

 

I didn't use the recs, because in the end my dd ended up NOT being a very classical child-meaning she strongly dislikes reading so I had to go another route.

[Jenny in Florida]

If you look at the wtm recs there is clearly more than 5 hours, closer to 10 hours, per week of work in English. Are people not doing this much? Doing this much and still counting it as one credit? No one is following the recs in this area?

 

We don't follow TWTM recommendations all that closely anymore. I have this genetic need to do things my own way, it seems.

 

However, yes, we do more than five hours per week of English-related study each year. And, yes, I count it as one credit.

 

This year, my son is doing:

 

- literature reading. He's read eight or nine "classics" and several other good, contemporary works. We discuss as he reads (and sometimes read together), and he writes about each work.

 

- an online course about Greek mythology that involved reading excepts of lots of other works.

 

- Imitation in Writing.

 

- grammar review.

 

I've explained my reasoning for giving just one credit in several other threads and won't bore everyone with it again. But, I didn't want to not answer here.

[Kate in Arabia]

I've explained my reasoning for giving just one credit in several other threads and won't bore everyone with it again. But, I didn't want to not answer here.

Thanks, Jenny, sorry if you feel like a broken record, lol.

 

Maybe I'm overreaching for my first foray into high school territory. I'm not exactly sure how it will all work out, but I suppose it isn't something set in stone -- I mean, I could plan for one thing and then make adjustments as I see how it actually pans out, right?

[Zee]

Hi Kate,

I'm not doing TWTM recs, but we do spend at least 2 hours a day on English. Some Friday's we spent only an hour, but there was homework sometimes, so we definitely averaged 2+ hours a day. It seems there is never enough time to cover all that we need to include in this subject. I will be giving 1 credit for it, and we won't be designating it as honors for reasons of my own.

 

HTH

[1Togo]

We also spend quite a bit of time on English; i.e. composition, grammar and literature, and I am only giving it one credit. The literature is assigned through our history curriculum, but I am giving one credit for English and one credit for history.

[Jenny in Florida]

Thanks, Jenny, sorry if you feel like a broken record, lol.

 

Maybe I'm overreaching for my first foray into high school territory. I'm not exactly sure how it will all work out, but I suppose it isn't something set in stone -- I mean, I could plan for one thing and then make adjustments as I see how it actually pans out, right?

 

No apology necessary! I just didn't want it to look like I wasn't answering your question.

 

But, yes, of course you can always change your mind. I keep detailed lists of everything my kids do. At the end of each year, I parse it out into course descriptions and reading lists that make sense to me at that moment. But I keep the original lists, too. So, if I ever needed to adjust for any reason, the information is all there.

[Jane in NC]

Hi Kate.

 

My son is now in college but we did follow a number of TWTM recommendations--with some tweaking. I gave one credit for English. On my son's transcript, I had initially wanted to give two credits for English/History/Great Books as a single subject but was dissuaded. Instead an ancillary document which listed all of the books used for grammar/writing/vocab as well as Great Books (and other) reading accompanied the transcript. This list suggested a rigorous program--at least this was my hope.

 

Frankly, I did not think there were enough hours in the day to read everything suggested by TWTM, especially if one wanted to go into depth with a Teaching Company lecture series, etc. Some of the ancient histories, for example, were a bit of a bomb. No problem. We just moved on in good conscience, denoting the excerpt covered.

 

Breathe deep,

Jane

[Joan in GE]

SWB doesn't recommend reading all the books on the lists either if I remember correctly.

 

I counted some of the books as literature (and therefore time towards the English credit)...a couple we read in French and used towards the French credit...some counted as history time...or American Gov...

 

but part of the reading time was just 'homework' time...I didn't count every minute of reading as time towards a credit...

 

Joan

[Kate in Arabia]

I'm remembering now, wasn't there an interview or something with SWB once where she said her publisher (at the time) pushed her to put time amounts for different subjects? I don't know why I'm focusing so much on that, lol, I should have a broad idea in mind and then see how it works out, especially since it's my first time with it.

 

I didn't do a formal writing program with ds this year, and prior years we tried different curricula that were of varying success, which is why I thought to go back a bit to WWS and hopefully get on some solid ground... plus we haven't done literary analysis before at all, which is what led me to WttW to start... I think I need to actually get these things in hand and sit down with it all to see how I think it will work out.

