moonlight Posted July 18, 2016 Share Posted July 18, 2016 I haven't decided if DS 13 will be in 8th or 9th grade in the Fall. I probably won't know until it is done what year it was! :-) That being said, I want to make sure that his coursework for English 9/Lit and Comp is enough for a high school credit. -BraveWriter Expository Essay class -Reading through The Elements of Style -The Elegant Essay -Killgallon Sentence Composing for High School or Paragraphs for High School -One Shakespeare book along with the GC lectures pertaining to it. -Speech class: Informative and Persuasive (20 hours for the year) -Literature: His Dark Materials trilogy, Frankenstein, David Copperfield, Bullfinch's Mythology, Pride and Prejudice, House of the Scorpion, Martian Chronicles, Animal Farm, Code Name Verity, Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, Brave New World, Watershed Down, The Outsiders, Lord of the Flies, Boy in Striped Pajamas, The Foundation Series, 1 HG Wells book, Warriors Don't Cry, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and I am Malala. Is this enough writing for the year? It seems light to me. Literature: Is this enough? Most of these books will be discussed in a book club. Do we need to go deeper? They cover a lot of the elements from Teaching the Classics in there. Should he have some written literary analysis at this stage? I also feel like my book list is all over the place. I don't know if I should organise his reading into themes. Should I add more? I want this to be a rigorous course totalling around 150-180 hours. Thanks! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mosaicmind Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 It looks good to me. Here is what we are doing for 9th English & Literature Analytical Grammar Brave Writer English from the Roots Up For Literature we are doing this (The Greeks by Roman Roads Media) THE EPICS BOOK LIST: – The Iliad – The Odyssey DRAMA ANDL LYRIC BOOK LIST:(Roman Roads Reader recommended for this unit) – Aeschylus (The Oresteia) – Sophocles (Oedipus the King and Oedipus at Colonus) – Aristophanes (The Frogs) – Eurpipides (The Medea and The Trojan Women) – Sappho (various poems) – Pindar (collection of Odes) – Theocritus (Idyls I, VI, VII, and XI) – Hesiod (Works and Days) – Quintus of Smyrna (The Fall of Troy) – Apollonius of Rhodes (The Argonautica) THE HISTORIES BOOK LIST: – The Landmark Herodotus: The Histories – The Landmark Thucydides – Xenophon: The Persian Expedition THE PHILOSOPHERS BOOK LIST: (Roman Roads Reader available for this unit.) – Plato: Six Greek Dialogues – The Basic Works of Aristotle I also purchased Beyond the Book Report seasons 1-3 to pull things out of that he will need. I purchased Norton's Anthology of World Lit A,B,C,D,E,&F. I think that's it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mom22ns Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 Literature: Is this enough? :001_huh: It is definitely enough. Neither one of my kids could have made it through all of that and ds is an English major in college. You have 18 books there, that is barely 2 weeks each. Is there going to be any writing about the books? I think the variety is nice, but you could organize them into quarterly themes if you wanted to. The writing is enough too, although I wouldn't say it is too much. All of it together would have taken my kids 1-2 hours /day all year. I see it as a solid 240 hours of work. Maybe your ds is faster than mine (not hard to accomplish), but I would be prepared to scale that if it is taking a lot more time than you had planned. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Haiku Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 (edited) Is this enough writing for the year? It seems light to me. Literature: Is this enough? I think it looks like plenty. I think it looks like more than you need. You have a full writing program supplemented with three extra resources. You have at least 24 books (and maybe more, depending on how many of the Foundation series you plan to read; just the trilogy, or all six?). How could he have time to actually work with the books rather than just reading them and discussing at book club (which, depending on how it is run, is probably not enough actual study of the book)? On top of that, you have at least 1/4 a credit of Shakespeare and a supplemental speech class. Where do you plan to find the time for all of this? Frankly, that seems like a massive amount of work for one English credit. By comparison, my dd's 9th grade English credit will consist of: Oak Meadow English 9: Introduction to Literature and Composition. Edited July 19, 2016 by Haiku 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moonlight Posted July 19, 2016 Author Share Posted July 19, 2016 The plan was to do no writing for the books that he reads. He really enjoys book club and most of the book selections are for that. Some of the books he is reading this summer and I was just going to include them in his books read. The plan was to not analyse the books any further than that. I guess what I was asking if it was enough was me asking more if it is enough to just read them and not study them deeper. The Elegant Essay is a 12 week program. The Expository Essay class from Bravewriter is 6 weeks long. Killgallon will go on all year, but it is fairly quick to go through for him 2-3 times a week. I am not sure if the speech class would be included as part of his English credit or an elective? The only deeper lit analysis I planned on doing was the Shakespeare book along with the TC lectures. So, would you give me different advice with those details? How would you handle the long book list for a class as you keep records? Would you include it as part of the class if it wasn't thoroughly analysed? Oh, and I was just thinking the trilogy for the Foundation series. Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Haiku Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 (edited) Ok. I was under the impression that Elegant Essay was a full-year program. I have a friend who used it with her daughter over the course of an entire year. In reading the description, though, it sounds like maybe my friend worked through it a bit at a time and then had her daughter spend a few extra weeks between lessons working on each type of essay. Personally, I don't think that it's enough for lit to just read a bunch of books and talk about them at book club. To me, "literature" includes literary analysis and writing about books. Were it me, I would chose half a dozen of those books and look for free lit guides online for him to work through. That would give him some practice working with and writing about the books, which is what a college-prep lit program should provide. Actually, were it me I would just use a single resource for lit and comp. ;) After years of using multiple resources for a complete LA course, I decided this year to simplify by using just one program. So far it's going well. You might not enjoy such an approach, however. I would be completely overwhelmed by the huge variety of resources you are planning. But that's just me. With the exception of a need to incorporate literary analysis and writing about the books your son reads, I certainly think you have "enough." It's just a matter of finding a way to arrange it all efficiently and not duplicating your effort. Edited July 19, 2016 by Haiku 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moonlight Posted July 19, 2016 Author Share Posted July 19, 2016 Thanks! It seems from the advice that I have gotten that I need to incorporate more literary analysis. I'll choose a few books and do that. I thought about doing Lost Tools of Writing, but couldn't figure out if it was secular. And I don't have a physical copy to look through it all. Since he will be reading most (if not all) of these books, should I keep track of them somewhere anyways or would it be irrelevant? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moonlight Posted July 19, 2016 Author Share Posted July 19, 2016 I've never looked at lit guides. Any advice for some that are not busywork and more analysis heavy?? :-) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moonlight Posted July 19, 2016 Author Share Posted July 19, 2016 Ok, I think we will analyse these books in some form or another. Still have to figure out what to do. Frankenstein Animal Farm Brave New World Watershed Down The Outsiders Lord of the Flies Warriors Don't Cry 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JadeOrchidSong Posted July 19, 2016 Share Posted July 19, 2016 Haiku, what is that one program for lit and comp that you mentioned uppost? Just curious. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Haiku Posted July 20, 2016 Share Posted July 20, 2016 It's Oak Meadow English 9: The Hero's Journey. The books, poems, and short stories the student reads are all related to the hero cycle as described in Joseph Campbell's The Hero With a Thousand Faces. My daughter is enjoying it, and I'm finding it to be well done. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RootAnn Posted July 20, 2016 Share Posted July 20, 2016 We took a semester to work through Elegant Essay. It wasn't very helpful here, but I found it difficult to use as a teacher. Talking about books is enough literary analysis for us. (DD did one big lit analysis paper each semester this year. She used Excellence in Literature as a framework. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moonlight Posted July 21, 2016 Author Share Posted July 21, 2016 The Oak Meadow Hero's Journey looks really good to me. I was actually determined to do it in 9th grade with DS. But, I think I read somewhere that it would appeal to an art loving child. I don't know why that one claim/statement stuck with me, but it did. I wonder if I should look at it again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Haiku Posted July 21, 2016 Share Posted July 21, 2016 It certainly appeals to my art-loving child. She told me her favorite part of it is the main lesson book art projects. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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