Please describe (brag about!) your best/most successful/most creative courses

[EKT]

I'd like to expand my thinking as I work with my daughter to design next year's courses. Do you have any courses that you are super proud of? A course that was particularly creative or out-of-the-box? A course that your teen loved or co-created or self-designed? I'd love to hear about it! (Could be anything in any subject area; I'm purely seeking inspiration and ideas.) Thank you!

[Dmmetler]

Some of the best ones we did:

World History-we used textbooks written for secondary students in English from England, Australia, Canada, India, and South Africa (in English), read, and discussed, and created a notebook graphic novel history. Reading the same event from multiple countries was really eye opening.  (We started this in middle school, but one year of middle school ended up being skipped entirely, and ended it in 9th grade, and it went on the transcript in 9th)

 

Entomology-Used a college syllabus from NC State U that we found online, bought the textbooks, and put together labs, including the AP bio ethology lab, some simulations, and a lot of stuff from 4-H, particularly materials from Purdue University's extension program. 

 

Limnology/Freshwater Bio-Basically the same as Entomology. Lots of piecing it together from parts. Fish and Wildlife at the state level provided a lot of ideas. Anatomy and phyisology doubled as cooking, since we could often buy the whole organism, fresh, at a local market and do dissection while also preparing it for dinner.  (this was before my kid decided to become vegetarian....and might have contributed a bit :) )

 

Curriculum design and development-my kid spent a summer reading and researching HOW to teach a specific age group, and created a Herpetology online class, and then taught it. We actually have done this now for three classes, and are working on a 4th this summer for a younger population. You'd better believe I gave credit for it, because it was easily the same level of work my college students do for a similar class. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[EKT]

41 minutes ago, Dmmetler said:

Some of the best ones we did:

World History-we used textbooks written for secondary students in English from England, Australia, Canada, India, and South Africa (in English), read, and discussed, and created a notebook graphic novel history. Reading the same event from multiple countries was really eye opening.  (We started this in middle school, but one year of middle school ended up being skipped entirely, and ended it in 9th grade, and it went on the transcript in 9th)

 

Entomology-Used a college syllabus from NC State U that we found online, bought the textbooks, and put together labs, including the AP bio ethology lab, some simulations, and a lot of stuff from 4-H, particularly materials from Purdue University's extension program. 

 

Limnology/Freshwater Bio-Basically the same as Entomology. Lots of piecing it together from parts. Fish and Wildlife at the state level provided a lot of ideas. Anatomy and phyisology doubled as cooking, since we could often buy the whole organism, fresh, at a local market and do dissection while also preparing it for dinner.  (this was before my kid decided to become vegetarian....and might have contributed a bit 🙂 )

 

Curriculum design and development-my kid spent a summer reading and researching HOW to teach a specific age group, and created a Herpetology online class, and then taught it. We actually have done this now for three classes, and are working on a 4th this summer for a younger population. You'd better believe I gave credit for it, because it was easily the same level of work my college students do for a similar class. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I love all of these! (It's encouraging to hear that you found and used a college syllabus online; I've totally been looking through various college course catalogs to find courses we could copy or recreate at home.) Thanks for sharing!

[Lori D.]

A few past threads on PAGE 5 of "High School Motherlode #2", the big pinned thread at the top of the WTM High School Board might also provide some inspiration... 😉

making your own courses
Interest driven education and *real* tea time (how to design your own course of study)
Interest-led AND college-bound?
How to design theme-based study (including input/output) like 8FillTheHeart, Corraleno, etc.
How do you design your own course?
Making high school unique, non-traditional, speciality, out-of-the-box courses (kinds of courses, and ways of doing high school unconventionally)
Tell me things you do to give your high schooler a unique experience
Out-of-the-box high school courses

[Alicia64]

I bought a used book on teaching writing through movies. It was a lot of fun. We'd watch the movie and then have writing assignments around the movie.

I'm not sure that book is in print anymore, but this looks similar.

Also, I was still reading aloud to my 14 and 15 year olds for bonding, but also because I wanted to talk about the books rather than only read a report from them. So I remember reading Tom Sawyer and then Huckleberry Finn. And Fahrenheit 451.

