Course Selection

Exonerate · Post by **Exonerate** » 2004-04-11 10:06pm

Ok, I'm a sophomore in HS in the US... We've gotten our course selection catalogs, and I've pretty much choosen my next year's schedule, except English.

My options are AP English Language, AP English Literature, which are probably both going to be pretty strenuous, seeing how I'm not much of an English person. I can also take semester courses, (20th Century American Writers, The Short Story: A World Perspective, Ethnic Experience in Literature, Experiencing Poetry, Unknown Shakespeare, and Study of Dramatic Literature)

I'm not planning to major or minor in English in college. English is not one of my best subjects, although I guess I'm adequately versed in it. I'd currently leaning towards AP English Language, since I have a feeling I'm going to hate AP English Lit. However, because of the workload, I'm having second doubts. I figure I'll probably take it eventually, but the question is now when I'll take it...

My planned schedule for next year, if it helps, is AP US History, Physics Honors, Math Analysis/Calc, Ceramics, Japanese III Honors, some English Course, and possibly Contemporary Media.

Any advice, suggestions?

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2004-04-11 10:10pm

I've taken both courses you speak of, and of the two I found AP Language to be the easiest. I'd take that; definitely don't pick the ones that you won't get any college credit for, because college English classes are a goddamn pain in the ass.

Post by **Mr Bean** » 2004-04-11 10:11pm

I'd go with reading over word usage any day

Which English is it that has you interperting rather than writing

BSing a report is magintudies easier than Bsing a story or Wong forbid a poem

aerius · Post by **aerius** » 2004-04-11 10:14pm

Pick the one with more cute chicks. I met my GF in an English class way back when, it worked for me, it'll work for you.

But seriously, take a look at what colleges and universities require for the programs that you're interested in. Or if they don't require it, see which ones they prefer you to have so that it looks better when you apply. Basically, look at what you need for what you want in the future and plan everything back from there.

Trytostaydead · Post by **Trytostaydead** » 2004-04-11 10:29pm

English language is just about grammar.. it's like a slightly harder version of the SAT II's. English literature I thought was well worth the extra effort (then again, I'm a grammatical dunce and barely passed the English Language AP), and did awesome.

What year are you? If you're only a junior.. take English language now, then senior year English lit. That way you'll pretty much get most of your English out of the way for college.

Seggybop · Post by **Seggybop** » 2004-04-11 10:36pm

I would take Literature, because dealing with endless robotic grammar rules is way too annoying. Reading stories and then writing random crap about them is pretty easy.

But where do you live that you can take Japanese for 3 years in high school!? X_X

Joe · Post by **Joe** » 2004-04-11 10:36pm

Trytostaydead wrote:English language is just about grammar.. it's like a slightly harder version of the SAT II's. English literature I thought was well worth the extra effort (then again, I'm a grammatical dunce and barely passed the English Language AP), and did awesome.

What year are you? If you're only a junior.. take English language now, then senior year English lit. That way you'll pretty much get most of your English out of the way for college.

Actually, I believe most colleges will only count both courses as credit if you get a 5 on at least one of the exams. Which is extremely difficult to do.

I personally got 4s on both but only got one semester of English exempted because of it.

Trytostaydead · Post by **Trytostaydead** » 2004-04-11 11:05pm

Joe wrote:
Actually, I believe most colleges will only count both courses as credit if you get a 5 on at least one of the exams. Which is extremely difficult to do.

I personally got 4s on both but only got one semester of English exempted because of it.

Oh. Didn't know that.. I got a 5 on one of 'em so.. heh. Anyways, AP Language is silly. Who needs to know grammar anyways? That's what secretaries are for

Exonerate · Post by **Exonerate** » 2004-04-11 11:28pm

Mr Bean wrote:I'd go with reading over word usage any day

Which English is it that has you interperting rather than writing

BSing a report is magintudies easier than Bsing a story or Wong forbid a poem

From what I heard, English Language is more about interpreting the structure of the stuff, while English Lit deals more with the underlying ideas. So both require analysis... >_>

I've done lit work in class, and I really don't like it, so that's why I'm leaning towards AP English Language.

I seriously doubt if any possibly fields I'm considering will require AP Language courses.

Trytostaydead: I'll be a junior next year.

I live in Southern California, which might explain why I'm able to take Japanese

Trytostaydead · Post by **Trytostaydead** » 2004-04-11 11:35pm

Exonerate wrote:
Trytostaydead: I'll be a junior next year.

I live in Southern California, which might explain why I'm able to take Japanese

Take Language first. Helps with the SAT IIs. And Language is yeah, just all about looking at the structure of the way things are phrased. So it's not really "analyzing" per se that you normally think of in English. Language AP is a lot about answering, "what is that? why? how? so, why do I care?" A very laid back class in my opinion, where you beat pieces and books to death and interpert everything back to the two most important themes in literature: SEX AND DEATH!

Btw, where in SoCal are you?

Exonerate · Post by **Exonerate** » 2004-04-11 11:52pm

About half and hour away from UCLA.

Illuminatus Primus · Post by **Illuminatus Primus** » 2004-04-12 12:09am

Joe wrote:Actually, I believe most colleges will only count both courses as credit if you get a 5 on at least one of the exams. Which is extremely difficult to do.

I personally got 4s on both but only got one semester of English exempted because of it.

Weak. I got AP 5.

SyntaxVorlon · Post by **SyntaxVorlon** » 2004-04-12 12:59am

Take what AP you can get, and get enough gen-edu classes out of the way as possible and college will be that much more enjoyable.

Trytostaydead · Post by **Trytostaydead** » 2004-04-12 01:30am

Exonerate wrote:About half and hour away from UCLA.

That's a lot of places. San Diego? Riverside? Apple Valley?

Fire Fly · Post by **Fire Fly** » 2004-04-12 01:58am

I'd personally go with the AP Lit because that was the course I took. Most of the time, we just read books and had discussions in class about it and then we'd write papers. I found that I greatly improved my writing skills after having taken AP Lit.

On a side note, I personally find AP classes to be the where you actually do learn about something. I remember my first AP class (AP History) and it wasn't too bad first semester then second semester...wham! But I'm glad I took it because it was the class I remembered the most from. I don't know if I could have ever survived through a regular class because I'd kill myself from the boredom and the overwhelming work of useless shit work keep-you-occupied stuff.

But that's just me.