Great Books on transcript

[Osmosis Mom]

For those of you who have done this -how did you put it on the course descriptive part? I mean, you are supposed to have some grammar, writing as well so how did you work that in? Did you add other English classes apart from 4 years of Great Books?

[Michelle in MO]

Generally speaking, I've heard that colleges don't like to see too many English credits on a transcript. So, depending on which year in high school you're creating the transcript for, you might put "English 1" or "English Literature 1" and then write a course description of which books you covered.

 

When my oldest and middle daughters were in 9th and 7th grades, respectively, I put down something like "English I" or "English Lit. I" and then wrote a complete course description of the books that they read (we did Omnibus I, but not all of it by any means). Included in that English credit was grammar, writing, and vocabulary work.

 

However, when they were in 10th and 8th grades and we were doing Omnibus II, I gave them two credits in English: one for Medieval-Renaissance Literature, and one for English II. But, they did a lot of English that year: my oldest had four writing tutorials (one with Bravewriter, and three with Cindy Marsch of Writing Assessment Services, and my middle daughter also participated in the latter three tutorials with Cindy), plus they completed two vocabulary books--Wordly Wise and VCR--plus they did grammar every single day. For Omnibus II, we did almost all of the readings, and either tested on or wrote about each book that we read. They each received well over 450 hours of work in English alone that year, so I felt fairly well-justified in giving them two English credits.

 

I do keep all of their paperwork and documentation, in case colleges have difficulties with seeing this on their transcripts. With my middle daughter, it won't matter, because that work was completed before 9th grade and she's currently enrolled in a private school. It might become an issue with my oldest daughter, but the guidance counselor told me that colleges generally look at the last two years of a student's work in high school. So, I'll have to see what happens and whether or not it becomes an issue as far as credits are concerned. I don't think it will be an issue, but just in case, I'm prepared---hopefully! :)

[Nan in Mass]

My son has on his transcript:

Classical Literature and Analysis

Medieval and Renaissance Literature and Analysis

Enlightenment to Modern Literature and Analysis

Science Fiction

(that makes 4 years of literature)

CC Composition 1 (1/2 year)

CC Speech (1/2 year)

Western History

US History

US Government and Economics (1/2 year)

Geography (1/2 year)

 

Most of the work done for those was done in great books (except the CC classes). Geography also included The Geography Colouring Book and travel.

 

We did grammar in Latin, so I didn't worry about not including that. And we did a ton more writing than a semester of CC composition, but I didn't worry about giving credit for it. Time-wise, he could have had three years of writing credit, but I didn't want to give too many English credits. We did a little vocab here and there but I didn't worry about trying to give credit for it.

 

HTH

-Nan

[Michelle in AL]

Here's a copy of my course descriptions for the 9th grade.

 

English 9: This yr long course covers composition, grammar, spelling, vocabulary, reading comprehension and literary elements. 9 novels by C.S. Lewis are read and analyzed along with various short stories. A unit on the elements of poetry is also included. 1.0 credit

 

Great Books 1: This class covers some of the great books of ancient history including Genesis, Exodus. 1st and 2nd Samuel, The Epic of Gilgamesh, portions of the Code of Hammurabi, The Odyssey, books 1,2 & 7 from The Histories by Herodotus, Oresteia by Aeschylus, portions of Plutarch’s Lives, Oedipus the King and Antigone by Sophocles, The Last Days of Socrates and The Aeneid. 1.0 credits.

 

I didn't include it as one english credit because it definitely filled 2hrs of work/day.

[Osmosis Mom]

Interesting replies. For oldest dd I wrote Eng. 9, 10, 11, 12, but I am not sure yet if that was an advantage or not. She was a voracious reader and had read several Great Books (and discussed them), but this fact was buried in the description, not on the transcript.

 

Still mulling this over.

[Nan in Mass]

Ellie, who has had tons of experience, says you should do that. I wanted the transcript itself to show what my son had done so I gave descriptive titles.

[Ruth in NC]

I divided his largely Great Book/classics reading into different time periods and also divided them into history and literature courses. Because he took community college classes in the 11th and 12th grades, these courses were 9th and 10th grade.

 

History of the Ancient and Medieval World

Literature of the Ancient and Medieval World

etc

 

In the course descriptions I listed the books related to each course.

[Chris in VA]

We did Omnibus 1 and 2, Sonlight 300, and our own 12th grade stuff.

 

On the English portion of the transcript I've got:

 

English 9: Great Books of the Ancient World (Literature,Composition,Grammar and Vocabulary)

English 10: Great Books of the Medieval World (Literature and Composition)

English 11: Great Books of the 20th Century (Literature and Composition)

English 12: Poetry and Short Story Semester

English 12: Great Books of the Early Modern Era

 

I gave 1.5 cr for English 9 because we did so much, and I gave .5 cr for each of the English 12 sections.

 

History looks like this on our transcript:

 

World History: Ancients

World History: Medieval

World History: 20th Century American History in World Context

American Government

 

He got one credit for each of those, except Gov't, which was half a cr. He also took psychology for 1 cr at a CC, which is an elective but can be counted as a social studies credit if a school requires 4 credits in social sciences. When we did history, we not only read the GB's, but we also read Spielvogel and some of Barron's World History the Easy Way (and a few chapters of MOH 2).

 

I also included a book list with the transcript.

[Osmosis Mom]

Well, to me those course-names would be too long as everything is one line on our transcript. I call classes that were much deeper than anticipated etc. for Honors and am going to list them as Honors right on the transcript, something I didn't do with oldest dd (I wrote Honors on the description). So, some of your suggested course-names would not work for me.

 

What about Rhetoric? Dd has done a lot of public speaking and I was planning on giving her a rhetoric credit. Has anyone done this or is it too weird?

[Nan in Mass]

I would do it. My son had a CC speech class, so he has "speech" on his transcript. If I had used TWTM rhetoric resources, I would have called it "rhetoric". I labelled anything that required extensive travel, and anything taken at the CC as honours. Some people double the credits for a CC class, but I didn't.

[kate in seattle]

What about Rhetoric? Dd has done a lot of public speaking and I was planning on giving her a rhetoric credit. Has anyone done this or is it too weird?

 

Both of my teens have been through the basic Toastmasters books (through a homeschool Gavel Club). I just listed it as Speech on the transcript. (Like you, I used very common, short names on the transcript. I heard this advice from an Admissions Officer for UW). They had to take speech in CC for the AA, which I then called Speech II on the transcript. My personal opinion is the Toastmaster's speech work was much more significant, but colleges are interested in seeing classes that progress in difficulty and since the Speech II class was a college class I justified calling it Speech because of that.

 

I found that transcripts had to be tweaked slightly even for kids who had taken basically the same classes.

 

kate in seattle