Reply to Moving to the U.S. soon. What is the difference between/among regular, honors and AP courses?

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Reply to "Moving to the U.S. soon. What is the difference between/among regular, honors and AP courses?"

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[quote=Anonymous]Your school will only have a couple of AP courses available for freshmen.  (By junior year, a student could pretty much fill their schedule with them if they want to.)

If you have a strong student, I'd suggest signing up for the APs.  The sequence of courses varies across MCPS, but the two that appear to be offered most commonly are AP US history and AP government (called NSL).  AP USH is a huge amount of work (probably moreso if your child hasn't had any US history before).  However, the Honors USH seems to be way, way too easy and I've heard kids don't learn much.  On the other hand, our experience with NSL is that even the AP NSL has been very, very easy.  I looked at the textbook and was surprised it was even considered high school level (looks like a middle school text to me).  So certainly, if that is the recommended freshman course I would recommend the AP level for it.

You will have the first few weeks of the term to switch classes, and many kids at my school switched from AP USH to Honors USH.  So I'd give it a try and be willing to switch a few weeks in if it's not a good fit for your child.

There are also a few AP electives offered to freshmen at our school.  They would be fine to take, but you could also just push them back to the following year without losing much.

I'd concur that you want Honors for everything else.  My dd's experience is that the Honors courses have almost never been very much work.  (Certainly, if your dc struggles in a subject, the regular class might be appropriate.  But again, you have the first few weeks of the term to assess and decide whether to switch classes.)

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