Excellence in Literature Question...

[momtofive]

I have a few questions about EIL and how it works in planning the English credit for high school. I'll have 2 high school age students next year, an 11th grader and a 9th grader. For my 11th grader, I'd love to use EIL American, as he'll be studying US History as well. Is it true that EIL could be enough for our whole english credit? Or would I have to add a writing curriculum? Maybe just a brush up on keeping grammar sharp like Fix-It or EG Ultimate book? I'd absolutely love it if this could fulfill our literature AND composition. What we're doing this year is overwhelming with lots of pieces and long days, and we need to keep english much more manageable next year.

 

For my 9th grader, I'm confused on whether I would start with Windows to the World, or EIL Intro to Literature. He's not had formal literature study yet. And if we go with WttW (which is where I'm leaning), would I need a writing curriculum too? And is that enough for the year (along with a grammar book like Fix-It or EG)? I have EIW 10, and IEW SWI-C that we've used with older brother. Maybe I could incorporate one of those?

 

I feel like I'm still trying to figure this high school credit stuff out, and would greatly appreciate any thoughts or advice. Thanks! ;)

[RootAnn]

I personally think you could use EIL as a full English credit as there are plenty of assignments for the composition part of the credit. You will want to go through & figure out how much of the writing to assign for each section.

 

I originally had a separate writing course, so I'd cut down on the amount of writing my DD would be doing with EIL. When the online course didn't work out the way I'd hoped, I was able to put back in those writing sections to make it a full credit.

 

I don't have any help to offer for the 9th grader as I haven't actually used WttW, although I own it.

[The Girls' Mom]

EIL has plenty of writing, IMO.  I've used it several times as a full English credit.  No grammar needed in the upper grades unless your student is still having issues with it.  

 

 

[Pat in MI]

May I jump in here and ask,  does EIL give writing instruction or should the student have had instruction in essay writing or __________ before using it?

 

[Penelope]

I am using the intro EIL book this semester.

 

My student has been through all three levels of WWS and has not needed any additional writing instruction before tackling the papers and essays in this book. I have read some essays with him in preparation, and discussed writing a good thesis statement, things like that. The EIL books do have examples of the essays they assign.

 

I don't have WTTW, but we have talked about how to annotate books and had a lot of book discussions re:literary analysis, so I think if you were willing to do that yourself, you wouldn't need WTTW depending on the child. But EIL intro will not teach lit. analysis on it's own, and does not explicitly teach essay writing, in answer to your questions. It is basically a guide with assignments, lots and lots of web links for background information and other connections, and formats with examples of the papers and essays assigned. Many of the links are linked from the curriculum website. I think a lot is expected of the parent/teacher or perhaps other resources, to facilitate and scaffold. I would venture a guess that a parent who isn't comfortable with writing and with discussing literature, with a child who doesn't come to those things naturally, probably isn't going to be satisfied with EIL.

 

I think it is enough for an English credit, except for ninth grade I think something for grammar reinforcement is in order. Personally, I would not want to use just this book for English, because I like having more choice in books and would not want to assign just the books that are assigned in the curriculum. But I do think it is enough for ninth grade, especially if you do the honors version, which has additional books for reading-- I would say it is quite heavy on reading in that case, certainly much more than the average public school honors class expects ninth graders to read.

Edited March 12, 2016 by Penelope

[Mom22ns]

I used EIL as a full English credit each time we used it (ds 2 years, dd 1 year). It does not include writing instruction, but does have plenty of writing assignments. It also has a model and grading rubric for each type of paper.

 

I never used Windows to the World. I've seen one person post that you should, but neither of my kids did and we didn't miss it. :)