<p>I have followed this discussion with interest, and have a few thoughts to contribute.</p>
<p>The good news here (besides the great opportunities your son has) is that you don’t really need to plan your son’s complete high school schedule at this point; all you need to do is put him in the best position possible for the future. Perhaps a summer session of Latin this summer would be good to help him determine whether he really is interested in taking four years of Latin; it is hard for a 14-year-old to make this decision without having taken it at all.</p>
<p>The other good thing is that this gives you a chance to see how willing your son’s school is to work with you to achieve your goals. </p>
<p>Also, if you speak French at home, your son is motivated and he did well in French I, perhaps he could skip a year of French. After my daughter scored a 7 (IB) in first-level French as a 7th grader, her school accidently put her in third-level French as an 8th grader. She could easily have switched to second-level French (which met at the same time), but she took the challenge, worked very hard and scored a 7 again in 8th grade. </p>
<p>I hope this is helpful. Keep us informed!</p>
<p>Schokolade, you are the second poster to discuss skipping French II (see cryingcloud’s post, #15) if one is highly motivated and does well in French I, and I am going to look into the possibility of my son’s doing so if he takes French II this summer in his school’s summer program. My son has kept a 99+% average in French I all year, and I think he could handle the challenge. I’ve made a note to discuss this with the upper-school head when he returns my call. Thanks for your help!</p>
<p>It’s good that you don’t have to worry about that. 
Are online classes a possibility? They’d provide the structure he needs, more thank likely. There’s also things like Rosetta Stone/Live Mocha for keeping up his language study during the year if he went with the summer school option which might be the best, considering the long days he has already. :D</p>
<p>Rosetta Stone is advised against. And I found LiveMocha to have little or no structure. </p>
<p>But online classes are a good idea. I’m sure there’s a few out there that offer Latin…</p>
<p>@harvard15 and @fairy_dreams: </p>
<p>Do you know of specific online courses that others have found to be good? I’d like to take a look at them and see whether they would offer enough structure for my son. Some recommendations would be great, saving me a lot of sleuthing on the internet. Much thanks for your ideas!</p>
<p>P.S. I will search for threads on online courses on this forum, too – don’t worry! :)</p>
<p>@fairy_dreams I used a free trial of RS french and found it pretty good with the foundation of the language that I already had. Since Browniebaker’s son has taken French I it might be a good fit? Live Mocha isn’t useful in the slightest for the courses but getting native speakers to check things over is always helpful.</p>
<p>@Browniebaker I haven’t used any of these online classes personally but I’ve heard of people using Lukeion, Artesian Wells Tutorials & Scholars Online. I don’t know if they’re any use to you. :)</p>
<p>^I have no personal experience with Rosetta Stone, but I’ve heard many many people express their displeasure with it. </p>
<p>But you’re right, it probably would be different if you already have prior knowledge. Most people who dislike it are first time learners. </p>
<p>Browniebaker, you can find tons of CCers who use online courses. I know Wartsandall takes Spanish at an online school (Keystone I think?) so you could PM her if you have any questions about the structure of the foreign language courses :]</p>
<p>Yep, it’s basically impossible to learn a language with a different alphabet with Rosetta Stone too. French, and having prior knowledge of the language should make Rosetta Stone work. If he’s doing summer school Rosetta stone could just keep him familiar with the language through the year rather than teaching him.</p>
<p>Let us know what you decide on Browniebaker! :)</p>
<p>@fairy-dreams and @harvard15:</p>
<p>Thank you all these recs! Lots to look into. I’m still waiting to hear back from the head of the upper school. (Is he really that busy? LOL) I hope he’ll tell me there’s a way to fit both languages into the upper-school schedule. I do remember a parents’ meeting at which another parent asked the lower-school head about the possibility of two languages in the upper school, and the answer was that a second language was not possible until junior year. It would irk me a tad to be paying $33K a year to the school yet have to pay for an online course to supplement.</p>
<p>Haha! 
