Separate lit and composition - credits?

[alisoncooks]

Apologies if this is covered in a tagged thread. 

DD has always taken a stand-alone writing course. Sometimes that course takes an hour+ a day. (She needs consistent and structured writing because of her LDs.)

She also has a reading/lit program that can often take an hour a day. 

My confusion…I mostly see transcripts having English 1 (comp and lit) as 1 combined credit. Is it pretty standard to have the above amount of work equal 1 credit?  

I wonder if it’s time to drop the separate writing program and choose a more writing-heavy lit program (if so…what?) to free up some of her time. She’s a bit bogged down with 2 hrs dedicated to English! Or maybe this is what it’s suppose to be…? 

[cintinative]

So you are right, most classes are combined lit and comp.  However, I wanted my kids to have lit that was based in certain time periods to correlate with their history, and in order to do that, I had to have them take a separate lit and comp class.  So they will get credit for lit, and credit for comp, and the classes will be listed separately because the providers have indicated they are both full credit hour courses.

How much work that ends up being is going to depend on the provider. For us, it is doable mostly because the lit class is very manageable.  Also if you wanted, you could so something like Wasko Lit + Write at Home and adjust the comp bit of it to be less than a credit hour. 

From a practical standpoint, this has allowed me to disentangle reading from writing. So where I have a kid who is stronger or weaker in writing, I can adjust their comp course selection accordingly. 

All that to say, I am sure we are oddballs in this regard, but you can split them.  😃

[Farrar]

Most school students are doing a combo class worth one credit. So most homeschoolers do that too. And some let it be a fatter credit, which is fine. It's good to have some really intensive credits. But if she's really doing two full credits, give her two full credits. That's fine and certainly not unheard of. And you can explain it in your school profile that this was part of your whole approach to language arts.

[alisoncooks]

4 minutes ago, Farrar said:

Most school students are doing a combo class worth one credit. So most homeschoolers do that too. And some let it be a fatter credit, which is fine. It's good to have some really intensive credits. But if she's really doing two full credits, give her two full credits. That's fine and certainly not unheard of. And you can explain it in your school profile that this was part of your whole approach to language arts.

This is sort of where I was leaning. She does lighter on some other subjects, so I was thinking this may just be a “fatter” 1 credit…

[royspeed]

alisoncooks:

FWIW, I see the merit in separating the study of literature from that of writing.

What's more, it drives me nuts that so many English courses pretend that writing = literary analysis — a peculiar type of writing that no student will produce after leaving school...

[ScoutTN]

I have separated them several years for the reasons given by pp:

My student wanted a particular lit class that doesn’t include writing.

Opportunity to focus on essay and research paper writing

I have found the freedom to just think about the literature without worrying about written literary analysis has been helpful for my student at times.

My junior will have a full credit for Lit (which includes Mr. Speed’s excellent Shakespeare intensive) and one for Composition this year. Separate courses. 

[alisoncooks]

So, for those that credit the two courses separately:  is one your required English and the other an elective? (If you have those sorts of parameters.)

[ScoutTN]

2 hours ago, alisoncooks said:

So, for those that credit the two courses separately:  is one your required English and the other an elective? (If you have those sorts of parameters.)

Yep

[Kendall]

I have done 1 hour a day for a full English credit each high school year (8th child will be high school next year).  That credit is focused on writing and does not include literature.  I also give a yearly 1/2 credit for literature read-which is associated with the history time period.  My high school children read literature for 30-45 minutes a day all year and I give a half credit for it (I just pick a semester to put it in at the end of the year).  The time they put in usually warrants another full credit, but it is very heavy in reading and light in output-only discussion based-so I only give a half credit. If they do end up writing about a book they have read in literature, that is done as part of the English time/credit.