<p>Ok, so my kid is just entering high school and i was wondering if it is good for her to make all of her classes honors classes. And i am wondering how this will affect her through out high school and if she will earn any good scholarships.</p>
<p>My kids always took honors when available, then moved on to AP courses. If the school weights grades and ranks, the decisions she/you make now can have a huge impact later. </p>
<p>As far as the scholarships go, it is hard to predict based on courses. She will need to excel in all her courses and get have top scores on either the SAT or ACT. Make sure she gets involved in something that interests her. Scholarships are difficult to predict, just try to make sure she takes school seriously, but still finds time to develop outside interests.</p>
<p>Was she recommended for all honors courses? Does she want to take all honors courses? Putting her in classes she doesn’t want to take and/or wasn’t recommended for can be a recipe for disaster.</p>
<p>There is not enough information to give you an answer. What kind of student is your daughter? Did her 8 th grade teachers recommend that she be placed in all honors classes? What does she want to do? Was she excelling in middle school? You don’t want her placed in classes where she does not belong.</p>
<p>A student should take the level classes they can do well in. Without knowing your daughter’s abilities there is no way to answer the question. Even kids who don’t take honors classes end up at colleges.</p>
<p>No sense in taking all honors classes unless your child has the aptitude. But if so, then definitely, as class rigor is evaluated by many colleges when applications are sent. No one can honestly tell you or your child what to do unless we know who the child is.</p>
<p>I think that the answer varies by child. You know your child much better than we do.</p>
<p>The answer also depends on factors at the specific school.</p>
<p>For example, at the high school my son attended, anyone who was reasonably qualified would want to be in honors math, English, and history classes, but some students opted out of honors science because it involved time-consuming projects, and some opted out of honors foreign language because it was extremely difficult.</p>
<p>There may be similar considerations regarding specific honors classes at your child’s high school.</p>
<p>There’s the issue of the learning value of honors classes, and there’s the issue of managing the GPA. If you have an A/A- students I’d say go for all honors classes and then pay attention to areas where she struggles -and scale back in those subjects. If she is more of a B+/B student, then go for honors in her best subjects, unless she’s enthusiastic and makes a case otherwise. A student who regularly gets a few C’s or whose performance gives you pause might do better without any honors classes -unless they end the year much improved. Again - there is the issue of challenge (which of course is good), but know how honors classes are weighted/or not weighted and do pay attention to cumulative GPA. I know several parents who insisted on far-too-many honors classes for their child and the child would have had better results with a higher gpa in some regular classes. Sometimes there is scholarship/merit money - schools can be very different - based on weighted GPA, or unweighted, or whatever is on the transcript.</p>
<p>One more thing to consider - sometimes Honors classes move faster and generate less busywork/homework. My S took some honors/AP because he found them easier and there was less out of class work, just because the kids who took them didn’t interrupt or slow down the class they covered more IN CLASS. There weren’t discipline issues to take teacher attention away either.</p>
<p>It really depends on your student. My oldest took all the gifted classes that were offered. He was able to get A’s. However now my middle son is starting high school this year and he’s slated for all gifted classes too. They are not the same type of student. Our gifted classes are not weighted. So if middle son starts getting B’s I will be moving him to regular classes. GPA does matter. While it’s best to get A’s in the highest level class available when they can’t do that it may be time to look over the options.</p>
<p>It really depends on the child, and on the school. My daughter took all honors, and then all APs throughout high school. At her first high school, the honors classes moved quickly, but they also generated a ton of homework, much of which was unnecessary. It was really burdensome and made high school less exciting than it should have been. It seemed like an endurance test more than an accelerated learning track.</p>
<p>She changed schools her junior year and found the honors classes at her new school a lot more interesting, with less homework and a greater focus on individual acceleration. Ditto for the AP classes. She was a lot happier at this school.</p>
<p>By contrast, my son, who started at the new school in 9th grade, chose not to take any honors classes his freshman year, even though he was recommended for all honors. By the end of the year, he realized he needed more of a challenge, and so he signed up for all honors classes sophomore year. Junior year, he’ll do 2 APs and the rest honors. For him, I think getting on the honors track at his own pace was the right choice.</p>
<p>A humane approach is for students to only take honors and AP courses in those subjects in which they have special interest and aptitude.</p>
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Yes, she should if recommended. See <a href=“https://www.admissions.uga.edu/article/top-ten-uga-admissions-urban-legends.html[/url][quote]We”>https://www.admissions.uga.edu/article/top-ten-uga-admissions-urban-legends.html
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<p>Our experience is the same as OHMomof2, far less busy work and behavior problems, the kids in the honors classes tend to be the kids that want to be there. My oldest found that there wasn’t really much different curriculum-wise, just in the pace and expectations.</p>
<p>Snarlatron, I agree with this approach, but some kids are good at every or almost every subject, and feel compelled to take honors classes in all of them. In most public high schools, honors classes are about pace and quantity of work. They’re not necessarily more intellectually challenging than AP classes, although the kids in them tend to be more interested in the subject. For a gifted kid, tons of work without much intellectual challenge is the kiss of death, so I’d advise any parent with a child like this to think carefully before just assuming that all honors classes are the answer.</p>
<p>Every college tour I went on with my son as well as an “inside the admissions process” event I went to stressed that the admissions committees really like to see a student challenge himself or herself with the hardest courses the high school offers. A clearly capable student taking few or no higher level courses even if the school offers them would have them wondering why not.</p>
<p>But (this is now my opinion) if the student can’t make at least a B in the harder courses, then it is probably a mistake to be taking them, at least as far as college admissions goes. </p>
<p>And check your school. At my kids’ high school, honors and AP are weighted the same and AP is not above honors.</p>
<p>Yes, colleges stress that they want you to take the hardest classes possible and do well in them. I agree that if a student can’t get at least a B then he should not be in honors classes. I also think that if a student is getting A’s in regular classes with intensive tutoring then that student should probably stay in regular classes. What really bugs me is when parents push kids into honors classes who clearly do not belong there, and then blame the teacher when their child does poorly. Kids in regular classes get into good colleges all the time!</p>
<p>It depends upon the aptitude of the student and the rigor at the hs. Let the teachers and GC guide you.</p>
<p>In general strive for the courseload that keeps the student challenged but not overwhelmed.</p>