From the High School Lesson Book - Final Grades - Year in Review

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It's getting towards the end of June, our final grades were turned in weeks ago, and I just realized I haven't done a year-end update. It's kind of customary to do these, and somehow I missed it. So just in case you've missed it along the way as well, here's a brief overview of what my high schoolers accomplished this past year.

Science - both kids did Survey of Science History & Concepts, an overview course that covers mathermatics, biology, chemistry, and physics. We started the year strong, and were still in good shape by mid-term, but Kennady got bogged down with the math requirements, so I switched up the order and she did great in biology so that kind of revitalized the whole course for her. Landon did this as an elective credit, and Kennady did it as a general science, so it was actually okay if they skimmed in parts. "Just the facts, ma'am" worked fine.

Math - As I've said many times, this is the course that makes Kennady want to quit school. Haha. She did okay, but worked in spurts, which made it hard for her to keep momentum and get as much done as we'd expected. In the end, I called it a pre-algebra credit instead of Algebra I. She just need to take math slow and steady - key word "Steady" - and it will be fine. Her course was a combination of Life of Fred, extra worksheets on occasion, and some review from A+ Interactive Math mini-courses.  Landon worked on a Consumer Math elective course in second semester, and will have to finish it up over the summer. 

Grammar/Composition - Keeping to a predictable schedule with grammar and with composition was a challenge, but in the end both kids did well. Landon did Analytical Grammar and Kennady did Fix-It! Grammar. Both did the Student Writing Intensive Level C from IEW and had writing assignments in their other courses to practice with. Over the summer, they are both going to do a little more composition - Kennady is going to get started on The Power In Your Hands (because we're reviewing it!) and Landon is going to do a little practice so that if he does any college courses in the coming year, he'll (hopefully) be ready.



Literature - Landon managed very well with his American Lit course, which was part of the Notgrass Exploring America study. Of course, I think it would have been nice if he'd read more great novels over his high school career, but he doesn't like to read that much, so it's all good. Kennady's initial plan this past school year was a full credit Brit Lit course, but it didn't take long for her to discover that it was too much for her to keep up with, at least for now. And I discovered something I didn't know - she enjoys reading, but she reads slowly. So eventually, we scaled back and went for a half credit course instead.



History/Geography - Landon did Notgrass Exploring America, and although he did fall behind the pace around mid-term, he has kept working at it and got pretty close to the end by the time I gave him a final grade. For the principle of the thing, I asked him to keep reading until the very end of the textbook, but he'll not have to do the written work. Kennady did Cultural Geography, a course which she started on last year and spread over the two years. This worked out well, but it's another course that she worked on in spurts, so she is also finishing up some of it over the summer.



Electives and everything else - Landon did Practical Drafting and Percussion (Fine Arts) and both were relatively easy credits for him. He also earned two full credits for his work with Civil Air Patrol this year. Kennady was going to do the half credit Health course, but after we got behind on almost everything in the fall and then realized that she'd bitten off more than she could chew with the Lit course, I advised her to leave the Health course for next year. She earned two full Fine Arts credits as well, one for Choral Singing and one for Guitar. Both kids got a half credit for the Phys.Ed. co-op class they do, plus all the other sports activities they're involved with.

And incredibly . . . it will soon be time to start sharing our plans for the upcoming school year!

How was your 2015-2016 school year? Leave a comment and let me know; and please link up your posts about homeschooling high school here. Visit your neighbors and leave some encouraging comments!

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If you're homeschooling through high school and have not yet joined the Blog Roll, please take a moment to do that as well.

Now that it's June, I've moved From the High School Lesson Book to Mondays. For now I'll continue to post every week, but I'm not sure that will happen all summer, since we won't be doing full-time school throughout! If you have a suggestion to increase participation, especially once most of us are back to school in the fall, or to get the word out to others who are homeschooling through high school, please let me know.

Visit the Schoolhouse Review Crew blog to read other Crew members' thoughts on their school year in the Reflections on our School Year Round-up, which will be live on Friday, June 24th.

This post is linked at the Hearts for Home Blog Hop hosted by Embracing Destiny and nine other blogs.

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