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| Sunrise . . . or the light at the end of the tunnel . . . NOTE: I'm sorry that this post appears in italics. It's some Blogger glitch that I have not been able to figure out, even after stripping out formatting, stripping out customizations in the template that I thought might have been triggering the italics . . . everything I could think of. I'll still keep trying to fix it, but for now, I'm afraid it's kind of difficult to read. I hope that doesn't present serious hardship.
Cue the stress. It's time to talk about high school. I'm kidding and not kidding here. Nobody is not anxious about high school. At this writing, my third and fourth children are rising seniors. I've been through this entire routine twice already. I have seen, with my own eyes, people graduate and go to college and be successful, on the foundation of an education that to me often felt like just muddling through – and still when I think about the coming year, my stomach hurts a little. Surely this is normal. I suppose the most important thing to say about homeschooling high school, on the front end, is that it's not actually that different from all the homeschooling you might have done up to this point. Your paradigm doesn't magically change. The things that are important don't magically change. The people you're dealing with DO change, in the sense of maturing, but fundamentally they're not any different from the people you were educating as fourth graders. They're STILL an integrated living complex of body and soul. The intellect is STILL integrated with the soul. The mind is STILL hungry for ideas. The human person is STILL the human person, as he was in the womb, as he was in the toddler stage, as he was at six and eight and ten and twelve. A high-school student STILL deserves the same Christian humanist education – which is to say, the same education FOR the human person, in terms of his identity in Christ – that he deserved at earlier stages. This is true, even when you're confronted with some increasingly immediate goals that don't apply when children are younger. High school is naturally when you begin to think about the future. Most people are at least including the idea of higher education in their planning, so as to keep that door open. Most people are thinking about possible careers, and about education as a bridge to those careers, whether that bridge passes through a traditional four-year university or not. And while I don't think that that's what education ultimately is FOR – the human being is a human being right now, not waiting to become a human being upon being offered a good job – this is a stage when inevitably, and importantly, parents need to think a few moves ahead, and to consider how the education they are offering both nurtures the human person and fulfills a set of standard requirements. Importantly, they need to think about how the education they are offering will translate into the language of standard requirements on a transcript, which is really the important thing here. Education doesn't have to BECOME heavily standardized at this stage. A parent simply needs to know how to translate what a child has done into language that college admissions offices, for example, can readily understand. That sounds like a challenge, but it's actually not so hard to do. ****** I'm going to lead with some practical nuts and bolts here, because I realize that that, more than anything else, is probably why you're reading this post. But I would like to return to the larger value of a Charlotte Mason education for high school, and why I think it's important to continue to educate in this, and not some more utilitarian, outcome-oriented way, at this important and challenging stage. First of all, some resources: For sketching out your plans – and this should be a four-year plan, not something you're making up out of thin air, year by year – a template is helpful. Years ago we belonged to an umbrella school whose planning pages were useful to me when I was anticipating our first round of high school. I still reference them today. Note that they offer templates for flexible approaches to high school. We have always used, and I imagine that you will probably use, a college-preparatory model by default. Whether your child does ultimately go to college or not, I think it's important not to shut that door. Additionally, for reasons I'll expound on later, this gives you a framework for delivering the kind of traditional liberal-arts education (another name for what a Charlotte Mason education really IS) that will serve any young adult well, regardless of the path he takes. But if you want a template for an accelerated or extended high-school plan, they've got that, too. Templates like this, or this, provide an important way for you, the parent, to see what the components of a standard college-preparatory course of study in high school consist of, and how credits are assigned and break down each year. The important thing for you is to provide something that will plausibly fulfill, every year, that range of credit requirements. Mind you, this does NOT have to look like standard-issue high school. Note that things like "150 hours=1 credit" are guidelines, not hard-and-fast rules. (more about this below) Note that all courses in a Charlotte Mason high-school program will fulfill all the requirements in this college-prep template. You just have to know under what heading to list them. Note that simply because the description for English 9, 10, 11, and 12 says "Literature/Comp," you're not necessarily REQUIRED to use a whole formal composition program all four years, or ever. Many people do find a formal composition program helpful in 8th or 9th grade, to prepare a student for the demands of high-school writing. But what that designation really means, practically speaking, is