Advice for new TJ Parents

[Anonymous]

Welcome to TJ! I am a parent of a freshman and appreciated some of the advice I found on this site last year. Hoping to pay it forward.

1. Consider taking PE over the summer- it will allow your child to take either an elective or a history class.
2. History is not a required freshman course, but 4 years are needed. So, you can double up in future years or do PE over the summer.
3. Spanish and French are quite difficult at TJ. If your child was planning to take Spanish 3 at their base school, Spanish 2 is likely where he/she will land and even that may be a struggle. Consider switching to Russian, German, or Mandarin if there is an interest.

[Anonymous]

Happy to add on. My kid’s a senior at TJ.

- I second all of the above. A few elaborations…

- Summer School: If your kid wants to maybe do music or art each year then you especially want to start with summer PE this summer as it frees up a slot. PE9 before TJ, PE10 after 9th and the extra history course after 10th was how DC handled it.

- Languages: Anyone I’ve ever heard of that is doing Spanish at TJ is floored at how ridiculously hard it is. German sadly has gone downhill a lot this year. They lost a wonderful German teacher last year and the current one is nowhere near the same level. It’s likely an easy A but just not a very good course. If you’re already 2 years into it some kids have done the 3rd year as a summer course to be done with it (UVA is reported to prefer 4 years though of language).

- Fall: Joining a time intensive call activity is a great way to make friends off the bat. A sport (many are easy to make the team), marching band, or some of the various time-intensive clubs would all help with that.

[Anonymous]

Parent of a rising junior. Agreed on PE. There is also one horrible PE teacher on staff you want to avoid.

Also agreed on Spanish 3. Destroyed any chance of my child ever taking another language class again. The teacher was at least caring.

[Anonymous]

Are they offering Japanese again? Curious, if not, my kid has to restart his language.

[Anonymous]

Agreed on Spanish. I have heard that French was getting there but Spanish is grueling for no good reason.

For summer classes i would suggest econ over PE. Having PE in the middle of the day can be a lifestyle enhancer for a lot of kids. Econ in the middle of the day is not. It's not that there is anything wrong with econ but it's not a break in your day the way PE can be unless you get that one PITA PE teacher.

[Anonymous]

If you would like to try sports just to see if you like it. Do a fall sport.

Winter sports overlap with first semester finals and spring sports overlap with second semester finals. There are advantages to being on a team with upperclassmen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agreed on Spanish. I have heard that French was getting there but Spanish is grueling for no good reason.

For summer classes i would suggest econ over PE. Having PE in the middle of the day can be a lifestyle enhancer for a lot of kids. Econ in the middle of the day is not. It's not that there is anything wrong with econ but it's not a break in your day the way PE can be unless you get that one PITA PE teacher.

+1 for this. The school suggested keeping PE in the schedule freshman year for reasons mentioned above. It was a great “brain break” while adjusting to TJ rigor. Daughter took PE over the summer before sophomore year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agreed on Spanish. I have heard that French was getting there but Spanish is grueling for no good reason.

For summer classes i would suggest econ over PE. Having PE in the middle of the day can be a lifestyle enhancer for a lot of kids. Econ in the middle of the day is not. It's not that there is anything wrong with econ but it's not a break in your day the way PE can be unless you get that one PITA PE teacher.

+1 for this. The school suggested keeping PE in the schedule freshman year for reasons mentioned above. It was a great “brain break” while adjusting to TJ rigor. Daughter took PE over the summer before sophomore year.

It is a great brain break…unless you end up with the teacher who thinks it should be as rigorous as other TJ classes with tests and homework.

Some of the Spanish teachers are leaving/retiring. We’ll see if that changes the rigor there.

[Anonymous]

My kid has two camps scheduled for the summer during summer school time, he is thinking about the Personal Economy this summer because it can be completed more easily. Summer PE next summer, we know not to plan a summer vacation or camps during that time. He is planning AP Human Geography as his elective.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid has two camps scheduled for the summer during summer school time, he is thinking about the Personal Economy this summer because it can be completed more easily. Summer PE next summer, we know not to plan a summer vacation or camps during that time. He is planning AP Human Geography as his elective.