It’d irk me too. If he says it’s not possible for him to do that you should ask if they will give him credit for the online class. Your son’s schedule could be pretty hectic too so if he’d be taking an elective just for the sake of filling up his school schedule to their satisfaction ask if he could drop an elective in place of an online class. Good luck!</p>
<p>33k. Yikes! In public schools, parent involvement almost always works. With persistence and in-person meetings, I’m pretty sure that there will be no problem. Although from what I’ve heard, private schools are more stringent on their students’ courses…</p>
<p>Private schools can be more flexible on where they will accept credit from though so hopefully that’ll work in your favour.</p>
<p>The upper-school head called me back by the end of the day. He said that a boy <em>could</em>, if the schedule allowed, have permission to take two languages but they advise against it freshman year because six courses would be a “huge courseload” at a time when the boy is adjusting to the longer school day (8:00 to 6:30 p.m.) and would allow him no “free period” for doing homework or meeting with teachers during their office hours before athletics, which other boys with only five courses have. </p>
<p>He said that my son could add Latin in sophomore year, (again) if the schedule allowed. He advised waiting until sophomore year so that my son will have a better idea of the upper-school courseload and could make a more informed decision.</p>
<p>He informed me that the summer school courses are not replacements for the term-time courses. French II, for example is remedial for boys who did poorly in French II or had French II at another school and need a refresher. </p>
<p>Well, I’m feeling mixed about all this: relieved that the school is receptive to my son’s adding Latin at least by sophomore year, yet concerned about starting Latin relatively late in high school. </p>
<p>I did float the question of online courses, to which the school is receptive, but I decided not to press the issue of course credit in this initial phone call. </p>
<p>I guess it comes down to how motivated my son is and whether he really believes he could handle six courses next year. He says he wants to do it. We’ll see. The upper-school head was receptive to the idea of my son’s taking Latin I this summer just to see whether he likes it first, but I KNOW my son will like it (for years he’s been reading the Latin dictionary for fun, especially for Harry-Potter-like spells, weird kid), so I don’t see the point of spending $1000+ for a Latin I summer course when he’d have to take Latin I in term-time any way.</p>
<p>I should have raised a dog instead; I hear they are much easier.</p>
<p>At least some good news came out of it, Browniebaker! </p>
<p>If he decides to wait until 10th grade, there’s always the possibility of a tutor for an hour or so per week and then seeing if the school will let him test into Latin II in his Sophomore year? At least then, he’s not commited to it if his schedule is too heavy and it’ll be more flexible for him.</p>
<p>And I’d have gone with a cat - much more independent. :D</p>
<p>Is taking six courses at a time really that extraordinary? Seems like you students here on CC are all taking heavy courseloads, but the again you are a select group. </p>
<p>Related to your question of pypassing Latin I, yesterday I did ask a few questions about bypassing French II, and I got the sense (actually always get this sense from this school) that they have a program they believe in for the boys and they want you to stick to it. We knew when we chose this school that it offered a very structured program, which is what my son likes about it, but the flipside is less flexibility for individual requirements. </p>
<p>But let me ask any high-schoolers here: is taking six courses really that extraordinary?</p>
<p>I don’t know what the norm is for school days since I’m homeschooled but it sounds like your son will be very busy assuming he wants to get some sleep in somewhere. 8.00 'til 6.30 then 3-4 hours homework is a fourteen or fifteen hour day, after all. What’s the rest of his schedule going to be like? Are the courses he’s going to be taking very rigorous?</p>
<p>Six courses isn’t that extraordinary–my junior daughter has 7 including double-blocked AP Calculus (resulting in 8 class periods) and my freshman son 7 plus a last-period study hall (helpful for frequent doctor appointments and some tennis tournaments). However, their class day is shorter; my children are done with classes plus their school sport at 5:30, and have a 50-minute break between classes and sports. Also, all students at their school take either 7 or 8 courses, one more that at many schools because Bible is a required course. Another consideration for you and your son in thinking about taking 5 or 6 courses is whether he does well in his other courses, and whether he would be able to complete his homework after 6:30 if he doesn’t have a study hall.</p>
<p>I would be encouraged by your talk with the upper school head. He didn’t seem to rule anything out completely, but provided some helpful additional information. Given your situation and the level of your son’s interest in Latin, I wouldn’t pay $1000 for the introductory Latin course. I’d save my money to take a trip to France!</p>
<p>I wonder if the upper school head knows that you speak French, among other languages, at home? Also, will your son’s school next year be a new school to him, or the upper school of the school he’s attending now? </p>
<p>When we moved back to America, my daughter was accepted by both excellent schools to which she applied. One told her it was just not possible to take two languages plus chamber orchestra. The school’s apparent unwillingness to consider this was one factor in her choosing the other school. The other school, her current school, has been very flexible in working with us on scheduling. As it turned out, she didn’t take two languages because this school doesn’t offer her other language (German)—but it has been very helpful to be able to work with the administration to have her scheduling needs met in other areas.</p>
<p>I missed the part where you said you & your husband could speak french. Maybe you could read up on immersion learning and your son could learn french that way? It would be good to have a second language that your whole family shares, I agree. :)</p>
<p>@ harvard15: My husband and I do speak French but we don’t speak it at home because (1) our French language skills are rusty and (2) my husband speaks his family’s natve language with our two children, and I do the same with a different native language. The children are fluent in the two different languages (not romance languages, so not related to French or Latin) because we have followed the one-parent-one-language concept for raising bilingual/trilingual children. Even if my husband and I felt comfortable speaking French at home, I would not want to add French to the mix because we’d be shortchanging the training the children have been getting in my husband’s family’s and my family’s respective native languages. </p>
<p>@Schokolade: My son’s school doesn’t build in a break between classes and athletics as your daughter’s school does. The question you asked is exactly the upper-school head’s concern; that is, whether without a free sixth period (typically used as study hall for doing homework or asking teachers any questions) a boy could handle having ALL his homework to do after leaving school at 6:30, arriving home at 7:00, and finsihing dinner at 7:30. Facing 4 hours of homework at 7:30 means probably no time for clarinet practice (he’s in city orchestra) before what would already be a very late bedtime at 11:30. When I think about it, I shudder and am just glad I’m not a student anymore. I don’t remember working going for so many hours in a day during high school.</p>
<p>Yet my son, when we discussed this last night, was confident he could do it and said he wants to do it. If it’s relevant, and I think it is, he gets straight A’s and maintains a 99+% average in French. But I wonder whether he’s too young to be afraid, and I wonder whether that fearlessness is a good or bad thing. </p>
<p>He thinks he could to go bed at 1:00 a.m. and wake at 6:45 a.m. every weekday. Don’t tell me all high-achieving high-schoolers keep such hours! (I have a feeling many do.)</p>