that your student will be both reading and writing as part of that course. Note that very naturally, in a Charlotte Mason education, a student will be writing frequently, and "across the curriculum," as they say. I have my current rising seniors narrate their math lessons to me, in fact, as a way of cementing what they know. I ask that they explain the concept in writing, and teach me, in writing, how to do whatever process they've just studied. This, too, counts as "composition." Here is another excellent resource for high-school planning, record-keeping, college preparation, and a host of other questions related to homeschooling high school. Paid plans are available, but there are also frequent free webinars, and many free items, on the site. You don't have to use an online, paid service, of course, but we have found this one to be worth the $20/year family subscription. One feature which I have particularly liked is that the system will automatically generate a very nice, official-looking transcript, with GPA and credit hours calculated for you. We have used these transcripts successfully as part of applications both to dual-enrollment programs and to four-year colleges. I usually copy and paste a generated transcript into a Word document, in "landscape" orientation, so that I can edit it a bit (add our homeschool name, tweak course names beyond the offerings that the system gives you to plug in, etc), but it's all very easy and headache-saving. But what curriculum? As in earlier years, we use Mater Amabilis as our foundational curriculum. The high-school syllabus is linked at the MA site; you can also find it here. The syllabus is a bit of a work-in-progress, and if you are a person who does Facebook, I highly recommend the Mater Amabilis for High School group as a community for mentoring, encouragement, and hashing out a plan that will work for YOU and your student. Note: This is an age when people tend to reach for an accredited program, for the open-and-go aspect as well as for the security which accreditation supposedly provides. It is true that in the college application process, for some colleges, being able to check a "private school" or "accredited program" box can save you a little work. BUT it seems to me that applying a fairly one-size-fits all program to the human person of high school age in your house is a high price to pay for that convenience. If you are assiduous at keeping records throughout the four years of high school, whatever extra work you may have to do to assemble your child's application (which is really primarily your child's work, anyway; you're just the guidance office) is relatively negligible. To me that extra effort seems a small price to pay for an education that is rich in content and oriented toward your child's growth as a person, as well as his preparation to confront the challenges of the next stage. Suffice it to say that what you will find in this syllabus are courses of study which can be plugged into one of the templates above. In some instances there is some picking and choosing to be done on your part, but most core readings are broken down over terms in ways that handily – both in terms of the time involved and the heftiness of the work – meeting college-preparatory credit criteria. MEANWHILE: The Ambleside Online Advisory discusses high school. As always, their insights are very helpful. Note that AO really begins a whole cohesive secondary course of study in Year 7, rather than constructing discrete middle- and high-school programs. There's a LOT of merit to this approach. At the same time, their Year 7 is truly a plausible 9th-grade year, and I think many students do begin at that level for high school, and don't necessarily complete all twelve years. What's important about this, I guess, is that high-school education is no more about ticking boxes or "finishing the program" than any other level of education is. While yes, credit requirements indicate that your student should cover a particular range of content areas over four years, as always, this education is less about the content, as in particular sets of information, and more about becoming the kind of person who can read with engagement, assimilate ideas, communicate those ideas with clarity, and discern good ideas from bad, truth from falsehood. Meanwhile, they include more helpful information regarding *credit assignment *how to understand "hours" *various college-preparatory resources including test prep *the increasing complexities of teenagers' lives, and how their education can meet them in those complexities I can say for myself that my teenagers have generally been quite busy during their high-school years. One who babysat regularly, taught a little co-op Latin class for younger children, pursued excellence in violin and participated in a youth-orchestra program. Another worked three days a week for an equine veterinarian, belonged to a local running club, and completed the requirements to become an Eagle Scout. Yet another currently lives and breathes Dungeons and Dragons (our pastor is the dungeonmaster!), and yes, I am including "Role-Playing Games" as an elective on his transcripts, and noting how this avocation covers skill sets like composition and mathematical strategizing. Still another plays the guitar seriously and is a visual artist. All have combined dual-enrollment coursework with Charlotte Mason work done for me. Several have served as assistant catechists in our parish's faith formation program, and both boys have served at the altar. My own goal has been to provide as varied and rich a life experience as possible – including rigorous academic work, but not excluding the rest of life as a seat of personal learning and growth. And I can add my own testimonials. My first two children both graduated at 17, one of them deciding in the middle of his junior year