What are you supposed to take in 9th?

[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).

If your child is not into a foreign language, consider having them repeat level 2 in 9th. FL classes in hs are much faster paced than ms classes, and many students have an easier transition doing level 2 again in high school.

[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

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.

That’s weird because at the Blair magnet they are specifically told not to take AP physics after magnet physics in 9th but instead to take AP physics C later in high school.

[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).

If your child is not into a foreign language, consider having them repeat level 2 in 9th. FL classes in hs are much faster paced than ms classes, and many students have an easier transition doing level 2 again in high school.

That’s not been my kids experience. Currently in Spanish 4 in 9th. The biggest leap for her was Spanish 3 in middle school. It’s but that it’s faster paced in high school it’s that the classes get more difficult.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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.

AP Comp Sci is not necessarily at lot of homework but you do need to understand the principles and be able to read, review, and write out the actual code. How tough the class is depends on the teacher.

Students only need 1 year of PE.

[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

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.

That’s weird because at the Blair magnet they are specifically told not to take AP physics after magnet physics in 9th but instead to take AP physics C later in high school.

Note that they recommend taking AP Physics C later in HS and advised kids to only take AP Physics 1 if beyond Alg 2.

[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).

If your child is not into a foreign language, consider having them repeat level 2 in 9th. FL classes in hs are much faster paced than ms classes, and many students have an easier transition doing level 2 again in high school.

OP here. I probably would not do this only because the same FL teacher in middle school level 2 teaches level 3 at the high school. So I imagine there's some continuity.

[Anonymous]

Any intel on the AP Comp Sci teacher at Blair?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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

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.

That’s weird because at the Blair magnet they are specifically told not to take AP physics after magnet physics in 9th but instead to take AP physics C later in high school.

Note that they recommend taking AP Physics C later in HS and advised kids to only take AP Physics 1 if beyond Alg 2.

At SMACS? Students take Magnet Physics ("Advanced Science") and AP Physics C and Mangent Physics electives, and also take AP Physics 1?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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.

And they know that one message board troll doesn't mean all non-magnet parents are aholes, and don't even assume whether a poster is a magnet parent or not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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

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.

That’s weird because at the Blair magnet they are specifically told not to take AP physics after magnet physics in 9th but instead to take AP physics C later in high school.

Note that they recommend taking AP Physics C later in HS and advised kids to only take AP Physics 1 if beyond Alg 2.

At SMACS? Students take Magnet Physics ("Advanced Science") and AP Physics C and Mangent Physics electives, and also take AP Physics 1?

No they do not take AP physics 1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Any intel on the AP Comp Sci teacher at Blair?

AP Computer Science principles at Blair is very easy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a PP said, a lot of kids take PE in their 9th grade year since that one can't usually be completed over the summer.

Conventional wisdom is that AP NSL is easier than APUSH, but APUSH builds on content that the kids will have learned in 8th, so some folks argue for getting it out of the way while that knowledge is still "fresh."

For science, the vast majority of kids will just take Honors Biology. It's not great, super basic and unchallenging, but the transition to HS is a lot and having one easy class is a small blessing.

Honors Bio is considered the hardest at our high school. Maybe it’s the teachers but the class is not easy. Tests are all full in the blanks without word banks