11th grade English (American Literature)

[Night Elf]

My ds15 has Aspergers and his current 11th grade English class with Keystone is really hard for him. He's a few weeks into it and is making C's on his quizzes. The 1st test is coming up.

 

He simply cannot wrap his mind around analyzing literature. The first topics wee theme, main idea, tone, audience, purpose and perspective. He thought those were bad. Now he's on historical criticism and analysis. They suggest suggestions such as:

 

How are the events, politics, economy, people, discoveries, and social climate reflected in the text? How do they affect the author's attitude?

 

What commonly held beliefs of the period are shown?

 

How are political, social, and economic conflicts reflected in the text?

 

And it goes on. He is struggling with this. He did great in their 10th grade class. I think this type of analysis will be throughout this course. He's only scheduled to read two books, The Crucible and sweet, hereafter.

 

I'm seriously considering withdrawing him but I need an appropriate 11th grade equivalent that they will take in its place. For 9th grade, we used Literary Lessons from The Lord of the Rings, BJU Grammar/Writing, and Write Shop levels 1 and 2.

 

What sort of programs could be appropriate for 11th grade? I would need to focus on American Literature, and need a secular program. In order to get credit from Keystone, I have to submit a portfolio with tests and writing assignments from the beginning, middle, and end of the course.

[mschickie]

You could just get some Novel Unit (secular) or Progeny Press (Christian) guides for some books your son might actually be interested in. This way if he is interested in the book the focus can be on developing the skills at his own pace instead of being overwhelmed. For 11th grade we used those guides and covered the following books: October Sky, The Chosen, Red Badge of Courage, and Of Mice and Men.

[Night Elf]

You could just get some Novel Unit (secular) or Progeny Press (Christian) guides for some books your son might actually be interested in. This way if he is interested in the book the focus can be on developing the skills at his own pace instead of being overwhelmed. For 11th grade we used those guides and covered the following books: October Sky, The Chosen, Red Badge of Courage, and Of Mice and Men.

 

Thank you. I'll take a look at those.

 

Are these questions about the Crucible? If so, they are easy questions IF you understand the historical background. Can you help him go step by step:

 

We start The Crucible next week. What he has been given so far are just historical excepts of journals and a few poems. He also had to analyze Simon and Garfunkel's Hazy Shade of Winter.

 

The truth is that he is pretty good at History. What's difficult for him is to find an underlying meaning in something. For example, when he reads something like the morning sky is blue and the sun is shining, he sees exactly that. He doesn't think about how it might symbolize something different like a bright new beginning after a dark episode.

 

I'm just not sure how much more time I want to invest in this class if I can build a course that is more suitable to his abilities. I do help him. I sit with him and practically hold his hand, but I can't help him find the answers for himself. Usually we talk it out and when we look at the answers in the program, he is always off the mark.

[Susan C.]

He will learn if you help, I see no problem doing that all of this year and some of next. I don't know the exact limitations of Aspergers, but there is enough to go at a more factual level. He just needs to get background information. Hopefully he is able to make connections between historical facts and why a piece was written. Dd and I worked through Scott Foresman American and British literature the last two years. In American (11th grade), she was just starting the analysis. Ds was also here, attending the local university for an English degree. He kept telling me that he got most of his information from the lectures at school and there was a lot of conversation in class about pieces and their backgrounds, meanings, etc. Does the online class have that? If not, well, anyone can dish out assignments, you do the online classes for the lectures!

[Night Elf]

He will learn if you help, I see no problem doing that all of this year and some of next. I don't know the exact limitations of Aspergers, but there is enough to go at a more factual level. He just needs to get background information. Hopefully he is able to make connections between historical facts and why a piece was written. Dd and I worked through Scott Foresman American and British literature the last two years. In American (11th grade), she was just starting the analysis. Ds was also here, attending the local university for an English degree. He kept telling me that he got most of his information from the lectures at school and there was a lot of conversation in class about pieces and their backgrounds, meanings, etc. Does the online class have that? If not, well, anyone can dish out assignments, you do the online classes for the lectures!

 

Not as much as I would like to see. The class isn't a lecture style. It's all written. There are interactive things sometimes. I don't feel like we've been really taught how to approach these questions. Mostly we just read through their examples and then try to mimic them with his excerpts.

[Susan C.]

Since he is already enrolled, and it looks like you need to abide by their rules, can you gather the background information for him and show him how to do the literary analysis (with him staying in the course)? I really liked Scott Foresman, but there were no tests. I graded papers and projects that dd did, and we went over the content. While going over content (which was a hybrid between testing knowledge and her lecture), things she didn't understand about literary analysis showed up, and we dealt with them as they came up.

[Jennifer in FL]

You might just want to pick up Windows to the World (IEW). She gives a very easy explanation of all the topics you mentioned and more. Although it is written for HS, she is a former home school mom who now teached in a small, Christian high school. Her explanations are very easy to understand and very conversational. It is $50 for the student teacher set, and you could easily match your topics with hers. Plus she uses short stories to teach, so he could begin to practice the concepts without having to read longer works.

 

Hang in there. Aspergers or no, some folks are just hard-wired to call a spade a spade, and not see some deep meaning in everything.