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CM style HS Literature
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Can someone please explain what high school literature looks like ala CM. My head is spinning. Can I just read aloud the books on the SCM Literature list for high school? Then what? Narrate? Discuss? I have no clue about literature and wish I had time to learn, but I have a 10th grader and I need him to get english credits. Currently I am using the literature guide that accompanies Notgrass World History but I really dont like it and dont feel my son is getting much out of it. But how can I give high school credit for reading aloud 4-5 books? He is taking a writing course and doing some grammar so I know the credit isnt all based on Lit. And what do I call the classes if we are just reading a wide genre? I am locked in a bit with him since he needs World and American Lit to graduate, or maybe he doesnt? I dont know why this is so confusing for me. What should literature look like in a CM school?
Thank you. That is helpful. Do you use the Ambleside literature suggestions. They seem waaaayyy too hard for us. There are so many lists of what books to read I have no idea which to choose. Some say match lit to history, some say don’t. I am just really struggling with what is best. In fact when I search this sight for high school literature posts most of them are from ME. So sad right. I just cannot settle on what seems best for my kids. I look at some canned literature studies for high school and they seem more like elementary historical fiction, then I look at Ambleside and I have never even heard of most of the books on their list. When I try to create my own list I end up with like 20 books for the year, so I get discouraged.
Hi Crystal,
The recommended books on our list are great for high school literature. Remember that it is not the only source of the literature/English credit. There is still composition (written narrations and a writing program if you chose), oral narration, dictation, grammar, poetry, and Shakespreare.
We want to make sure to raise the bar on the type of narration questions we ask so that we are continually challenging our children’s minds and how they think about the books they read.
Here are a few articles that my help:
Teaching Literature (Scroll towards the bottom. Sonya addresses literature once it’s been assigned to older students)
I currently have 2 students earning credit for 9th grade literature. I decided prior to this year to have them each read their literature independently (we still read poetry and Shakespeare together). I am also reading their literature. It has helped me formulate deeper narration questions but has been a wonderful way for us to casually discuss characters, events, episodes, etc.
My oldest isn’t in high school yet (we’ll be starting AO year 5 in a couple of weeks) so I can’t say whether their literature selection for high school is too much or not.
Crystal, if most of the literature posts on the board are from you, then I am in 2nd place.😊 I haven’t solved this issue yet either.
We are also a read-and-narrate family. What that actually looks like is my high school boys read a chapter a day from a book I’ve assigned them and we have book discussions on Fridays. Sometimes the discussions are only, “So, do you like it?” “Yup.” Sometimes we look up all the characters in an allegory to see what each one represented so that we really understand it (like Animal Farm). But I try to base the discussion around what THEY think of the book or get out of it, not what I think, unless there is a very specific lesson in the book that I want to point out.
I have a list of books for each boy for the year; we don’t always get to all of them. I compile the list based on what they’re reading in history (you could use the literature from Notgrass), classics, books I like, the SCM lit suggestions, etc.
As part of their literature credit, I also have them write 3-4 essays or narrations per year related to books (not necessarily analysis), and I schedule in two weeks each of poetry and short stories, which I pull from resources I already own (like Abeka literature books or LLATL Gold books).
ErinD, I found this very helpful, thank you! I chuckled inside at this -” Sometimes the discussions are only, “So, do you like it?” “Yup.” ” I can get this response, or something similar, quite often. I laughed to myself, but there was also a tiny sob at the end. It was like you were saying it’s okay for them to respond that way and it took off the pressure that I didn’t even realize I felt.
You’re welcome. I had to come to terms with the fact that sometimes “I like it” is the only thing to say about a certain book. Like CM says, you want your kids to interact with great books and our job is to get out of the way (totally paraphrasing that but I think that’s the gist of it). To me, sometimes that means not discussing a book; just letting them digest it on their own.
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