Anonymous wrote:sounds like johnnie was not paying attention and i thgouht all private school kids were perfect students......

Dumb comment. Use spell check next time.

No but they can spell "thought."

sounds like johnnie was not paying attention and i thgouht all private school kids were perfect students......

Anonymous wrote:Where did you go to college?? We had ten page papers due over a weekend at mine. I don't think it's all that unusual. It's probably assigned double spaced so it's really just 2.5 pages.

I'm old...we still used typewriters when I was in college and used white-out. The richer students had ones with erasing ribbons Went to a STEM-based school

I have to agree that you are missing something. It sounds like your DC procrastinated.

As a ninth grade teacher I promise this was not assigned Friday.

That's a long paper for one weekend. Perhaps during the time they were going through the book in class the teacher mentioned over and over that this assignment was coming? I would certainly expect some sort of written instructions about it though.

Although now that I look at a recent paper my 6th grader just did, double spacing a paper sure does take up a lot of space. Five pages isn't a whole lot if there is a lot of subject matter. A quick check says 300 words fit on a double spaced page. This whole message is 100 words.

(and took mere minutes - so I guess that x15 is certainly doable in a weekend for a solid student)

That seems to be a bit extreme and would definitely check whether your child has given the full story of when the assignment was given (I love my DD and think the world of her, but I also know that when she was younger she would procrastinate and had to scramble…don't worry that gets better with maturity). Also, I would find out if they had any time to work on the essay during class time. I think you're right that this type of assignment may be standard for 11th & 12th grade since they have more experience and maturity, but seems a quick turn-around for a freshman.

Hopefully, the discussion and analyzing during class time will help your DC produce a good essay, even on short notice.

Where did you go to college?? We had ten page papers due over a weekend at mine. I don't think it's all that unusual. It's probably assigned double spaced so it's really just 2.5 pages.

5 pages? on one book???? I am sure I never had to do that even in college

Thanks all. I will confirm Monday, but I've seen the written assignment which appears to have been issued on Friday. I think about 2-3 weeks were spent on the book. No rubric was given for the essay. All of that might be fine to me in an AP Eng class for juniors or seniors, but it strikes me as a bit out of wack for freshmen.

Are you sure that your child was only given a weekend's notice? I'd check that with someone else besides my child before jumping to conclusions.

That's extremely unusual. Even in college the papers are listed in the syllabus ahead of time.

Isn't this what you are paying for at private school? A rigorous education to prepare for the Ivy League?

OP, it might help people respond if you said how much class time was devoted to the book and/or to writing analytic essays, and what was discussed.

Looking for a reality check from parents who have recently had children in 9th grade. Is assigning on a Friday an analytic five page essay (not five paragraphs) about a book the class has read and having it due on Monday for freshman pretty typical, way out of bounds, reasonable but unusual, or somewhere else on the spectrum of workload for freshman at your school? Thanks in advance for sharing experiences.