Need advice about English - dual enrollment

[Kassia]

My daughter is in 9th grade and we were going to do a year of American Literature at home this year.  I'm not crazy about the curriculum we chose so we talked about her taking English classes for DE (she is already taking Spanish as a DE student).  

 

Ideally, she'd start in the freshman English comp class in the fall and then move to American lit in the spring.  But, since it's so late, the only English comp class available is an accelerated class for 8 weeks which starts in October and runs through December.  She's nervous about doing that because of the pace.

 

The only DE English class that doesn't have English comp as a prerequisite is creative writing.  She would love that class, but I don't know if that's a good class for her to take as a freshman or if it's an okay class to have on her transcript.  She could take that in the fall and then move to English Comp for a full semester in the spring and then do American Lit next fall.  

 

What do you think?  Is taking Creative Writing okay for freshman year if she takes English composition in the spring?  I'm also nervous about her going so long without writing *formal* papers since we finished her last English class in May and then going straight to a college composition class.  

 

Please help!  I'm so confused as to what is best for her.  

 

 

[RootAnn]

If she would love it, I don't see what would be wrong with it. I wouldn't do the accelerated Comp class, but my oldest is allergic to the pencil.

[Melissa B]

My eldest dd took poetry through DE in 10th grade. She had to attend poetry and short story readings at coffee houses as part of her class. She found both those readings and the reading aloud of student work VERY eye-opening. Creative writing classes seem to allow a very wide spectrum of subject matter.  :eek: That said she has now declared English (poetry) as one of her majors, so it didn't scar her for life or anything. 

[quark]

Is there any way to reach out to the professor to ask? Or if the professor has a Rate My Professor profile, do the students who reviewed him/ her say anything about the content of the Creative Writing class?

[katilac]

Are you okay with her hearing lots of mature content, and discussing it in class? Sex, drugs, violence? Because that's going to happen in the regular composition class, and then twice as much in the creative writing class. 

 

I am okay with it at 16, but my particular kids probably would have struggled with it a bit any earlier than that. Not in the sense of "I've never heard such things!" but more embarrassment at sitting there while this person is reading a paper about their real life, um, exploits, and then being expected to respond. (There tends to be lots of peer review and editing in these classes). Other kids would just shrug it off. 

 

If she is not a struggling writer, I wouldn't worry too much about taking time off - the gen ed composition classes are pretty basic, they are trying to get many students up to speed. 

[Kassia]

Thank you!  

 

This is an online class, but I assume there will be a discussion board.  I did look at Rate My Professor and there was nothing about the content.  I'm not too concerned about it because she is very mature for her age, but maybe I'm just being naive.  The English Comp class will also be online (she would take that in the spring).  

 

I guess my biggest concern is if a creative writing class would be more of an elective in 9th grade rather than an English class since she hasn't taken many composition or literature classes yet (we did do Oak Meadow's Intro to Lit and Composition last year).  I can't help but feel that she should get those classes out of the way first, but maybe I'm overthinking this.  She loves creative writing.