If I had to do it over again, I'd make sure that the boys read about Winston Churchill. I never studied him in school and didn't know much about the guy who practically saved us from Hitler on his own until I read The Splendid and the Vile by Erik Larson. (You might want to read it first. I wouldn't read this until your daughter is 16 or 17.)

[Miss Tick]

Our self-designed courses always feel cooler and better put together on paper than they do in practice, but this is something i have struggled with always. On paper it is always just so. Sigh.

I, too, created a course based on a college syllabus I found online, Heroes and Heroines. It had a variety of sources (short film, graphic novel, articles) and then capitalized on the fact that we had read The Iliad and The Odyssey the year before. There were 8 or 9 written response discussion questions and one longer paper over the course of a semester.

[lewelma]

Great question! 

[daijobu]

Introduction to electronics using the book, Make: Electronics by Charles Platt.  

[Miss Tick]

58 minutes ago, daijobu said:

Introduction to electronics using the book, Make: Electronics by Charles Platt.  

I'm putting together this same class for next year! 😄

[Momto6inIN]

My DD loved the World Geography/Cultures/Religions course I designed for her in 9th grade!

National Geographic's People's of the World

DK's World Religions book - she read the chapters that corresponded with the major religions in each section of the world we studied

the first few introductory chapters of BJU's Cultural Geography text

a mostly nonfiction book list with a book from each continent/geographic area (Queen of Water for Central/South America, KonTiki for Oceania, Shades of Grey for Europe, Cry the Beloved Country for Africa, I Am Malala for the Middle East, and Mao's Last Dancer for Asia

At the end of each unit, she wrote a short paper on something she found interesting in her reading.

[EKT]

5 minutes ago, Momto6inIN said:

My DD loved the World Geography/Cultures/Religions course I designed for her in 9th grade!

National Geographic's People's of the World

DK's World Religions book - she read the chapters that corresponded with the major religions in each section of the world we studied

the first few introductory chapters of BJU's Cultural Geography text

a mostly nonfiction book list with a book from each continent/geographic area (Queen of Water for Central/South America, KonTiki for Oceania, Shades of Grey for Europe, Cry the Beloved Country for Africa, I Am Malala for the Middle East, and Mao's Last Dancer for Asia

At the end of each unit, she wrote a short paper on something she found interesting in her reading.

Oh, this is lovely! We just read I Am Malala this past year, but I love your idea of reading multiple books (of a similar type) from different geographical areas. 

[Momto6inIN]

41 minutes ago, EKT said:

Oh, this is lovely! We just read I Am Malala this past year, but I love your idea of reading multiple books (of a similar type) from different geographical areas. 

I don't get credit at all, it was a mishmash of ideas I got from other people on here 😊

[BakersDozen]

We had a super fun World Religions class/course last semester which was a hit. Based on Dale Tuggy's YouTube videos, added activities I either created or found on-line, etc.

But I think the Forensic Science class from a couple years ago was the most challenging and interesting. Each week the students walked into a new "scene": bone yard, blood rooms, weapons rooms, etc. We shot bullets and shattered glass, studied fabrics and plastics, and put lipstick on (yes, even the guys) so we could make lip prints on balloons and study them. It was a ton of work but oh, so worth it!

I let Ellen McHenry provide the rest of our most interesting and favorite courses.

[Not_a_Number]

I probably don't belong in this thread because I have little kids... but honestly, we haven't really designed classes as much as gone with the flow. So we read whatever we feel like, and then we discuss, and then we do the next thing we feel like 🙂 . And I rather like it that way. I have a loose plan for what I'd like to cover by some point in my head, but this takes the pressure off "designing the perfect course" for us. 

[daijobu]

4 hours ago, SusanC said:

I'm putting together this same class for next year! 😄

With Radio Shack closed it may be more challenging to source the parts, especially if you are as much of a newbie as I was.  DM me if you have questions.  ("Joe's Knows"--available from Amazon--sets of resistors and capacitors is handy to have on hand.)  

[madteaparty]

22 minutes ago, daijobu said:

With Radio Shack closed it may be more challenging to source the parts, especially if you are as much of a newbie as I was.  DM me if you have questions.  ("Joe's Knows"--available from Amazon--sets of resistors and capacitors is handy to have on hand.)  

I swear I have this book and the unopened kit that comes with it...file under aspirational purchasing. @SusanC Lmk if you want it—I think  DH is making his way to the homeship this august. 