[Joan in GE]

I'm remembering now, wasn't there an interview or something with SWB once where she said her publisher (at the time) pushed her to put time amounts for different subjects? I don't know why I'm focusing so much on that, lol, I should have a broad idea in mind and then see how it works out, especially since it's my first time with it.

 

I didn't do a formal writing program with ds this year, and prior years we tried different curricula that were of varying success, which is why I thought to go back a bit to WWS and hopefully get on some solid ground... plus we haven't done literary analysis before at all, which is what led me to WttW to start... I think I need to actually get these things in hand and sit down with it all to see how I think it will work out.

 

Yes, SWB talks about that, I think in her book as well...or was it one of the tapes?

 

I think generally for an English credit you need some of each - grammar, literature, vocab, composition...

 

I don't know if you'll end up using an umbrella school or not, but the one we used would not count speech time for English. Instead it fell under 'Fine Arts'...

 

Joan

[Jane Elliot]

Ok, I have posted a few times in different threads on this topic but haven't gotten any comments to my comments, so now I'm feeling paranoid.

 

If you look at the wtm recs there is clearly more than 5 hours, closer to 10 hours, per week of work in English. Are people not doing this much? Doing this much and still counting it as one credit? No one is following the recs in this area?

 

I *think* we would easily meet that amount of time. I'm adding in a writing program (WWS) and thinking of a literature analysis one (WttW?) as well since we've not done much in that area. This is on top of the recs.

 

The fact that no one in these particular threads seems to be doing anything similar is making me second-guess myself..

 

Kate, I explained what we've done for our first five graduates here. Basically, we've followed WTM English recommendations (with some exceptions) and the transcript recommendations (Chapter 39 titled "Paper Proof: Grades and Record Keeping"). If you look at that chapter, the recommendation is to give one credit for English, one credit for literature, and one credit for history.

 

Honestly, if we had not counted English and Literature as one credit each (i.e. granted more than one English credit in a year), I don't know where we would have come up with enough credits for them to graduate. Maybe I could have titled the courses differently. Really my dc were spending so. much. time. on English. I think it did pay off. They've done very well at university (3.8 - 4.0 for all of them), and I think it was all the time they spent writing and reading in high school.

 

These threads are making me second guess my transcripts (not our course of study), but to the best of my ability I've tried to have the transcripts accurately reflect where we put our time and effort. Like I said in the other post though, we've mainly only applied to Christian colleges and universities, and I've only ever turned in my transcript, no course descriptions or extra explanations.

[Joan in GE]

One important question is whether or not you will use an umbrella school or not...as it will give guidelines for how you give the credit...

 

Eg they only needed 4 English credits, 1 World History, 1 American History, 1/2 Amer Gov....

 

And we used all the electives for foreign languages...

 

Joan

[Jane Elliot]

One important question is whether or not you will use an umbrella school or not...as it will give guidelines for how you give the credit...

 

Eg they only needed 4 English credits, 1 World History, 1 American History, 1/2 Amer Gov....

 

And we used all the electives for foreign languages...

 

Joan

 

No, we homeschool independently in Idaho and have no requirements from anyone. Legally I can set my own criteria.

 

I am mainly concerned with how this is viewed by college admissions offices. So far, we've been fine with the universities and colleges to which we've applied (and have even been given some full-tuition and nearly full-tuition scholarships). But, I have seven more to graduate, and they may not all choose to go the same route. I wonder how college admissions offices in general view more than one English credit per year.

Edited May 23, 2012 by Luann in ID

[Candid]

Here's the thing that I sometimes think home schoolers don't quite grapple with: Yes, you may end up having your child doing 2 hours of English a day instead of what seems like an hour or so in a standard classroom setting. BUT a student in a rigorous high school might easily be doing another hour of work in many of their subjects. I've certainly heard 4 - 6 hours of homework from locals here. So I wouldn't get too worried about having too much.

 

If you must put credits and you are coming short, I'd study the book list and see if it could be split so that you have an additional class on the list. If you have a lot of works read this might help.

