How Do You Know it’s High School Level?
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I was consulting with a homeschool parent about the age-old question, “How do you know it’s high school level?” She asked me how to tell whether “Movies as Literature” was a high school course. The more we talked about it, the more confident she became. Meanwhile, I was getting more and more excited about the curriculum she was asking about. Learning literature through watching movies??? How cool is that?!
When I looked it up online, I noticed that the description of the curriculum answered her question with ease. It says, “This complete, one-year high school English course uses classic movies on video to introduce and study the elements of literary analysis.” That’s the easy way to tell if it is high school level – it tells you! And that’s the easy way to tell if it is a whole credit (whole year) course – it tells you!
I haven’t seen this product with my own eyes, but it looks like fun to me! If you haven’t seen it before, check it out!
Do you use movies in your homeschool? Let me know in the comments!
Please note: This post was originally published in March 2010 and has been revamped and updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.
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Oooh that sounds good. I am not fond of literary analysis so this might make it more interesting.
We are using this curriculum this year.
It’s very good! We will finish the curriculum over the summer. We can use this course as an “extra” English course — or perhaps an elective. It is very family friendly and by the end of the course you can have a great library of classic movies. 🙂 An Extra Bonus!!
As an aside…It does make you watch movies differently.
Great curriculum!
Thanks Lee, that does look good!
I’ve had this course for three years or so. I have used the individual movie studies just like I would a book study. Neither of my children would want to do all the movies as one course. Instead I add a movie (like a book study) to our other english requirements.
I am just starting highschool with our daughter. Last year when she was studying World War II, we watched a number of great movies to enrich her study on the subject. She loved this approach! I look forward to using “Movies as Literature” as part of our English Curriculum.
Sounds like a great course.
My kids read a classic book, then they go to the library and get the movie for movie night. What great discussions and comparisons. We just finished Romeo and Juliet. My son particularly does not like those “important” sections of the book left out! And he especially does not like to have to wait for his older sister to catch up on the reading. Tonight he was finishing up the movie “Moby Dick.”
Movies have added a lot!
I am so glad you reviewed this book! What a relief, and my children are really looking forward to doing this one. Because we have seen (and they hated) one of the movies in the list, we will pick something else for that particular film and use discussions. This is a great way to teach elements of a good story with some meaningful discussion in a fun, new way. I like that they can learn concepts in the conversation without taking 2 weeks to read a particular story. This sounds like Cliff’s Notes for film.
Yes, this is definitely one of those things that makes me with I was still homeschooling!
Blessings,
Lee
Hi! I was just wondering, you have to purchase all the movies too correct?
Hi Pam! I believe that many may be found at the library or on a streaming/dvd subscription service such as Netflix. Check out the curriculum website for more details.
We bought this neat curriculum guide this summer for my Freshman who is interested in Film School, Movie Directing.
I have used it with my daughters and I plan to use it in two years with my son. One of my daughters was rather the ‘cool’ type; surprisingly she really loved the older movies in this book.
Dear Lily,
It’s wonderful that you are willing to use whatever method works to teach your children the information they need. Keep up the good work!
Robin
Assistant to The HomeScholar