[Clemsondana]

13 hours ago, Not_a_Number said:

I probably don't belong in this thread because I have little kids... but honestly, we haven't really designed classes as much as gone with the flow. So we read whatever we feel like, and then we discuss, and then we do the next thing we feel like 🙂 . And I rather like it that way. I have a loose plan for what I'd like to cover by some point in my head, but this takes the pressure off "designing the perfect course" for us. 

If you do that in high school (which you can!), at some point you'll have to figure out how to apportion their work into the required credits.  When mine were younger we were more free-form.  I did have a general plan of doing something for each subject, but wasn't attached to a specific set of books or even specific topics.  Now, though, I find that it's easier to have a list of things that we have to do, a list of things that we want to do, and a list of options for how do do them, and then I break them down into how the actual credits will be assigned, whether based on hours (like PE or, for older, fine arts) or book completion or some other standard.  

Back to the original question...freshman year this year was a lot of box-checking - I wasn't going to get creative with chemistry, alg 2, personal finance, etc, and kid liked checking stuff off the long list.  We did stick some interesting things together for PE and fine arts, but it wasn't really 'fun planning'.  🙂  Next year we're doing a horticulture elective (it could be science, but we're also doing biology).  We grow a lot, just assembled a greenhouse, and kid has taken an interest in things like pruning trees.  I bought a textbook from Future Farmers of America and have added reference books on gardening that we've used, along with seed and tree catalogs.  We're planning to do some hands-on stuff - soil testing, possible hand-fertilization if we can keep things happy in the greenhouse out of season, growing some new kinds of plants - in addition to what we normally do.  We'll also plan for the kids to research plant diseases and insects as issues come up.  Younger is doing this for their main science, possibly with a notebooking approach, but won't be using the textbook as a spine.  Actually, both kids may do this more as a journaling-style class, which we've never done.  We're also doing a 1/2 credit science fiction elective or English credit (kid is also taking an English class at co-op).  I found a 3-volume series from a college professor that teaches about sci fi (it should arrive tomorrow!) and kid has chosen some books from a list of 150 classic science fiction books.  They love this genre, so it's more like giving credit for a hobby that they write about some.  They are thinking that this will be a fun summer class, although it may turn into a full credit over 2 summers.

[Not_a_Number]

7 minutes ago, Clemsondana said:

 

If you do that in high school (which you can!), at some point you'll have to figure out how to apportion their work into the required credits.  When mine were younger we were more free-form.  I did have a general plan of doing something for each subject, but wasn't attached to a specific set of books or even specific topics.  Now, though, I find that it's easier to have a list of things that we have to do, a list of things that we want to do, and a list of options for how do do them, and then I break them down into how the actual credits will be assigned, whether based on hours (like PE or, for older, fine arts) or book completion or some other standard.  

 

Yeah, true. I know @lewelma had to do that! But I really like the outcomes of what we’ve been doing so far, so I may keep it up.

Edited April 19, 2021 by Not_a_Number

[BakersDozen]

18 hours ago, Not_a_Number said:

we haven't really designed classes as much as gone with the flow.

We've done this but mostly in the younger grades. No way could I have pulled off what I did with Forensic Science by going with the flow - too many supplies to order/track down! Plus my students have other classes and by planning things out it gives us a start/finish timeline so we can see how my classes fit in with others.

[Not_a_Number]

16 minutes ago, BakersDozen said:

We've done this but mostly in the younger grades. No way could I have pulled off what I did with Forensic Science by going with the flow - too many supplies to order/track down! Plus my students have other classes and by planning things out it gives us a start/finish timeline so we can see how my classes fit in with others.

Yeah, I’m sure it limits what one can do!! And I only have 2 kids. On the other hand, I can also make sure to meet them where they are at, which is my major talent as a teacher.

[JennyD]

On 4/18/2021 at 11:10 AM, Dmmetler said:

Some of the best ones we did:

World History-we used textbooks written for secondary students in English from England, Australia, Canada, India, and South Africa (in English), read, and discussed, and created a notebook graphic novel history. Reading the same event from multiple countries was really eye opening.  (We started this in middle school, but one year of middle school ended up being skipped entirely, and ended it in 9th grade, and it went on the transcript in 9th)

This is such a brilliant idea and I need to find a way for us to do something like this.  