[Jane Elliot]

Here's the thing that I sometimes think home schoolers don't quite grapple with: Yes, you may end up having your child doing 2 hours of English a day instead of what seems like an hour or so in a standard classroom setting. BUT a student in a rigorous high school might easily be doing another hour of work in many of their subjects. I've certainly heard 4 - 6 hours of homework from locals here. So I wouldn't get too worried about having too much.

 

If you must put credits and you are coming short, I'd study the book list and see if it could be split so that you have an additional class on the list. If you have a lot of works read this might help.

 

In our case, we're not talking about just two hours of English. They're doing closer to four hours per day of English if we count literature (great books), writing, vocabulary, and grammar. And that is pretty close to what I see on the suggested schedules in WTM, which is why it makes sense to me that WTM suggests giving an English and a literature credit each year.

 

I fully understand that students in school take homework home (and I also understand that a full hour of class during the school day is never all used in direct instruction or work, not in our local school anyway.) In English, more than in any other subject, I don't expect 1 credit to equal 1 hour of work per day.

 

However, I would like my transcripts to be fairly standard. So what would I call these other classes if I'm not calling them literature?

Edited May 23, 2012 by Luann in ID
a stray "not"

[1Togo]

nm

Edited May 23, 2012 by 1Togo

[Jane Elliot]

I think everyone is suggesting that you put the literature into English along with writing, grammar, etc. Since we are spending hours as you are doing, I also want to give more than one credit, but it doesn't seem to be what is expected. If you not using an additional history curriculu and use Great Books as the focal point for your history study, perhaps they can be the history credit.

 

I guess my question then at this point is: Expected by whom?

[Janice in NJ]

If you look at the WTM third edition, it recommends three "Englishy" credits for the Freshman year.

 

English I

Speech I

World Literature I

 

So far, I have given one credit for grammar, composition, and vocabulary and a separate credit for the great books.

 

For example, last year, my dd earned an AP English Composition credit through an online course. She also worked through 11 titles from the Modern book list: read, annotate, discuss, literary devices, author research, and a couple of papers. Yes, I gave her a credit for it. She earned two "English" credits in 10th grade.

 

This year, she completed Honors Composition I at the CC in the fall. For summer session she is taking American Literature at the CC. This year she also completed twelve works of British Literature with me at home. (As listed above.) Shouldn't she get credit for that? Certainly. This year she will have three English credits.

 

Her freshman year, she did no outside classes. But she still earned two English credits with me. :001_smile: She is slated to earn two her senior year; if she takes one class each semester at the CC, she will earn three again. We may switch to 2 1/2 by only doing a fall course at home. It depends. The bottom line? I have some rhetoric material I want to do with her, and it looks like the colleges just don't teach that any more. So I will. :001_smile: And I will give her credit for it.

 

The transcript should reflect the work the child has done. Her lit and composition classes freshman year were over 200 hours each. I am NOT going to give a kid one credit for 400 hours of work. Even AP English classes are generally only 300 hours of work. :001_smile:

 

So those of us who give more than one credit in English and literature are out there. And our kids get into college. I include a course info document along with the transcript that includes a course description, materials used/works studied, the method of evaluation, and the final grade. The document makes it clear that these courses were by no means skimpy. So far no one has questioned the transcript or given me the impression that they consider it "padded." If they do, they have kept it to themselves and still offered my kids scholarships.

 

In the end, it's the test scores that count; and they focus on reading, writing, and mathematics. The transcript just backs up the scores; it tells the story of your journey. Use your time to educate. Don't stress about the transcript. It will come together quite easily once you've educated your kids.

 

Peace,

Janice

Edited May 23, 2012 by Janice in NJ
Oops. Meant to post under the OP. Sorry Candid. :-)

[1Togo]

Your question is exactly the reason I deleted my post. We've only dealt with state colleges and the military, so I put together transcripts that looked typical; i.e. four English, four math, etc. However, we've always spend hours on composition, grammar, vocabulary, and literature, and dd is spending more time than our two oldest. We've only had one child who was in a school setting, and he didn't do anything close to what we do for English.

Edited May 23, 2012 by 1Togo

[Jane Elliot]

If you look at the WTM third edition, it recommends three "Englishy" credits for the Freshman year.

 

English I

Speech I

World Literature I

 

So far, I have given one credit for grammar, composition, and vocabulary and a separate credit for the great books.

