Question about literature and writing credits (Lord of the Rings)

[Misty]

My 14yr old daughter is taking a Lord of the Rings literature course at co-op this year. The teacher is using Literary Lessons from The Lord of the Rings. She says I can give my daughter a credit for Ancient Literature, or Literature with an emphasis on Tolkien, or even British Lit (if I add a few more books from Dickens and Austen). She also says that I can give her dual credit for both Lit and Composition if she also does the writing portion of the program. I'm fine with this, but my husband is not. He says you have to write anyway in any literature course and he thinks I'm shortchanging her by giving her two credits.

 

Has anyone been through this course and can comment?

[Matryoshka]

I think your dh is right that a lit course includes writing.  One high school English credit is typically a mix of writing and composition.  It would look 'padded' to give a separate credit for each.

 

I actually wouldn't skip the writing, because I think just the reading would be very 'lite' for a high school English credit.

 

We did the curriculum in 8th grade.  We did skip the writing in it, but added in Lively Art of Writing and did a bunch of other papers to round out the credit.

[Lori D.]

My 14yr old daughter is taking a Lord of the Rings literature course at co-op this year. The teacher is using Literary Lessons from The Lord of the Rings. She says I can give my daughter a credit for Ancient Literature, or Literature with an emphasis on Tolkien, or even British Lit (if I add a few more books from Dickens and Austen). She also says that I can give her dual credit for both Lit and Composition if she also does the writing portion of the program. I'm fine with this, but my husband is not. He says you have to write anyway in any literature course and he thinks I'm shortchanging her by giving her two credits.

 

Has anyone been through this course and can comment?

 

1 credit of high school English is typically composed of about 1/2 Literature and 1/2 Composition (Writing). Because reading and discussing are time-consuming, most English credits are composed of 180 hours of work -- about 1 hour per day, 5 days a week, for 36 weeks of the school year. So, about 2.5 to 3 hours per week spent on Literature *and* 2 to 2.5 hours/week spent on Writing.

 

In order to award TWO credits -- one each for Literature and for Composition -- you would need to double those figures and spend about 2 hours each day on these topics -- one hour a day on Lit., and one hour a day on Writing. The Writing hours could certainly "double dip" and include a separate Composition co-op class and those assignments, or could include writing for History or Literature papers, or creative writing, etc.

 

Another way to look at it: the amount of work for an *average* 1 credit high school English class typically includes: over the course of the *year*, reading/discussing 6-8 novels/novellas/essays, plus some short stories and poems. And each *semester* the student writes 1 multi-page paper, several 5-paragraph essays, and a number of single paragraph responses.

 

We used Literary Lessons from the Lord of the Rings when DSs were 8th and 9th grades. In order for it to equal 1 credit of English on our 9th grader's transcript, we had to add a writing program and a few additional works of Literature to read / discuss/write about.

 

Is your DD reading other works as part of the co-op class? LLftLotR does have some additional information about: The Iliad and The Odyssey (ancient Greek epics); Macbeth and Midsummer Night's Dream (Shakespeare plays); and Beowulf and Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (medieval classic works). But LLftLotR does not formally teach or schedule these works as part of the program, except for some in-depth discussion of excerpts of those last 2 works as some of those 12 units that make up large part of LLftLotR.

 

LLftLotR also does not teach writing; the program only has some suggested writing assignment ideas. Is the teacher of the class actually teaching composition in the class, grading papers, fielding questions, guiding student writing, etc.? 

 

 

Three years ago, I taught a co-op class for gr. 7-12 loosely based on LLftLotR. We read the trilogy, one Tolkien short story, and some Tolkien poems. It was a 90-minute class, with 60 minutes focused on me teaching literary analysis and on class literature discussion, and 30 minutes specifically teaching writing. There were weekly writing assignments and a longer paper per semester, and I graded. There was also a weekly literature lesson with information and discussion/literary analysis questions that I created for the students to do at home. (Much more in-depth than the comprehension and discussion questions in LLftLotR.) Altogether, with reading, writing, and thinking/answering the lesson questions students had about 2.5-3.5 hours of work at home per week, plus 1.5 hours a week of class time. Because of the amount of books read and amount of writing done, and because the co-op met just 12 weeks each semester, rather than a full 18 weeks for a semester, I recommended parents award 0.5 to 0.66 credit for this amount of work.

 

While I love LLftLotR as a gentle introduction to Literature and beginning literary analysis for grades 7-9, IMO it is in no way equal to 1 credit of English. Especially if a co-op teacher is spending much of the class instruction time in covering the fill-in-the-blank comprehension questions and vocabulary worksheets.