[Farrar]

So, I love teaching wacky things and making plans, but my kids foiled me by specifically not wanting to do that for the majority of courses in high school. And the few things that they did more independently, like BalletBoy studied business and entrepreneurship and Mushroom studied and made video games - they did on their own. So... I didn't get to do as much as I wanted.

Probably the course that I'm most happy with that I planned on my own was the course that's now GPS Core One: Africa and Asia. But African and Asian history and lit is my THING. I'm also pretty happy with our American history and literature in four acts course that we've done this year.

[8filltheheart]

I have designed more courses than I can even begin to list.  I don't have any particular favorites bc each one has been designed for a particular student and they all have very different interests.  What would be considered a wonderful course for one would be a total flop for another.

Some that really influenced them as who they are as people and their interests as they got older would be 

• a stock market study 
• Anne of Green Gables study (following Anne and reading everything she mentioned reading including memorizing poetry)
• a philosophy of science and religion course
• communism in the 20th century
• black holes and dark matter

Some that have been more fun oriented and based on interest

• ecobiosystems
• the Inception study I described in your other thread
• a Tolkien study that led to comparing his unfinished Fall of Arthur with multiple other Arthurian epic poems
• a Lewis study
• a fairy tale study (this one was tons of fun and interesting.  We read about the cultural and psychoanalytical interpretations of fairy tales from around the world.  Dd ended up translating a Russian fairy tale into English.)

I'm designing a world geography/culture study next yr for my rising 6th and 10th graders.  It is going to a fun course that will even incorporate Ticket to Ride games (we own something like 7 of them),  Bible geography, and lit on top of the culture/history studies.

19 hours ago, Not_a_Number said:

I probably don't belong in this thread because I have little kids... but honestly, we haven't really designed classes as much as gone with the flow. So we read whatever we feel like, and then we discuss, and then we do the next thing we feel like 🙂 . And I rather like it that way. I have a loose plan for what I'd like to cover by some point in my head, but this takes the pressure off "designing the perfect course" for us. 

I'll echo what others have said.  I have designed my kids' courses for decades.  What I can pull of easily for my younger kids is definitely not translatable to middle and high school level courses.  I spend my summers researching resources and how I want to schedule things (loosely) in order to achieve the objectives for the course.  I could wing it, but it would be much lower quality with more limited resources.  Quality courses require planning and longer view vision than little kid rabbit trails.

[Porridge]

Nm

Edited April 20, 2021 by Porridge

[Porridge]

nm

Edited April 20, 2021 by Porridge

[EKT]

2 hours ago, 8filltheheart said:

I have designed more courses than I can even begin to list.  I don't have any particular favorites bc each one has been designed for a particular student and they all have very different interests.  What would be considered a wonderful course for one would be a total flop for another.

Some that really influenced them as who they are as people and their interests as they got older would be 

• a stock market study 
• Anne of Green Gables study (following Anne and reading everything she mentioned reading including memorizing poetry)
• a philosophy of science and religion course
• communism in the 20th century
• black holes and dark matter

Some that have been more fun oriented and based on interest

• ecobiosystems
• the Inception study I described in your other thread
• a Tolkien study that led to comparing his unfinished Fall of Arthur with multiple other Arthurian epic poems
• a Lewis study
• a fairy tale study (this one was tons of fun and interesting.  We read about the cultural and psychoanalytical interpretations of fairy tales from around the world.  Dd ended up translating a Russian fairy tale into English.)

I'm designing a world geography/culture study next yr for my rising 6th and 10th graders.  It is going to a fun course that will even incorporate Ticket to Ride games (we own something like 7 of them),  Bible geography, and lit on top of the culture/history studies.

I'll echo what others have said.  I have designed my kids' courses for decades.  What I can pull of easily for my younger kids is definitely not translatable to middle and high school level courses.  I spend my summers researching resources and how I want to schedule things (loosely) in order to achieve the objectives for the course.  I could wing it, but it would be much lower quality with more limited resources.  Quality courses require planning and longer view vision than little kid rabbit trails.

I was hoping you would chime in! 🙂 

Your Anne of Green Gables course and your fairy tale study are calling my name! Love those ideas! All the courses sound wonderful. 

