Planning and Record Keeping - Back to Homeschool Blog Hop

  Today, for planning and record keeping, I will be focusing on high school.

When do you think you need to be thinking about high school? I would like to suggest that you need to be thinking about high school as you begin your planning for 7th Grade. Seriously, 7th Grade! Students in 7th and 8th Grade can take high school level courses and count them as high school credit as long as they really do the work at high school level.

Algebra 1 is a favorite early credit class. Some home schoolers might take Algebra 1 in 7th, and Geometry in 8th. Others might spread Algebra 1 over 7th and 8th Grade. It can go on the high school transcript. Some middle school students complete high school biology. In my home, my students completed early credits in History and in Literature/Composition.

Now that you know that, it is wise to have a framework of what courses you plan for your student to complete. (And be aware, plans can and probably will change!) A high school plan will probably look like a completion of state requirements meshed with what colleges will want for incoming freshman. And you put that into a chart.

So, basically, most high school students will plan to take:

• at least four credits of English (1 credit = 1 course for 1 year or 1 semester college course through Dual Enrollment) 
• at least three credits of Math (some states only call for two; many colleges are looking for four)
• probably three sciences with lab (our state only requires two labs, but we found many colleges want three)
• two to four credits in Social Studies (includes history, geography, sociology, and government courses)

 In my state public school students must also have:

• 2 credits of a (the same) foreign language
• 1/2 credit of Physical Education
• 1/2 credit of Health
• 1 credit in technology
• total credits equaling 21 or more

We are reviewed annually by a private school because of our choice within our state law. The school, our "umbrella", requires 3 years of Bible/Religion.

So I created a form that started with what my state wanted public school kids to have. I created columns for the subjects, required total credits, 9th Grade, 10th Grade, 11th Grade and 12th Grade, like this:

For planning high school, I started with filling things in: English 9, English 10, etc., Algebra 1, Geometry, etc., Biology, Chemistry, etc. My picture doesn't show Foreign Language, but I changed it. I worked my document to real life. It started as a plan, but now three columns are actuals. Here is what it looks like now:

Changes we made (some of them):

• dropped the Social Security Number for security (personal preference)
• dropped last column on right
• came up with names that truly reflect the class
• Added information at the bottom including activities

It is not perfect, and there is not ONE right way to do the transcript, but I thought I'd share it. It is good to have the GPA on the transcript and the activities and the key (if you have weird stuff like we do -- dual enrollment).

So what do you think? I hope this was helpful.