 

Again, totally JMO, and depending on what the teacher is covering in the class, or if you already have your English credit covered in some other way, I would award 0.5 credit of Literature, and entitle it in a way that reflects the works covered.

 

As far as what to entitle this credit... unless you really feel you need to give this course a special title, I would just fold it in with whatever else you are doing to complete hours required for an English credit and call it "English 1" (or "English 9").

 

If this is an additional Literature course to your English credit, and if you add additional literature, then yes, entitle the course something that reflects the content. I personally would NOT entitle the course "Ancient Literature"; Lord of the Rings is not an ancient work of literature, and it is the main work covered. Also, unless the course is delving deeper into Tolkien and his influences, and reading a number of Tolkien's other works, I personally would not entitle it Literature with a Tolkien emphasis. I'd probably just call it "Literature: Lord of the Rings", or "Literature: Literary Lessons from The Lord of the Rings".

 

Just my 2 cents worth. :) Hope your family enjoys the co-op class and LLftLotR. What a fun way to start your high school English adventures! :) Warmest regards, Lori D.

[brookspr]

I agree with your husband, I would not give two credits unless the amount (hours) of work justified it and the amount of writing was significant enough to be a separate class/credit.

 

We just started this curriculum with my son (he will be 13 soon and is in 8th grade) and I would say he spends 45 minutes a day reading (give or take depending on the length of the chapter) and then another 30 minutes or so completing the lesson the following day. He does the written fill-in-the-blank and then we do the questions orally. Where they suggest a writing assignment, I have him work on that over the course of a week. So total I would say it's about 3.5-4 hours of work a week, which would be equivalent to an average of 130 hours over the year = 1 credit (from what I've read, 1 credit can be anywhere from 120-180 hours of work)

 

We will be also adding in Bravewriter classes on occasion, along with Fix-It grammar lessons, but I would still only give one credit if this were for high school.

[Pegasus]

Literary Lessons from Lord of the Rings, completed in full as written, would be a fairly light 1 credit high school course.  We added other readings and a full separate writing curriculum, separate vocabulary, and still just awarded a total of 1 credit.

 

 

[Misty]

Thanks for the feedback ladies. And no, the co-op teacher is not teaching writing. She's leaving the writing portion up to the parents to do or not do. Ok, so I'll add other readings (for a British Lit or Ancient history credit) and we'll do writing separately. I think I'll just do an entirely different writing program because she is a weak writer at this point. 

 

So I can give a full credit and call it British Lit if I add a few additional titles (Dickens, Austen.. what else?) and also add a writing program as well as have her do the writing assignments (or at least most of them) from LLfLofR? Or did I understand wrong?

 

 

[8filltheheart]

How was the teacher suggesting an ancient lit credit? Lotr by itself is not even connected to ancient lit. However if the teacher is incorporating all the works in the units, they more than enough for an ancient lit credit.

 

Fwiw, I have a different perspective on the program. We spend 3-4x as much time on each unit as each book. I find it a heavy lit credit.

 

That said, I would not give a separate writing credit.

[Lori D.]

On 9/6/2015 at 3:06 PM, Misty said:

… So I can give a full credit … if I add a few additional titles… and also add a writing program as well as have her do the writing assignments (or at least most of them) from LLfLofR? 

Exactly!   🙂
 

On 9/6/2015 at 3:06 PM, Misty said:

 (for a British Lit or Ancient history credit) … and call it British Lit...

 

Again, I would not call this "Ancient Literature". And it is in NO way an Ancient History credit -- there is NO History involved in LLftLotR. (I'm guessing that "ancient history" from this part of your post was an accidental mis-wording , and you meant "ancient literature". 😉 )

I know the teacher is suggesting possibly calling it "Ancient Literature", but this is ONLY because LLftLotR has ONE unit (out of a total of TWELVE units) on epic conventions, and the unit gives an OVERVIEW on several ancient epics (Illiad, Odyssey, and Aeneid) -- but does NOT schedule them or even have the student read excerpts. BUT, even if you go ahead and read/analyze/write about all 3 of those ancient epics, I would NOT call the course "Ancient Literature -- the main focus is on a work of fantasy, not ancient classics, so the title needs to reflect the focus of the class. Which is the work of fantasy, Lord of the Rings.

