Using college-level texts for highschool

[Kate in Arabia]

I'm working on plans for ds (rising 9th grader), there are a couple of courses where I am using a college-level text. Am I dreaming, or did I read here somewhere that a one-semester college-level course could be equated to a one-year highschool course?

 

One course in which I'm using a college text is Islamic history, the survey book I chose is designed for a one-semester course and I am stretching it out over a year. It's easier because this is our "spine" and I have a lot of supplementary books and projects.

 

The other is an Arabic course; I would consider ds to have competent knowledge of Arabic, he has had instruction and exposure (some years weaker, some stronger) throughout his life, and when I looked at this textbook I thought it would provide a solid base for more dedicated learning. In reading through the preface, it mentions that the text and included materials are intended to cover about 150 classroom hours plus 200-300 hours outside of class. It is designed as a three-year course in college Arabic (there are three individual volumes), it would be nice for ds to complete it all in highschool but I don't want to be unrealistic.

 

I understand a lot of this is subjective -- what level the individual student is, etc. -- but just as a general guideline, would you plan to cover the whole book in one year or plan to cover half the book this year and the second half in 10th grade? Remembering from my own college days as a student of Arabic, that 200-300 hours outside of class time for review and preparation is not an exaggeration.

 

Thoughts welcome.

[jessicalb]

My understanding is that a single semester, three credit university course is equivalent to a one year high school course.

 

The Arabic sounds awesome! My son tried out conversational Farsi but didn't get very far with it. It's hard without people around to practice with.

[Kate in Arabia]

The Arabic sounds awesome! My son tried out conversational Farsi but didn't get very far with it. It's hard without people around to practice with.

I was excited about this text because it also has DVDs with it, and includes both fus-ha (formal Arabic) and spoken Egyptian colloquial.

 

DH and I are fortunate that we can tag-team on this -- I have a graduate degree in Arabic and when I was in college that meant learning it as a research language (heavy grammar, no spoken). Dh grew up in Saudi and is a fluent speaker, but hasn't had as much formal grammar instruction. So together we ought to be able to make it work, lol.

 

The kids get a lot of practice here, I was looking forward to a more structured approach to give a good foundation.

 

Thanks!

[Mom22ns]

You might consider this thread when considering the high school credit for a class using a college text.

[regentrude]

I am using college level texts for high school most subjects.

I choose how much of a text to cover. Even a college class will often not cover a whole text.

I have no experience with humanities. In math and sciences, one semester college often covers the first half of the textbook, the second semester covers the second half, but doing half the text would not be equal to one year of high school.

 

This said: using a college text for homeschooling and taking a college class are two entirely different things. You can tailor the coverage of the text and the depth to your student and make a high school level course out of half the text or out of the whole text or even just a fraction of the text with other stuff. If I were in your situation, I would start and see how my student does with the text, how fast progress is, how much work is required - and THEN make a decision whether to aim at covering all in one year, or whether it would be better to stretch it out over two years.

Edited August 15, 2012 by regentrude

[Kate in Arabia]

This said: using a college text for homeschooling and taking a college class are two entirely different things. You can tailor the coverage of the text and the depth to your student and make a high school level course out of half the text or out of the whole text or even just a fraction of the text with other stuff. If I were in your situation, I would start and see how my student does with the text, how fast progress is, how much work is required - and THEN make a decision whether to aim at covering all in one year, or whether it would be better to stretch it out over two years.

Thanks for this. I know from looking through the text that several of the concepts he already has a good knowledge of, while others he doesn't. And his vocab is quite good, but perhaps not all of the specific terms in a given lesson. Also his Egytpian colloquial is limited to Arabic movies and tv, lol.

 

I suppose my biggest hurdle is getting over the "one year must equal one text (or 1/2 text)".. we can start and if he finishes 1/2 or 2/3 or 1+, as long as the time/effort spent and improvements made are worthy of a full credit, that is a credit. Yes?

[Kate in Arabia]

You might consider this thread when considering the high school credit for a class using a college text.

Thanks for the link, Debbie, I think that's where I first remember reading about a college semester in general equating to a highschool year.

[regentrude]

I suppose my biggest hurdle is getting over the "one year must equal one text (or 1/2 text)".. we can start and if he finishes 1/2 or 2/3 or 1+, as long as the time/effort spent and improvements made are worthy of a full credit, that is a credit. Yes?

 

YES!

I am using one college level history textbook for three years of study as a spine... we use lots of extra resources and literature and have, if I count the hours, a very solid history credit every year.

For courses like this, I always keep track of hours because I have the same insecurities (if it's one text=one credit, that's easy). So we just work until I am comfortable assigning a credit, i.e. 160+ hours.

 

The 4 credit hour French course at the university my DD took covered one third of the textbook for French 1 and the second third for French 2; as a high school course that would have been the material covered in two years of high school French.

Edited August 15, 2012 by regentrude

[Nscribe]

We generally prefer the college texts versus those designed for high school. They just seem to be filled with less visual clutter (standardized text practice, "critical thinking" suggestions, cross curricular connections...).

[Jenn in CA]

Yes, yes, this is so true! When my oldest, who had read Spielvogel's Western Civ (college level), were 10th & 11th grades, I handed them a public high school history textbook and they seriously could not believe it. They thought it was a junior high book.