that he was ready to apply to college and go away (that was a fun Christmas break, let me tell you: I was glad his middle-school coursework had been rigorous enough to count for high school, because I had to construct a plausible four years, overnight, out of what he had done). Both are now college graduates, and graduated with distinction in their majors. One was class valedictorian. One was a humanities major, the other a STEM major. Both are in graduate school at this writing: again, one in a humanities discipline, the other in science. One worked as a classroom teacher for four years before returning to school. The other went straight from college to a masters program, but is planning to take at least a year off, doing some kind of forestry-tech work (job interviews occur daily as part of our coronavirus quarantine lifestyle) while discerning what the next step is. God willing, my younger two will graduate next year. It remains to be seen where life will take them, but I am confident that they will be equipped, intellectually, morally, and spiritually, to follow the call as it comes. ******** More about college planning and preparation: Some things to consider *Validation of the grades on your transcript -test scores: give purposeful time to test prep for the SAT/ACT/CLT -consider the possibility of at least a few dual-enrollment courses via your local community college or four-year college -keep a careful record of what your student reads and does, both academics and extracurriculars, and be prepared to list books and activities on a narrative transcript to accompany your briefer official one. Talk to admissions offices to determine what they want to see in this regard. As a general rule, they do NOT want to read your student's term paper or see a portfolio of work (the exception here would be art school, when a portfolio is a standard part of the admissions process). But they ARE often interested in knowing of what books a given course consisted. *Sources for recommendation letters -co-op teachers -dual-enrollment professors -any teacher in an online program who has direct personal knowledge of your child and his academic performance -a Scoutmaster who can speak to your child's ability to challenge him/herself, meet goals, fulfill responsibilities, and communicate with clarity It's good to plan to include at least one person besides yourself in your child's academic life in high school who can speak to your child's ability and preparation as a student. Secondarily, a pastor or employer might write a testimony to the student's character, but what admissions departments are really looking for are students who will come to college and not fail out. They want to see validation that your child will come, succeed, and stay to graduation. Of course things don't always play out this way, even for students who look ideal on paper, but they are very interested in retention rates, and in students who are strong investments in that regard. *Varieties of experience A strong application profile – not to mention a healthy life – includes diverse experience, not merely academic achievement. I don't mean, therefore, that you need to push your child to take on a frenetic schedule of wildly varied activities and "leadership opportunities," just to look good on college applications. But it is good to encourage involvement in things they care about, and perseverance in endeavors that matter to them. Encourage them not to drop the music or dance lessons or theater or karate when life heats up, but to go for the black belt, or extend themselves to join the youth orchestra. Encourage them to apply for the job that comes their way, and to work with you to come up with a flexible school schedule that will accommodate work hours. Encourage them to take on some additional adult responsibility at the parish: to be assistant catechists, for example, in the faith formation program. Things my own children have done in high school, which have subsequently appeared on transcripts: *violin lessons and youth orchestra *guitar lessons, including opportunities to play in a combo for things like gallery openings *training for the Spartan mud race and triathlons *running with a local running club *Irish dance to an advanced level, which included helping to instruct younger dancers in preparation for performances *art lessons *volunteer work as a counselor at the art studio's summer camps *paid work as assistant to an equine veterinarian *assistant catechist in our parish faith-formation program *Latin teacher for a little class of younger homeschooled students (this was this child's own initiative – nobody would have hired a 15-year-old to teach a Latin class, but she came up with the idea and offered it, and did a great job. Subsequently, as a college graduate, she spent two years teaching Latin in a private school, and still offers Latin tutoring). *a summer college Great Books course (the University of Dallas's excellent Arete program) *Outward Bound *drama, including playwriting and participation in productions of Shakespeare plays *Role-Play Games, including Dungeons and Dragons *Scouting, up to Eagle Scout All these things, at various times, have gone into the holistic picture of a student, which a college application is meant to portray. Homeschooling – and, I think, especially independent homeschooling allowing for maximum flexibility – is really a gift of time and possibility in the high-school years. Academics are important, and my high-school students do work hard academically, reading a fairly heavy schedule of meaty books and writing anywhere from 300 to 500 words on a daily basis. BUT they also increasingly live young-adult lives, with varied experiences, responsibilities, and relationships in our community. All these elements contribute to their growth, formation, and preparation for the challenges of the future. |