 

For example, last year, my dd earned an AP English Composition credit through an online course. She also worked through 11 titles from the Modern book list: read, annotate, discuss, literary devices, author research, and a couple of papers. Yes, I gave her a credit for it. She earned two "English" credits in 10th grade.

 

This year, she completed Honors Composition I at the CC in the fall. For summer session she is taking American Literature at the CC. This year she also completed twelve works of British Literature with me at home. (As listed above.) Shouldn't she get credit for that? Certainly. This year she will have three English credits.

 

Her freshman year, she did no outside classes. But she still earned two English credits with me. :001_smile: She is slated to earn two her senior year; if she takes one class each semester at the CC, she will earn three again. We may switch to 2 1/2 by only doing a fall course at home. It depends. The bottom line? I have some rhetoric material I want to do with her, and it looks like the colleges just don't teach that any more. So I will. :001_smile: And I will give her credit for it.

 

The transcript should reflect the work the child has done. Her lit and composition classes freshman year were over 200 hours each. I am NOT going to give a kid one credit for 400 hours of work. Even AP English classes are generally only 300 hours of work. :001_smile:

 

So those of us who give more than one credit in English and literature are out there. And our kids get into college. I include a course info document along with the transcript that includes a course description, materials used/works studied, the method of evaluation, and the final grade. The document makes it clear that these courses were by no means skimpy. So far no one has questioned the transcript or given me the impression that they consider it "padded." If they do, they have kept it to themselves and still offered my kids scholarships.

 

In the end, it's the test scores that count; and they focus on reading, writing, and mathematics. The transcript just backs up the scores; it tells the story of your journey. Use your time to educate. Don't stress about the transcript. It will come together quite easily once you've educated your kids.

 

Peace,

Janice

 

Janice, I love this post! I especially agree with the bolded parts, and I'm relieved to find someone else has been doing it similarly to the way we have.

 

Do you mind if I ask what types of colleges/universities have accepted your kids? Also, I'm wondering if they asked for the course descriptions and materials used or if you just decided to send them as extra information?

[Jane Elliot]

Your question is exactly the reason I deleted my post. We've only dealt with state colleges and the military, so I put together transcripts that looked typical; i.e. four English, four math, etc. However, we've always spend hours on composition, grammar, vocabulary, and literature, and dd is spending more time than our two oldest. We've only had one child who was in a school setting, and he didn't do anything close to what we do for English.

 

That makes sense. We've mainly dealt with homeschool-friendly, Christian colleges and universities. I've tried to make my transcripts reflect accurately what we've done, but if I found myself dealing with an organization that didn't really understand homeschooling, then I might rethink my approach.

[Jenny in Florida]

Honestly, if we had not counted English and Literature as one credit each (i.e. granted more than one English credit in a year), I don't know where we would have come up with enough credits for them to graduate. Maybe I could have titled the courses differently. Really my dc were spending so. much. time. on English. I think it did pay off. They've done very well at university (3.8 - 4.0 for all of them), and I think it was all the time they spent writing and reading in high school.

 

I wonder if that is some of why this question gets so hotly debated.

 

I have exactly the opposite issue. If I counted two credits for English and literature, my kids' transcripts would look even more ridiculous. Both of mine are kids who really need to be busy and who have significant interests in multiple areas. Even counting all of the English/literature/grammar/composition as a single credit, each of mine has accumulated enough credits to graduate in three years.

 

I'm definitely not arguing against spending lots of time on this stuff. I just don't necessarily believe that every hour invested in school has to be reflected in terms of credits on a transcript.

[Jane Elliot]

I'm definitely not arguing against spending lots of time on this stuff. I just don't necessarily believe that every hour invested in school has to be reflected in terms of credits on a transcript.

 

I agree with you there. Perhaps we all just have different preconceived notions about which activities could go on our transcripts. For example, my dc run their own livestock businesses, do a lot of 4H activities, take extension courses, read a lot of books about these activities, even write about them... but it never occurred to me to put any of that onto the transcript until I was making up the transcript for my sixth child who would like to go into agriculture as a career. Until now, these things haven't seemed like school but have all seemed extracurricular to me, so here we have many hours of learning that haven't been reflected on our transcripts. And it's no wonder I've felt desperate to claim the many additional hours we spend on English. Maybe I just need to be more creative.:)

[Candid]

 

However, I would like my transcripts to be fairly standard. So what would I call these other classes if I'm not calling them literature?

