High School Scheduling to prepare for College

[clh2]

I have a senior and freshman in HS and they prefer taking the harder classes mainly because the students in those classes tend to take studies more seriously and they are away from the troublemakers, that's their words not mine. They always complain more about their regular general classes that they have to take.

My 15 YO DD (soph) says the exact same thing. She is in 3 honors classes this year, and is doing 2 AP's and 1 honors class next year.

 

[agnes!]

This is kind of similar to a thread I started this morning.
http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=2383533

agnes!

 

[golfgal]

My dd13 is in all honors classes right now, as well. She was recommended for all honors next year, but wants to take regular english. I'm letting her, because it is her weakest subject, but I'm hoping she won't like it, and take honors the following year (I have my BA in english, this is killing me, but I've typed her papers for her, and it's not her strongest subject - she excells in science and math). She did get her first B of her life in english last semester (91), and she doesn't have a great teacher (I know - DH and I both had her!).

It's hard letting them make their own choices!

Check with the school to see if they allow this. Our school will only VERY RARELY allow a kid that has not taken the prerequisite honors course as a freshman move into the honors course as a sophomore. I would STRONGLY encourage her to take the honors English. So what if she gets a B instead of an A, she will be a lot better off doing that.

We had conferences at school last night so this was a hot topic as the kids start class registration next week. One theme that kept coming up from parents, teachers and administrators was the college bound kids will do better being around other college bound kids, period. There is a pretty big difference in the drive and work ethic between the regular classes and the honors classes (we also have a middle track at our school so that helps some too). The biggest decision we are facing is whether to do honors or AP with our soon to be sophomores. They will probably take AP science, social and English and honors math. DD might take honors science vs the AP science though.

 

[Darcy03231]

I would check with your school to see if a child does really well in the lower classes if they get moved up to honors.

Our high school starts most all the kids our their freshman year with a mixture of honors and extensions (our courses are AP, honors, extentions and foundations). Rarely does a student have all honors classes first semester freshman year. Once they see how they're doing classes get adjusted for the second semester (we're on block scheduling - class schedule changes completely the second semester unless its a specialized class that meets all year), depending on how well they did, teacher recommendations, etc. Some honors students get moved up to AP, some extensions students get moved to honors, some extensions students get moved to foundations, some honors students get moved to extensions. The goal is to get the kids into the classes for their level of learning. My son has some honors, some extensions and some foundations classes. My daughter is in all honors/AP classes. They really try to tailor the class level to the child's ability.

 

[ZephyrHawk]

Sorry, I'm going to disagree with that. My GPA, while not "astronomically high", is high. I will not be the valedictorian of my class, but I will be getting several thousands of dollars in scholarship money because of my GPA. GPA does amount for something more than "a chance to be valedictorian".

Good for you! I certainly wouldn't recommend to anyone not to try to get the best GPA they can. That woud be silly. However, when someone (and this is not directed at the above poster in any way) is taking art and home ec because they know they can't keep their 4 point if they go into AP calc, well, there's something not right about that.

When I was in high school I had a hard time at one of the advanced classes. I went to the teacher and asked for extra credit. I worked extra hard and he gave it to me, but I still didn't get an A in his class. I ended up with a 3.89 (no weighting), 8th in my class. Only 1 person ahead of me on that list took any AP clases at all, and she took less than I did. One of the valedictorians had a problem in the same hard class I took extra credit for. She brought her mom to school and cried and cried to the same teacher until he caved and gave her an A. She kept her 4 point.

 

[golfgal]

Good for you! I certainly wouldn't recommend to anyone not to try to get the best GPA they can. That woud be silly. However, when someone (and this is not directed at the above poster in any way) is taking art and home ec because they know they can't keep their 4 point if they go into AP calc, well, there's something not right about that.

When I was in high school I had a hard time at one of the advanced classes. I went to the teacher and asked for extra credit. I worked extra hard and he gave it to me, but I still didn't get an A in his class. I ended up with a 3.89 (no weighting), 8th in my class. Only 1 person ahead of me on that list took any AP clases at all, and she took less than I did. One of the valedictorians had a problem in the same hard class I took extra credit for. She brought her mom to school and cried and cried to the same teacher until he caved and gave her an A. She kept her 4 point.

This is why our school does a regular and honors ranking-if you don't take honors courses there is no way you will be ranked in the top of the class-period. You can still graduate with your 4.0 but you won't graduate with honors.

 

[mjkacmom]

Check with the school to see if they allow this. Our school will only VERY RARELY allow a kid that has not taken the prerequisite honors course as a freshman move into the honors course as a sophomore. I would STRONGLY encourage her to take the honors English. So what if she gets a B instead of an A, she will be a lot better off doing that.

We had conferences at school last night so this was a hot topic as the kids start class registration next week. One theme that kept coming up from parents, teachers and administrators was the college bound kids will do better being around other college bound kids, period. There is a pretty big difference in the drive and work ethic between the regular classes and the honors classes (we also have a middle track at our school so that helps some too). The biggest decision we are facing is whether to do honors or AP with our soon to be sophomores. They will probably take AP science, social and English and honors math. DD might take honors science vs the AP science though.

I already checked, and she can switch the following year. What makes me angry is that the guidance counsellors went into the honors english classes, and warned them about honors 9th grade english, saying how hard it is and will take up all of their free time! I know someone who took it, found it really hard, took regular the next year, and was frustrated at how dumb-downed it was, and wants to go back to honors.

