Hello. I’m a freshman ESL (English as Second language)student. I’m going to schedule for my sophomore year in a month, but I have some problems with AP classes, please help me.
My English reading skill is not very good, but I can express my opinions with some easy words (like TOEFL vocabularies). I have been studied in US high school for a year, and I’m still taking ESL class. Now I am taking regular English 9 and law education.
I want to take AP Seminar and AP US History before a graduate from high school, but I’m worried about my English skill. I know it will be better if I take these classes in my junior year, but I can’t take them at the same time, so I decide to take one of them in my sophomore year.
If I take AP Semiar next year, I won’t need to take English 10, so I can save a room for other class. I’m interested in seminar because I like to think about different questions and discuss with others, but I’m also worried about the final essay.
If I take AP USH, I can take my gov’t class in junior year, so that I can finish a school law program and focus on AP Biology in my Senior year. But the thing is AP USH is the hardest AP history class, but I have never took AP before, and this course also required a lot of reading, which I’m not very good at.
I really want to try these interesting courses but I’m scared because of my English is probably not good enough to handle them.
Could you please give me some advises? or tell me which one requires less English work
Thank you very much.
Stop and take a deep breath! It will be ok.
I don’t think you should take either next year. Both require tremendous amounts of reading and writing.
You are probably looking at the students around you who are taking lots of APs and thinking you won’t get into a “good” college without APs. First, that is not true and second, taking AP classes and getting poor grades will hurt you more than not taking APs will help you (that is a complicated sentence- take a minute to read it).
You have to run your own race. As somebody who has moved to new places and had to learn new languages, I am going to say that your written English is great- especially for somebody in their 2nd year of speaking the language.
Take US History Junior year and AP seminar senior year. Use Sophomore year to really get your English skills sharp and get super high grades.
You are not ready for any AP classes which require college level reading and writing in English. You should take regular English 10 next year, and regular American History or Government, or possibly honors level English and History next year, depending upon how regular and honors levels are run at your high school.
You are doing great, learning English so quickly. This summer, if they offer summer school classes, you should take an English literature class, because I would imagine that your home language isn’t English, and rather than gain ground this summer, you could lose ground. Another option would be to take a community college English literature class or Composition class. The goal is to keep on improving your written and spoken English over the summer. The other thing you should be doing is reading as much as possible in English - tons of fiction and/or non-fiction, whatever you like, because that’s how you acquire more vocabulary and how you can absorb correct written English.
If you are not already old for your year in high school, another thing that you could consider is taking advantage of all the free education that you can, and take an extra year in high school, if possible.
Thank you and your suggestions are really helpful, and I think I will take literature class in summer!