<p>DS is in high school and he is doing honors level work in all subjects except English. His learning seems to be asymmetric, doing really well in all subjects except English. What can he do to improve his reading comprehension, literary analysis, and writing? Have you used a tutor in such situations? Did it help? Are there some good Summer English Programs that can help him? How do top colleges look at an honors student with a B in English? Thanks in advance for your help.</p>
<p>My son took 9 APs, was beyond AP in math and got B+'s in honors English. He took regular English as a senior and got an A. He got into Harvard. Now he had a lot of things beyond otherwise stellar grades that made him attractive, excellent APs and ECs, including being a legacy, nevertheless it does show that a few B’s won’t hurt. (He also got into Carnegie Mellon, RPI, WPI and was waitlisted at Harvey Mudd.) </p>
<p>My younger son had very similar grades, but was not as advanced in math and had some science B’s. Rank was lower as were SAT scores. In his case he actually had a very strong CR score, but not so hot English grades except senior year when he also dropped down to regular English. He got into U of Chicago, Tufts, Vassar. He’s a history guy.</p>
<p>Anyway, what my examples show is that even very good colleges will look past an occasional B if they like the rest of the application. </p>
<p>I’ve heard good things about CTY’s crafting the essay course, I don’t know if there is an age limit for it. In general I think the best way to improve reading is just to do a lot of it. Find a genre you like and go to town - my kids both read tons of sci fi and fantasy and both had great CR scores despite the fact that they didn’t actually like doing literary analysis. Younger son is a good writer as long as he gets to write about history, older son hates writing and pretty much managed to avoid it once he got to college.</p>
<p>As a first step, I would look into the books and blog of Cal Newport. He has practical suggestions for sketching out what profs are looking for, understanding material better and highlighting parts that are unclear, and other strategies. </p>
<p>I think a tutor would also be helpful. DD1 did not get good math instruction for Algebra I, and never quite recovered. Now that DD2 is coming up, the second that she said “you know I can do the problems, but I really don’t understand the concepts behind them” we retained a tutor from teh local college. He is doing a great job, and I can hear light bulbs going off when they talk at the kitchen table.</p>
<p>As a college English teacher I can tell you that this can be important for success in college. I have often been asked to tutor, but I’ve never thought this a good approach for a student who is already so high achieving.</p>
<p>Instead, I organize groups of friends in similar situations. I let them select an area of interest. I chose the books and movies. We had pizza. They talked, and I listened and made occasional comments. They wrote and shared their writing with each other. I pointed out ONE THING to work on for each kid and only added a new thing when this was mastered.</p>
<p>Then they went in my pool.</p>
<p>I barely made money, especially compared to tutoring them at $100 an hour, but this approach was so successful many went on to get A’s in English. All had really happy college results.</p>
<p>I don’t disagree with mathmom’s assessment at all. Come to think of it, the boys I worked with struggled to get B’s in regular English. She is undoubtably right. It’s not necessary to stress about some B’s in honors English.</p>
<p>I’ve often thought that being an English prof at a tech school might not be too much fun. I remember Richard Feynman saying he never once got an A in English. He also said it was a stupid discipline.</p>
<p>“What can he do to improve his reading comprehension, literary analysis, and writing?”</p>
<p>Literary analysis is a particular art form that is essentially reserved for dealing with literature - as in English lit class, or lit classes in other languages. It is somewhat related to art criticism, but it bears very little resemblance to the types of analysis performed in other fields of study. Personally, unless your child feels a crying need to master this skill at a high level, I’d recommend that you not worry about it. Clearly his reading comprehension can’t be all that bad if he is a top student in all of his other subjects.</p>
<p>Really great advices so far, thank you. Any others?</p>
<p>I’m not sure if this is a great idea or not but it is what came to mind.</p>
<p>I get the New York Times and they have a Sunday book review section where writers critique the writing of other writer’s novels. I prefer the print edition but here is an example of a short one online.</p>
<p><a href=“‘Dangerous Work,’ Arthur Conan Doyle’s Arctic Diary - The New York Times”>‘Dangerous Work,’ Arthur Conan Doyle’s Arctic Diary - The New York Times;
<p>I think reading about what other skilled writers make note of makes me more aware of successful and not so successful writing. Perhaps this might help your student see that as well.</p>
<p>BTW, I don’t know if you have to sign up to see this but the NYTs does not spam you so you might want to try it. They let you have a certain number of views a month before they want money.</p>
<p>Have you met with or even emailed his English teacher(s) with your concerns? They may have specific suggestions for him.
Encourage your son to READ as much as possible! If classroom literature is not his thing that is fine. Focus on hot contemporary authors, especially if you can find some genre that will appeal to him (Steampunk is the rage now). Your school librarian is a good resource as well as the town library especially if there is a teen section and librarian.
My math/science-oriented son started reading more in middle school when discovered a genre he liked based on a recommendation from a friend. </p>
<p>Here is an excellent resource:
[GUYS</a> READ](<a href=“http://www.guysread.com/]GUYS”>http://www.guysread.com/)
Also <a href=“http://www.teenreads.com/[/url]”>http://www.teenreads.com/</a> is good though not focused on guys.</p>
<p>Find reading based on his interests. I started getting books and subscribing to magazines that are science, nature and technology oriented such Scientific American (when he decided Popular Science was too easy!), Wired, National Geographic. We always watch lots of science documentaries on tv so if there was something that really interested him I would find related books (Stephen Hawking, Neil deGrasse Tyson etc.).
Non-fiction reading is a great way to get boys to read more. It will help their critical reading skills, vocabulary, and pique their interest in potential careers as well.</p>
<p>LakeMom, BeanTownGirl thank you so much. We had conversations with his teacher and the recommendations were not helpful or significant enough to make much difference.</p>
<p>Literary analysis is only one aspect. It is covered in depth in AP English so he can pick up a crash course that way. As far as reading and comprehension I would suggest one on one or tutoring. My oldest is dyslexic so has been in one-on-one tutoring for reading and comprehension since first grade and we added writing to the mix in middle school and it really does help (at least marginally for him but enough). But if that sounds too intense…reading, more reading and more reading is the best way to increase reading skills and comprehension. It doesn’t really matter “what” they are reading…just that they are reading and having conversations about what they have read with the parents or in a group setting if not one on one.</p>
<p>Like someone said, comprehension might be just fine (my dyslexic has pretty good comprehension but you have to be able to read to comprehend the words on the page. ) If would talk to his teachers and see if they can give you some insight into where he is deficit. What year is your son? Did he take the PSAT or the PLAN test this year? Those scores might also shed light, especially the PLAN because it breaks out the Reading/Writing scores into grammatical and what amounts to comphrehension.</p>
<p>Your son can also check out CritiqueCircle and ReviewFuse to get writing feedback.</p>
<p>All problems are probably tied into reading comprehension. The bad news is that RC is one of the hardest things to fix. The Good news is that the problem is not insurmountable. But to correct more time than average will have to be spent reading and rereading and writing and rewriting. Learn to deal with it in HS. Such a problem could become especially acute in college.</p>