And yes, I'm coming up against the thing some of you have mentioned: In the early years, we've just followed interests (with only the loosest of plans at the outset), but I do feel like I need to have a map for our high school courses or I (personally) don't feel I'll be able to get my kids where they need to go. (It's not uncommon for us to spend months on a single topic, which has been wonderful and deep! But it also means there are some things my kids haven't learned yet, that I think they should have. For instance, every time we've studied American history, we end up spending months in the Revolutionary War period because that's our favorite. But the trade-off is that we've never formally made it to World War II, aside from some excellent historical fiction and The Story of the World audiobooks. That's not nothing, but it's also not as thorough as I would like. In high school, I want to make sure I'm filling in some gaps and reaching some specific goals, and I (again, just me, personally) really need a plan to achieve that.) 

[8filltheheart]

FWIW, all of the courses I listed above were high school courses except for the AGG study.  We did that in 7th grade, but it was easily on par with an upper high school level course. Dd fell in love with epic poetry the yr we did that study. (She bought an 1800s ed of Marmion with her own $$ and it is one of her prized possessions.) Shakespeare became another love. It really impacted her in completely unexpected ways. 

[EKT]

14 minutes ago, 8filltheheart said:

FWIW, all of the courses I listed above were high school courses except for the AGG study.  We did that in 7th grade, but it was easily on par with an upper high school level course. Dd fell in love with epic poetry the yr we did that study. (She bought an 1800s ed of Marmion with her own $$ and it is one of her prized possessions.) Shakespeare became another love. It really impacted her in completely unexpected ways. 

Yes, I was actually thinking of it (the AGG course) for my rising 6th grader. She would love it!! 🙂

[8filltheheart]

17 minutes ago, EKT said:

Yes, I was actually thinking of it (the AGG course) for my rising 6th grader. She would love it!! 🙂

It would take quite an accelerated 6th grader.  My current college sr is the only one of my kids who could handle it in 7th (she couldn't have done it in 6th or wouldn't have enjoyed it as much, for sure.)  Marmion, Lady of the Lake, Prelude to Recollections of Early Childhood, Siege of Valencia, etc are all beyond most advanced 6th graders. King Lear (the most obvious allusion) was probably the easiest work we read.  AGG is written at a completely different level than what Anne herself quotes.  🙂

[lewelma]

I've been thinking about how to respond to this question. I posted this list in the previous thread, but are the geography courses I have designed for my younger. But when I was thinking about these courses, I came to realize that only the first one that I called "Geography" had pre-selected resources that we planned to go through. The rest of the classes were designed around questions, not resources.   

Geography - with trade books (Guns, Germs, and Steel + Collapse, NZ Geographic, National Geographic) 

1 The Social, Economic, and Political Impact of Colonialism on Africa

1 Physical and Cultural Geography of the Mackinzie Basin, NZ

0.5 NZ Demographics (comparing the causes and consequences of European vs Māori demographics over 150 years)

0.5 The Causes and Consequences of the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami - (the physics of waves, the immediate response, and the long term social and economic impact. This course also studied how International aid agencies work.)

0.5 The history of Early NZ 1800-1840 (Pre Treaty of Waitangi -- the founding document of NZ)

1 Māori worldview, values, and protocols. (This is what we are currently studying - also includes some history and language)

Edited April 20, 2021 by lewelma

[lewelma]

So to prepare question-based classes, I have to find the questions!  They need to be open ended and require nuanced thinking. They need to require my son to deal with different perspectives and values. They need to be engaging enough questions to get him to do a 100 hour research paper. In geography, NZ has excellent questions laid out, so I spend my summer studying these questions and what high-end thinking looks like.  What is critical to synthesize? How do you evaluate?  What is insightful? I find example papers and really study and evaluate how I should facilitate my son's exploration of a topic to develop a nuanced answer for a 10,000 word research paper. I have found that this process has really trained me to *think* like a geographer. The point is that when I prepare for a class whether in geography or another topic, I don't pre-learn the content and I don't find resources. Instead I study thinking, and teach myself how to think so that I can teach my son.  Have you ever seen the book, Engaging Ideas?

https://www.amazon.com/Engaging-Ideas-Professors-Integrating-Classroom/dp/0470532904/ref=rtpb_3?pd_rd_w=KTgTC&pf_rd_p=be844577-fee7-4bbc-8dda-083e56cc6f0d&pf_rd_r=TW2Y4K7H30ZQPH7CR6CQ&pd_rd_r=9e666dc1-e4f6-4e34-8dc0-03b87e744b19&pd_rd_wg=M4PpL&pd_rd_i=0470532904&psc=1

I have studied this book cover to cover, and it is how I have developed a high-end curriculum based on answering questions rather than focusing on knowledge acquisition.  It is actually written for university professors by a university professor, but it can be adapted to high school. It is excellent.

