What are you supposed to take in 9th?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PE
Hon Algebra 2
Hon English
APUSH
AP Physics
AP CS Principles
Hon FL4

Do not do this schedule unless your kid is great at time management, study skills, and really ready to buckle down.

AP USH, AP Physics, and Hn FL4 are in no way easy classes. And both Hn Alg 2 and AP CS principles will require some time even though they will be easier than the first three I named.

My SMCS kid did something similar with 4 magnet classes, APUSH and FL4. It wasn't that bad.

Okay okay we get it. Your child is a genius. You keep posting this stuff over and over again. It's obsessive. Are you okay?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Assume kid is in Geometry in 8th and Honors US History and Foreign language 2 and on the "honors" track or what not.

I'm guessing:
Honors English
Alg 2
FL 3
AP NSL
Honors Biology.

What else should the student take? Also, does she have to take Bio first - is there leeway to take physics first? Kid will play a sport and also does a time consuming activity (theatre).

My DD took Honors Algebra 2 and Honors Physics concurrently in 9th grade, and said it turned out to be a really good science pathway. Apparently she was far better equipped to understand both bio and chem concepts than her classmates who hadn’t taken physics yet. She did have some scheduling issues later, because apparently Honors Physics in 9th was a new thing, and nobody had really thought out how that would affect IB sciences in 11th and 12th, but it doesn’t sound like that will be as issue for your kid.

So based on my kid’s experience, if your kid’s school allows Honors Physics in 9th, and they’re up for the challenge, they should take it. It’s not a crazy-hard class, and your kid seems to be prepared for the math aspects.

AP Gov is a decent 9th grade AP, assuming they can handle the volume of reading. Good intro to AP coursework—if they can’t handle it, or they hate it, they should stick with honors history going forward. APUSH covers much more content, and is a far more difficult exam to score well on.

AP Computer Science Principles is a good way to knock out the tech credit and get their feet wet with APs. Not a ton of homework (at least for my kid), and a bit more challenging and interesting than the basic tech courses. Wouldn’t be a bad freshman course.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Assume kid is in Geometry in 8th and Honors US History and Foreign language 2 and on the "honors" track or what not.

I'm guessing:
Honors English
Alg 2
FL 3
AP NSL
Honors Biology.

What else should the student take? Also, does she have to take Bio first - is there leeway to take physics first? Kid will play a sport and also does a time consuming activity (theatre).

My DD took Honors Algebra 2 and Honors Physics concurrently in 9th grade, and said it turned out to be a really good science pathway. Apparently she was far better equipped to understand both bio and chem concepts than her classmates who hadn’t taken physics yet. She did have some scheduling issues later, because apparently Honors Physics in 9th was a new thing, and nobody had really thought out how that would affect IB sciences in 11th and 12th, but it doesn’t sound like that will be as issue for your kid.

So based on my kid’s experience, if your kid’s school allows Honors Physics in 9th, and they’re up for the challenge, they should take it. It’s not a crazy-hard class, and your kid seems to be prepared for the math aspects.

AP Gov is a decent 9th grade AP, assuming they can handle the volume of reading. Good intro to AP coursework—if they can’t handle it, or they hate it, they should stick with honors history going forward. APUSH covers much more content, and is a far more difficult exam to score well on.

AP Computer Science Principles is a good way to knock out the tech credit and get their feet wet with APs. Not a ton of homework (at least for my kid), and a bit more challenging and interesting than the basic tech courses. Wouldn’t be a bad freshman course.

At Blair strong math students take AP Physics in 9th. Also, APUSH not APNSLis what's available for social studies.

[Anonymous]

Do you mean Blair magnet or anyone at Blair (for AP Physics)? Northwood also does APUSH for 9th..

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you mean Blair magnet or anyone at Blair (for AP Physics)? Northwood also does APUSH for 9th..

Non-magnet. Magnet takes Magnet Physics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PE
Hon Algebra 2
Hon English
APUSH
AP Physics
AP CS Principles
Hon FL4

3 AP classes as a 9th grader is nuts. And I don’t think you can take AP physics without pre-calc at least.

People who don't know what AP Physics 1 is really, really need to stop making these uninformed comments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PE
Hon Algebra 2
Hon English
APUSH
AP Physics
AP CS Principles
Hon FL4

3 AP classes as a 9th grader is nuts. And I don’t think you can take AP physics without pre-calc at least.

It's not nuts. Physics 1 and CS Principles are intro courses designed to replace high school classes. They weren't on the menu when we were kids. Both of them are lower level versions of the main 2nd year AP classes in Physics C and CS A.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PE
Hon Algebra 2
Hon English
APUSH
AP Physics
AP CS Principles
Hon FL4

Do not do this schedule unless your kid is great at time management, study skills, and really ready to buckle down.

AP USH, AP Physics, and Hn FL4 are in no way easy classes. And both Hn Alg 2 and AP CS principles will require some time even though they will be easier than the first three I named.

My SMCS kid did something similar with 4 magnet classes, APUSH and FL4. It wasn't that bad.

