My son is a freshman in Pre-IB.He works really hard and gets good grades. (Mostly 100 on all subjects).I read from other posts that junior year is going to be hard.He is going to start play soccer and restarting his piano lessons.He finish studying at 11/11:30 pm.How can I help him with time management so that he will not be stressed out in junior year?
We visited a couple of college campuses.He wanted to study medicine and he want to choose Biomedical engineering as pre med.
How can I choose the electives and science that help him in the future?
He has to take one Art elective as a requirement. He want to choose AP art history.I am telling him to choose regular Art so that it won’t add more workload. Since he is going to pre-med,is Art history useful in college?
Since I am from different country and didn’t attend school here,I have to learn about this school system/IB program as much as I could.
Thank you in advance for your help.
No, Art History is absolutely useless in pre-med. I recommend doing drama as that trains public speaking skills. I believe that communication in any major is the greatest skill. No matter how intelligent you are, if you can’t speak well, no one will want to listen to you.
The IB curriculum is basically a standard universal curriculum that every school in the world (that has the program) follows. If he wants to choose biomed engineering, he should take all 3 sciences but with more emphasis on Physics. I recommend taking Biology and Physics IB and leave Chemistry regular as the IB program only requires the student to take 2 IB sciences.
Some tips:
My family has a Yale legacy (and I’m expected to carry it on. Ohhh the pressure) and this is how we train each other for success. My father likes having a talk with my brother and I after he comes back from work. We are expected to summarize everything we learned that day and “re-teach” it to him. This is a very effective method because it shows that your son is recalling information and remembers it. I always recommend this method as it has shown to prove great results (the legacy).
Good luck to your son! If he gets almost 100’s on all the subjects, he won’t have too much of an issue.
Hi - I’m a current IB senior at a public high school in the Midwest. I can tell you a little bit about my own experience, but I would take it with a grain of salt as every school and every IB program is different.
Many schools have “pre-IB” programs that are designed to help kids get ready for the IB courses junior/senior year. These are the best tools that your son has at his disposal because they are there to help him get to the level he needs to be for IB. It’s a great sign that he’s doing so well in all of his subjects. The workload will definitely increase sophomore year, but it will really explode junior year. He will learn what is important to take time on and what can be rushed through. Once he starts his activities, he will be required to prioritize, something that will come in handy in the coming years.
One great thing about the IB is that it is essentially a liberal arts curriculum, meaning that it exposes students to a wide variety of subjects in six different areas. Over my two years, I’ve taken classes in chemistry, psychology, calculus, etc. but also history, world literature, and languages. Your son may have a fairly good idea of what he wants to do now, but it may also change - and that’s okay. The IB is a good way to try out a lot of different areas.
As for choosing classes - he likely has a required curriculum right now, at least for the first two years. Follow your school’s counselors’ advice and take the most rigorous/honors classes possible to prepare for IB. Art history will not help him in pre-med - but also, high school is the time to take classes to broaden your horizons. If art history isn’t replacing another important class in his schedule and he enjoys it, I would say go for it.
Thank you for all the suggestions and advice.The re-teach really works.I start that when they start kindergarten.His school offers physics as elective.I have to talk to their counselors about other options for physics.For higher level they only offer biology and chemistry.His first priority is to apply for 6 year med school.BME is our second option.He is joining the debate team.
Thank you.