 

Without going into more detail, I'm not totally sure. But you can look at the parts of the program you are doing and see if some part can be made into something else. Suppose for example, you see that you are reading a lot of plays in a particular year, then maybe they could go into a literature of the theater lit class while the other works stayed in English. Or if you are studying ancient lit, you might make a class of epic poetry or religiously based ancient works or the evolution of theater. A lot depends on what you are reading and I suspect it will change from year to year. Some years the spin off class might not even be lit, but a history, theology, philosophy class.

[Jenny in Florida]

I agree with you there. Perhaps we all just have different preconceived notions about which activities could go on our transcripts. For example, my dc run their own livestock businesses, do a lot of 4H activities, take extension courses, read a lot of books about these activities, even write about them... but it never occurred to me to put any of that onto the transcript until I was making up the transcript for my sixth child who would like to go into agriculture as a career. Until now, these things haven't seemed like school but have all seemed extracurricular to me, so here we have many hours of learning that haven't been reflected on our transcripts.

 

There was another thread recently that touched on the question of where to draw the line between extracurricular and elective. In that discussion, I said my usual rule of thumb is to ask myself whether the subject is being studied in a relatively formal way? In other words, just devoting hours to something doesn't make it a "class" in my world.

 

So, for example, my son gets credit for choir on his transcript. He sings with a rigorous teaching ensemble. They rehearse an average of four hours per week and perform at least once a month. In addition to the vocal training, they get instruction in reading music and music theory. They log far more than the number of hours required to justify a credit each year, but I award just one.

 

On the other hand, he does lots and lots of theatre. I'd say he devotes more hours to that than any other single pursuit. He's done four shows so far this academic year, each of which rehearsed between five and 12 hours per week. (Tech week is always more than that.) All but one show had three weekends of performances after the rehearsal process. However, I don't see those experiences as instructional. Obviously, he learns things from every show, and he works very hard doing them, but those go in the extracurricular bucket.

 

He also volunteers (science museum, theatre, church) and dances and is working on a movie with a friend of his. All of those are excurricular, too.

 

With the exception of choir, though, most of the credits I meant are pretty traditional classes: art history, music appreciation, computer programming, creative writing, anthropology, theatre arts (when they do an actual study of something), philosophy, etc.

[Kate in Arabia]

One important question is whether or not you will use an umbrella school or not...as it will give guidelines for how you give the credit...

We are with an umbrella school, and they do have a core list of requirements, but lots of room for maneuvering. As I mentioned (I'm not sure if it was here or another thread), my adviser there suggested keeping literature separate, I guess it would count as an elective? But they are somewhat flexible, I think I can put together a plan at the beginning of the year and adjust it once I get to the end.

 

I am very happy, actually, to see a range of opinions on this topic. Thanks to everyone who has commented.

[Kate in Arabia]

If you look at the WTM third edition, it recommends three "Englishy" credits for the Freshman year.

Thanks for the reminder, Janice, I looked back through that section again this morning. It looks like she only counts one "English" credit and the rest are electives (albeit 'English-y' electives).

[Joan in GE]

We are with an umbrella school, and they do have a core list of requirements, but lots of room for maneuvering.

 

I don't know if you use Homeschool Tracker Plus, but with it, it was pretty easy to change the subjects of different assignments and then it recalibrated the hours we'd spent under the new subject.

 

For example, several lessons spent on Locke, which at first I had under English... I went back through and changed the subject to American Gov and automatically it changed the hours, lessons, etc to the new subject and deleted from old.

 

Joan

[Kate in Arabia]

To date my homeschool tracking has been on Excel, I haven't really looked into other options; but maybe I should?

 

Thanks,

 

Kate

[Kendall]

I think I have read all posts in this thread and haven't seen what I do mentioned. I got the idea from Jean in Wisc. I do 1.5 credits for English. On the transcript I list:

 

English 9 1 credit

Ancient Literature 1/2 credit

 

or

 

English 9 with Ancient Literature 1.5 credits.

 

I've done it both ways(2 kids so far).

 

I have done 2 full credits the senior year - 1 English and 1 Literature and we increased the amount of work. The 1.5 credits was 2 or more hours of work most days.