If he is planning on taking AP Econ down the line, know that it satisfies the personal finance requirement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Happy to add on. My kid’s a senior at TJ.

- I second all of the above. A few elaborations…

- Summer School: If your kid wants to maybe do music or art each year then you especially want to start with summer PE this summer as it frees up a slot. PE9 before TJ, PE10 after 9th and the extra history course after 10th was how DC handled it.

- Languages: Anyone I’ve ever heard of that is doing Spanish at TJ is floored at how ridiculously hard it is. German sadly has gone downhill a lot this year. They lost a wonderful German teacher last year and the current one is nowhere near the same level. It’s likely an easy A but just not a very good course. If you’re already 2 years into it some kids have done the 3rd year as a summer course to be done with it (UVA is reported to prefer 4 years though of language).

- Fall: Joining a time intensive call activity is a great way to make friends off the bat. A sport (many are easy to make the team), marching band, or some of the various time-intensive clubs would all help with that.

Is Spanish 3 hard as a 9th grader or hard even in 10th? DS is coming in after 1 year of Spanish at Kilmer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agreed on Spanish. I have heard that French was getting there but Spanish is grueling for no good reason.

For summer classes i would suggest econ over PE. Having PE in the middle of the day can be a lifestyle enhancer for a lot of kids. Econ in the middle of the day is not. It's not that there is anything wrong with econ but it's not a break in your day the way PE can be unless you get that one PITA PE teacher.

+1 for this. The school suggested keeping PE in the schedule freshman year for reasons mentioned above. It was a great “brain break” while adjusting to TJ rigor. Daughter took PE over the summer before sophomore year.

It is a great brain break…unless you end up with the teacher who thinks it should be as rigorous as other TJ classes with tests and homework.

Some of the Spanish teachers are leaving/retiring. We’ll see if that changes the rigor there.

Spanish is another good option for summer classes right now.

That one PE teacher isn't horrible but you are not going to get the break you were hoping for. It's about as much work as econ, maybe a little bit more

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Happy to add on. My kid’s a senior at TJ.

- I second all of the above. A few elaborations…

- Summer School: If your kid wants to maybe do music or art each year then you especially want to start with summer PE this summer as it frees up a slot. PE9 before TJ, PE10 after 9th and the extra history course after 10th was how DC handled it.

- Languages: Anyone I’ve ever heard of that is doing Spanish at TJ is floored at how ridiculously hard it is. German sadly has gone downhill a lot this year. They lost a wonderful German teacher last year and the current one is nowhere near the same level. It’s likely an easy A but just not a very good course. If you’re already 2 years into it some kids have done the 3rd year as a summer course to be done with it (UVA is reported to prefer 4 years though of language).

- Fall: Joining a time intensive call activity is a great way to make friends off the bat. A sport (many are easy to make the team), marching band, or some of the various time-intensive clubs would all help with that.

Is Spanish 3 hard as a 9th grader or hard even in 10th? DS is coming in after 1 year of Spanish at Kilmer.

Honestly, think about whether your kid really wants spanish or if german works just as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid has two camps scheduled for the summer during summer school time, he is thinking about the Personal Economy this summer because it can be completed more easily. Summer PE next summer, we know not to plan a summer vacation or camps during that time. He is planning AP Human Geography as his elective.

I have been told many times that APs for the sake of racking up APs is not very productive. AP Human Geography is not going to help a stem applicant very much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid has two camps scheduled for the summer during summer school time, he is thinking about the Personal Economy this summer because it can be completed more easily. Summer PE next summer, we know not to plan a summer vacation or camps during that time. He is planning AP Human Geography as his elective.

I have been told many times that APs for the sake of racking up APs is not very productive. AP Human Geography is not going to help a stem applicant very much.

AP Human Geography looks amazingly interesting and is a perfectly good Social Science option. For a id who likes math and patterns, Human Geography is a far better fit then the traditional World History.