 

Edited April 20, 2021 by lewelma

[lewelma]

Here is a feel for how I prepared for, organized, and facilitated the class that ended up being called: The Social, Economic, and Political Impact of Colonialism on Africa.

My goal was to study the differences in development of two countries.  So in my preparation for this course, I found these questions:

1) Explain what natural and cultural factors contributes to the differences in development of two countries.

2) Explain how development can be measured both qualitatively and quantitatively and the limitations of these indicators in context of your case study. 

3) Explain the strategies used by each country for reducing the differences in their development.

I then went digging into how you would answer them. To be clear, I am not a geographer, and I have never even taken a social studies class except 2 very poorly-taught high-school history classes. So I really didn't know how to think this way. I didn't know what was important to consider when looking for causes and consequences. Or how to evaluate solutions, or how to deal with the legal ramifications. I really knew nothing. With quite a bit of effort, I found good information about what should be included in insightful answers, such as including issues of 1) natural and cultural processes, 2) different perspectives and values, 3) the impact of processes that shape and change environments and societies, 4) how elements can interact, 5) how change can be spatial or temporal, predictable or cyclic etc, 6) how sustainability can be incorporated into all solutions.  I studied many different texts I found online, and studied example research papers at a high school and university level.  I studied *thinking*. And I studied it enough that I could make explicit what is often only implicit. 

When we started the class, the first question for my ds was what 2 countries are you going to study?  My ds decided that he knew nothing about Africa, so wanted two countries in Africa.  It took us a few days to read enough on Africa to have any opinion at all. We needed a high and a low developed country to compare, so he chose Botswana and the DRC. Now let me be clear, I knew *nothing* at the time about Africa. I had not collected any resources. I had not prepared any content. I was NOT a subject matter expert that would teach. My goal was to facilitate the exploration of the subject, and to help him develope a nuanced understanding of the complexities as we worked our way through the research. 

Course Organization: 1) So the first thing we did was spend 2 weeks reading anything and everything we could find on Botswana and the DRC.  He spends 2.5 hours per day on geography, so this represented 25 hours. During this time it becomes clear what are the important issues and what are the best resources.  You start to realize that the UN, UNICEF, The World Bank, etc are big players and they have a LOT of content available to read on the web that is technical and detailed.  2) Next up is organizing our thinking to answer the 3 different questions.  This is where the questions direct what you read and how you read. This is where we use the approach described in Engaging Ideas, and this approach is very engaging just like the title says. LOL.  3) Finally, he starts writing the paper, but he continues to read and write at the same time until he is done. 4) After finishing the first question, we go after the second and then the third with the same steps resulting in 2 more research papers. He finally chooses to write one more paper on leadership that is a result of knowledge he has gained by answering the first three questions. 

Those four 10-15 page papers took about 240  hours to write (10 weeks 12 hours per week). He wrote the extra leadership paper because he came to believe that the 2 leaders at independence (Seretse Khama and Mobutu) were critically important to the development of the countries over the next 60 years. So we ended up having a detour into what makes a great leader, and in his final paper he integrated this study in leadership with his analysis of the political, economic, and social comparison of the two countries. High end stuff for 10th grade, and beyond the scope of even what I was planning from the start. 

By driving his interest through an engaging question, he had to learn a lot of content. From a silo-ed point of view, he was studying Development Economics, but we did it with case studies rather than with a textbook. Does he have all the knowledge that a textbook has? No. But he will remember his research project forever because it was *his*.

-------

All this is to say that course planning can look very different depending on how you approach it. I prepared over many months, but I didn't know we would be studying Africa until the day we started. 