 

[erincon23]

My DS14 will be starting HS next year. He's really struggled in middle school -- not necessarily academically, but he's had severe anxiety issues, and this year, he's just back to school this week after dealing with a crippling back injury for the past few months. So, he's developed a dislike of school, and as we get ready for registration, he doesn't want to take the honors classes he would probably be recommended for.

He really hates math -- ok, he can stay in regular -- but he likes science, and doesn't want to do honors biology. He excels in English, but refuses to take honors English. When he took his HS placement test, he took it late because of the back problem, and they didn't offer the Honors English placement test at that time.

I talked with an English teacher at our high school about honors English -- he said that the school will basically do what the parent requests despite the results of the placement test. He feels that the honors class kids tend to be more accepting of our "special snowflakes" -- which this kid definitely is, and he thought Andy would enjoy both the challenge and the kids much more than regular (he's met Andy several times -- this teacher is also the theatre director, and I've been very involved with the theatre since my older DS was a freshman).

SO! How do I convince my son that he should try the honors English? I really think he'd be bored silly by the regular, and he really should be taking the higher level classes. He's not moved by the college prep argument, doesn't want to do the extra work. Some kids, you can just tell them that that's what they're doing and they cave; this one would stop doing homework, not participate, etc. just to get sent back down to the regular English. Unless it's his idea, he doesn't do it. Any suggestions?

Erin

 

[MrsPete]

Check with the school to see if they allow this. Our school will only VERY RARELY allow a kid that has not taken the prerequisite honors course as a freshman move into the honors course as a sophomore. I would STRONGLY encourage her to take the honors English. So what if she gets a B instead of an A, she will be a lot better off doing that.

Our students aren't allowed to change courses mid-semester (meaning that you cannot begin in regular and say at mid-term, "Hey, move me to honors"), but registering for the next year's class at a higher level is no problem. They'll look to see that the student made an A (or at least a high B) in the regular class, and they'll not think twice about letting the student "move up".

I also recommend that you START with honors as a 9th grader and see how it goes.

 

[binny]

Ours tell the kids that its easier to move down than move up. DS's counselor told him that he should start with honours then move down if he really feels like he cant handle it.

She also said that she think he will be surprised at the classes because he has been in charter schools and homeschool for so long that he is probably far ahead of where he needs to be.

 

[barkley]

just as a heads up-there have been recent news stories and articles about the a.p. tests being seriously overhauled from their current style. going from what has been more traditionaly a memorization based test to practical, analytical application format.

if this occurs then parents need to seriously question the training possessed by the teachers instructing these courses in their high schools. if any courses are 'taught to the test' it's the a.p.'s-and if a teacher has'nt been brought up to speed on how to instruct for the new testing format it can lead to lousy results on the test. it can also result in receiving no college credit (where applicable) since some colleges only give credit for scores of 4 and 5. it's not something i would want my high school student with a very good gpa to have to deal with-being one of the students instructed while a teacher is transitioning from one teaching style to another (no college will give consideration to my student's gpa lowering because the teacher was in the process of getting on board with the new manner of instruction/testing criteria).

one other consideration parents may want to look to is what their child intends on majoring in and where. a neighbor's dd has known for several years what she wants to major in-very challenging/few u.s. universities offer. they spoke to the few that offered programs and found the number of freshman admissions are very few (and reducing now b/c of budget issues). they were advised that their excellent gpa dd might have a better chance of admission if she took advantage of dual credit courses at our state's colleges. the dd could take college courses that met both her high school requirements and earn transferrable general ed. college credits. she has done this and is now applying as a high school senior but an incoming college junior. her gpa has remained among the highest in her graduating class but she won't be competing for one of the few freshman openings at the colleges of her choice-she will be looked to as an overachieving high school senior who has managed to accomplish 2 years of college ahead of her peers for consideration in entry to one of the many more junior standing openings at those competative schools.

 

[golfgal]

I already checked, and she can switch the following year. What makes me angry is that the guidance counsellors went into the honors english classes, and warned them about honors 9th grade english, saying how hard it is and will take up all of their free time! I know someone who took it, found it really hard, took regular the next year, and was frustrated at how dumb-downed it was, and wants to go back to honors.

Our teachers tell the kids that too, they want the kids to understand that they will have homework. The hard part for the teachers is that some kids will have an hour of homework and others 3 hours-same homework, different study "skills". Our twins are in all honors classes and have about an hour of homework each night. Most of their friends are in all honors courses and have 3 hours of homework-the difference, our kids sit at the kitchen table as soon as they get home and do their homework-their friends that take 3 hours are in their rooms facebooking, texting and listening to their Ipods while doing homework .

Our students aren't allowed to change courses mid-semester (meaning that you cannot begin in regular and say at mid-term, "Hey, move me to honors"), but registering for the next year's class at a higher level is no problem. They'll look to see that the student made an A (or at least a high B) in the regular class, and they'll not think twice about letting the student "move up".

I also recommend that you START with honors as a 9th grader and see how it goes.

Our high school is fairly lenient on letting freshman into the honors program for this reason. They cover a lot more material in the honors classes then they do in the regular classes that it is very difficult to catch up if you don't start in the honors program. They would rather have the kids start there and move down so the requirements aren't all that stringent-but they still track the kids even in the honors program.

The only program they see a lot of kids moving up from non-honors freshman year to honors sophomore year is math. Kids that do well in Algebra I get invited to take honors geometry over the summer and move into the honors Algebra II as sophomores. Our twins some how got into the wrong math classes so they are in Algebra I this year. We didn't switch them out because we knew they could take geometry over the summer--6 week course that covers a year's material. It is a MUCH better way to take geometry we think AND they have 5 years of math on their transcript when they graduate so we just kept things the way they are--and it is one less class for homework for them .