I would just call this English 1 or English 9 (for the freshman English credit) on the transcript, and in the separate course description document you can list that the course primarily focused on the Lord of the Rings through a co-op class covering the Literary Lessons from the Lord of the Rings program.

That way you can cover whatever additional works you WANT. 🙂
 

On 9/6/2015 at 3:06 PM, Misty said:

...British Lit if I add a few additional titles (Dickens, Austen.. what else?)

 

If you really want to make this a British Literature course, I would recommend focusing on Medieval Lit (because that was the major influence on JRR Tolkien in writing Lord of the Rings), and you could add these works (which are discussed in-depth in several of the LLftLotR units):
- Beowulf
- Sir Gawain and the Green Knight
- a king Arthur work (perhaps T.H. White's 4-part novel, The Once and Future King, or Tennyson's lengthy poem, "The Idylls of the King")

Other British lit. works that are *very briefly mentioned* in passing in LLftLotR:
- Macbeth
- Midsummer Night's Dream

And then there are the epics (2 ancient Greek and 1 ancient Roman), discussed in the unit of LLftLotR on "epic conventions", with most of the discussion covering the first one:
- The Iliad
- The Odyssey
- The Aeneid 

I personally don't think Lord of the Rings is very-well-suited to go as part of a standard British Literature credit.

Typically, a British lit course that includes Jane Austin and Charles Dickens is all about 19th and 20th century classics, such as these 19th century works/authors:
- something by one of the Bronte sisters (Wuthering Heights or Jane Eyre)
- Silas Marner (George Elliot)
- Frankenstein (Mary Shelley)
- something by Robert Lewis Stevenson (Treasure Island, Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde, etc.)
- something by Oscar Wilde (Importance of Being Earnest, Picture of Dorian Gray, etc.)
- British poets such as Samuel Coleridge, William Blake, John Keats, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Robert Browning, Christina Rossetti, Percy Bysshe Shelley, and William Wordsworth
- Pygmalion (a play by George Bernard Shaw)

and these 20th century British novels/authors:
- Lord of the Flies
- Brave New World
- Animal Farm
- 1984
- Heart of Darkness
- something by CS Lewis
- something by PG Wodehouse
- possibly something by EM Forester or Virginia Woolf

Some ideas for fleshing out a Lit. course, with Lord of the Rings and this co-op class as 1/2 to 2/3 of the works covered:
- additional works by Tolkien
- or, works by authors who influenced Tolkien
- or, works of fantasy by British authors, such as George MacDonald (Lilith, or, Phantases, or some of his short stories, and CS Lewis (Till We Have Faces; or, Perelandra); Peter Pan; Alice in Wonderland; Watership Down; etc.
- or, other classic fantasy works
- or, other epics

Hope that helps clarify things! 🙂 Enjoy your Literature adventures this year! Warmest regards, Lori D.

Edited January 26, 2019 by Lori D.

[Misty]

Thank you! This has been extremely helpful!! And yes, I did mean to say British Lit.. Not history...Sorry! I'll read through all this again and take notes and formulate a plan.. Thanks so much!!

[Junie]

Welcome back, Lori D.  The board has missed you!

[Lori D.]

Welcome back, Lori D.  The board has missed you!

 

Aww, thanks Junie! :) It's nice to be back, and to have been missed! :)

[Jenny in Florida]

If you really want to make this a British Literature course, I would recommend focusing on Medieval Lit (because that was the major influence on JRR Tolkien in writing Lord of the Rings), and you could add these works (which are discussed in-depth in several of the LLftLotR units):

- Beowulf

- Sir Gawain and the Green Knight

- a king Arthur work (perhaps T.H. White's 4-part novel, The Once and Future King, or Tennyson's lengthy poem, "The Idylls of the King")

 

Other British lit. works that are *very briefly mentioned* in passing in LLftLotR:

- Macbeth

- Midsummer Night's Dream

 

This is similar to what we did for my son when he did Literary Lessons from the Lord of the Rings in 7th or 8th grade. He did that curriculum in the same year he did medieval and Renaissance history, and I had him read (or we read aloud) some of the works that were discussed or excerpted in the curriculum and/or unit studies. In addition to the Tolkien trilogy, he read: Beowulf, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, A Midsummer Night's Dream and Macbeth. We listened to The Sword in the Stone audiobook on a long drive. And we read eight or 10 additional poems not covered in the curriculum.

 

Because my son did this pre-high school, I wasn't as worried about writing and composition. He worked through a grammar book alongside the curriculum, and I had him write a few short essays, and we called it good.