Okay okay we get it. Your child is a genius. You keep posting this stuff over and over again. It's obsessive. Are you okay?

Okay okay we get it. Your child is not a genius. You keep posting this stuff over and over again. It's obsessive. Are you okay?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PE
Hon Algebra 2
Hon English
APUSH
AP Physics
AP CS Principles
Hon FL4

Do not do this schedule unless your kid is great at time management, study skills, and really ready to buckle down.

AP USH, AP Physics, and Hn FL4 are in no way easy classes. And both Hn Alg 2 and AP CS principles will require some time even though they will be easier than the first three I named.

My SMCS kid did something similar with 4 magnet classes, APUSH and FL4. It wasn't that bad.

Okay okay we get it. Your child is a genius. You keep posting this stuff over and over again. It's obsessive. Are you okay?

Okay okay we get it. Your child is not a genius. You keep posting this stuff over and over again. It's obsessive. Are you okay?

I hate magnet parents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PE
Hon Algebra 2
Hon English
APUSH
AP Physics
AP CS Principles
Hon FL4

3 AP classes as a 9th grader is nuts. And I don’t think you can take AP physics without pre-calc at least.

It's not nuts. Physics 1 and CS Principles are intro courses designed to replace high school classes. They weren't on the menu when we were kids. Both of them are lower level versions of the main 2nd year AP classes in Physics C and CS A.

People who don’t understand what the AP Physics I content is or about the exam need to stop making these comments. There have been several threads in recent weeks about AP Physics, look them up. Better yet, look up the pass rate of the AP Physics I exam. There is reason many schools are pulling back on recommending it to 9th or not offering it at all.

[Anonymous]

Blair no longer allows grade 9 students to take AP Physics 1 unless they have already completed Algebra 2 - it used to be a corequisite.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PE
Hon Algebra 2
Hon English
APUSH
AP Physics
AP CS Principles
Hon FL4

Do not do this schedule unless your kid is great at time management, study skills, and really ready to buckle down.

AP USH, AP Physics, and Hn FL4 are in no way easy classes. And both Hn Alg 2 and AP CS principles will require some time even though they will be easier than the first three I named.

My SMCS kid did something similar with 4 magnet classes, APUSH and FL4. It wasn't that bad.

Okay okay we get it. Your child is a genius. You keep posting this stuff over and over again. It's obsessive. Are you okay?

Okay okay we get it. Your child is not a genius. You keep posting this stuff over and over again. It's obsessive. Are you okay?

I hate magnet parents.

Don't generalize. Majority of magnet folks are nice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:PE
Hon Algebra 2
Hon English
APUSH
AP Physics
AP CS Principles
Hon FL4

3 AP classes as a 9th grader is nuts. And I don’t think you can take AP physics without pre-calc at least.

It's not nuts. Physics 1 and CS Principles are intro courses designed to replace high school classes. They weren't on the menu when we were kids. Both of them are lower level versions of the main 2nd year AP classes in Physics C and CS A.

People who don’t understand what the AP Physics I content is or about the exam need to stop making these comments. There have been several threads in recent weeks about AP Physics, look them up. Better yet, look up the pass rate of the AP Physics I exam. There is reason many schools are pulling back on recommending it to 9th or not offering it at all.

My kid has friends at two different STEM magnet programs who bombed that exam as freshmen. They had the math, they just weren’t ready for that level of work on top of everything else that year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Folks need to understand the difference between an easier AP class vs an easy class.

AP NSL is an easier AP class but it is not an easy class.

AP USH is not an easy AP. There are people for who APUSH content wise is easier 9th grade because they just finished US content in 8th. But there will still be more content and work expected in the class.

Each student will need to determine how much they can handle in terms of work load.

What is the work load like for AP NSL?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At my child's school your child cannot just sign up for AP NSL. It's by recommendation only and DD did not know of a single child who was recommend from their cohorted honors history class in 8th grade. There were definitely some but not among the 20 or more people who were talking about it.

+1

Our DS was not recommended for freshman AP Gov after getting all “A’s” in the ”magnet style” history path in our home MS, nor was our DD that came from the humanities magnet and literally won a national award creating a documentary on the role of the government and also got straight “A’s”. I am utterly perplexed on who gets recommended for AP gov as freshman. It was especially infuriating when both of our kids Honors History teachers told them freshman year that they should be in AP Gov and were in the wrong class.

I think we weren’t quite aware enough as parents to fight the system since our kids are twins. Also the advising at our HS is terrible. Like egregiously bad.

OP here - oh, that's surprising. I did not realize this and that's terrible - so many things are uneven across our district and so many important things are not well known or publicized.

So our kid would be in the Clarksburg APPs program (sorta a honors program with some specialized classes), and those kids all get put into AP NSL in 9th. It turns out they also have to take "APPS" Biology and "APPS" English (I didn't realize this when I posted the original post) so there's actually not a lot of wiggle room on the order of Sciences.

Questions:
How much HW in AP Comp Sci Principles?
What's the dance class order (one pp mentioned it)? I think our kid needs at least one class every year that requires movement.