Edited April 20, 2021 by lewelma

[EKT]

10 hours ago, 8filltheheart said:

It would take quite an accelerated 6th grader.  My current college sr is the only one of my kids who could handle it in 7th (she couldn't have done it in 6th or wouldn't have enjoyed it as much, for sure.)  Marmion, Lady of the Lake, Prelude to Recollections of Early Childhood, Siege of Valencia, etc are all beyond most advanced 6th graders. King Lear (the most obvious allusion) was probably the easiest work we read.  AGG is written at a completely different level than what Anne herself quotes.  🙂

She is advanced in this area! My ultra literary child. 🙂 But yes, I meant more that she would love a course designed around AGG, and I would adapt to suit. Appreciate your help so much!

[EKT]

7 hours ago, lewelma said:

So to prepare question-based classes, I have to find the questions!  They need to be open ended and require nuanced thinking. They need to require my son to deal with different perspectives and values. They need to be engaging enough questions to get him to do a 100 hour research paper. In geography, NZ has excellent questions laid out, so I spend my summer studying these questions and what high-end thinking looks like.  What is critical to synthesize? How do you evaluate?  What is insightful? I find example papers and really study and evaluate how I should facilitate my son's exploration of a topic to develop a nuanced answer for a 10,000 word research paper. I have found that this process has really trained me to *think* like a geographer. The point is that when I prepare for a class whether in geography or another topic, I don't pre-learn the content and I don't find resources. Instead I study thinking, and teach myself how to think so that I can teach my son.  Have you ever seen the book, Engaging Ideas?

https://www.amazon.com/Engaging-Ideas-Professors-Integrating-Classroom/dp/0470532904/ref=rtpb_3?pd_rd_w=KTgTC&pf_rd_p=be844577-fee7-4bbc-8dda-083e56cc6f0d&pf_rd_r=TW2Y4K7H30ZQPH7CR6CQ&pd_rd_r=9e666dc1-e4f6-4e34-8dc0-03b87e744b19&pd_rd_wg=M4PpL&pd_rd_i=0470532904&psc=1

I have studied this book cover to cover, and it is how I have developed a high-end curriculum based on answering questions rather than focusing on knowledge acquisition.  It is actually written for university professors by a university professor, but it can be adapted to high school. It is excellent.

 

I love the idea of pursuing questions. And I appreciate the book recommendation; I have added it to my list!

[Not_a_Number]

7 hours ago, lewelma said:

All this is to say that course planning can look very different depending on how you approach it. I prepared over many months, but I didn't know we would be studying Africa until the day we started. 

I feel like some of my "preparation" for my kids so far has wound up being posting on here 😂. I find it fascinating to learn about what has worked for other people and I appreciate it when people provide resources that has worked for them. So I do a lot of reading to figure out what the space of possible projects/classes is, then I brainstorm stuff with my kids. Again, this is for much younger kids, but I'm not sure I see this changing if we keep homeschooling through middle school and high school. 

 

7 hours ago, lewelma said:

I was NOT a subject matter expert that would teach. My goal was to facilitate the exploration of the subject, and to help him developed a nuanced understanding of the complexities as we worked our way through the research. 

Yeah, I can see us moving in this direction.

Edited April 20, 2021 by Not_a_Number

[EKT]

7 hours ago, lewelma said:

Here is a feel for how I prepared for, organized, and facilitated the class that ended up being called: The Social, Economic, and Political Impact of Colonialism on Africa.

My goal was to study the differences in development of two countries.  So in my preparation for this course, I found these questions:

1) Explain what natural and cultural factors contributes to the differences in development of two countries.

2) Explain how development can be measured both qualitatively and quantitatively and the limitations of these indicators in context of your case study. 

3) Explain the strategies used by each country for reducing the differences in their development.

I then went digging into how you would answer them. To be clear, I am not a geographer, and I have never even taken a social studies class except 2 very poorly-taught high-school history classes. So I really didn't know how to think this way. I didn't know what was important to consider when looking for causes and consequences. Or how to evaluate solutions, or how to deal with the legal ramifications. I really knew nothing. With quite a bit of effort, I found good information about what should be included in insightful answers, such as including issues of 1) natural and cultural processes, 2) different perspectives and values, 3) the impact of processes that shape and change environments and societies, 4) how elements can interact, 5) how change can be spatial or temporal, predictable or cyclic etc, 6) how sustainability can be incorporated into all solutions.  I studied many different texts I found online, and studied example research papers at a high school and university level.  I studied *thinking*. And I studied it enough that I could make explicit what is often only implicit. 

When we started the class, the first question for my ds was what 2 countries are you going to study?  My ds decided that he knew nothing about Africa, so wanted two countries in Africa.  It took us a few days to read enough on Africa to have any opinion at all. We needed a high and a low developed country to compare, so he chose Botswana and the DRC. Now let me be clear, I knew *nothing* at the time about Africa. I had not collected any resources. I had not prepared any content. I was NOT a subject matter expert that would teach. My goal was to facilitate the exploration of the subject, and to help him developed a nuanced understanding of the complexities as we worked our way through the research. 

Course Organization: 1) So the first thing we did was spend 2 weeks reading anything and everything we could find on Botswana and the DRC.  He spends 2.5 hours per day on geography, so this represented 25 hours. During this time it becomes clear what are the important issues and what are the best resources.  You start to realize that the UN, UNICEF, The World Bank, etc are big players and they have a LOT of content available to read on the web that is technical and detailed.  2) Next up is organizing our thinking to answer the 3 different questions.  This is where the questions direct what you read and how you read. This is where we use the approach described in Engaging Ideas, and this approach is very engaging just like the title says. LOL.  3) Finally, he starts writing the paper, but he continues to read and write at the same time until he is done. 4) After finishing the first question, we go after the second and then the third with the same steps resulting in 2 more research papers. He finally chooses to write one more paper on leadership that is a result of knowledge he has gained by answering the first three questions. 

Those four 10-15 page papers took about 240  hours to write (10 weeks 12 hours per week). He wrote the extra leadership paper because he came to believe that the 2 leaders at independence (Seretse Khama and Mobutu) were critically important to the development of the countries over the next 60 years. So we ended up having a detour into what makes a great leader, and in his final paper he integrated this study in leadership with his analysis of the political, economic, and social comparison of the two countries. High end stuff for 10th grade, and beyond the scope of even what I was planning from the start. 

By driving his interest through an engaging question, he had to learn a lot of content. From a silo-ed point of view, he was studying Development Economics, but we did it with case studies rather than with a textbook. Does he have all the knowledge that a textbook has? No. But he will remember his research project forever because it was *his*.

-------

All this is to say that course planning can look very different depending on how you approach it. I prepared over many months, but I didn't know we would be studying Africa until the day we started. 

Thank you for illustrating your approach in such detail. I think there are many areas my daughter would love to use this approach, particularly in art history. You're giving me lots of ideas; appreciate your sharing!

[klmama]

21 hours ago, Plum said:

I bought that book after you recommended it on a previous post. I'm ashamed to say I haven't cracked it open yet. I guess I have something to do this weekend since I still haven't even begun planning for next school year. 

I did the same thing!  I've just started planning for next year, and it's challenging; my dc will be a senior and wants to take too many courses.  I have to keep reminding dc that it's okay to save some topics for college, LOL!  Maybe we can figure out a way to combine some of them by taking a questioning approach.  I'll pull that book off the shelf and take a look.

 

[Eos]

"How to Climb 5.12" was an English - PE - History - Geography - Geology mashup.  My oldest was a dedicated rock climber throughout high school and became a professional guide in junior and senior year.  This class included reading true climbing stories, historical climbing accounts, developing map and compass skills, a WFR certification, writing 12 essays about his research, an insane amount of climbing and fitness, geology lab field work, and yes, he did learn to climb at the 5.12 level. 

He and we thought he'd become an environmental / outdoor educator.  His college major and current career?  Chemical engineering, nearing an MS in nuclear engineering.  

Edited April 22, 2021 by Harpymom

[lewelma]

DS is taking Earth Science at the local university this term, and he has a research paper to write based on a topic they have not covered in class.  He has to pick 1 out of 8 topics, and we have decided that after the class is over, we will write the other 7 before the year ends in December. Looks like the professor read the book I posted above. 🙂

Here is the question he just finished: Describe the current sources of Phosphorus for agricultural production, and the challenges that human society faces in the coming years as the P supplies are potentially depleted. Discuss the changes that might need to occur in P source/recycling in order to maintain the agriculture needed to support the Earth's current (and future) population.

Then they have listed 4 introductory references to get you started on your research.  This paper took 40 hours for my son to research an write it. I bet you could find good questions online if you looked into university course work.