Disclosure: I received this complimentary product through the Homeschool Review Crew.

High School English Curriculum

Homeschool Review Crew

Paradigm Accelerated Curriculum

Having a child in high school has been a new experience for me but gearing up to graduate a child from our homeschool is probably more terrifying.  I have a girl entering her senior year and she’s using a new high school English curriculum so we can make sure she’s ready for college. 

Paradigm Accelerated Curriculum offers a variety of curriculum options for homeschooling families.  Members of the Homeschool Review Crew were given seven different options to choose from.  We chose English 4 Literature and Philosophy (12th Grade) for our review. 

About the Curriculum

Paradigm Accelerated Curriculum is very much student-directed and self-paced.  As the parent or teacher, your involvement is minimal.  You are able to purchase this as a digital download or in physical format.  The physical books are softcover workbooks.  These are consumables. 

From this company, a curriculum can be found for grades 7-12.  While most of the courses that are offered are English related they also provide a Government course.  English courses build on each other to get your student ready for college. 

That being said, you can start with the grade level your child needs.  For instance, we started off with a high school English curriculum for our review.  While we haven’t used the grades below(we’re using 12th grade) we did make sure to have those in other forms before using this one. 

Goals

The main goal of the company is to produce a curriculum that will help with character development while also providing superior academics.  They give parents a chance to step back while their students take the reins and become in charge of their own academics.  With these courses, they enter the world prepared and self-motivated. 

English IV

The final course for learning English this course covers literature and philosophy.  It is the fourth book in the high school series to prepare students for college.  After completion, your senior has one credit for either English or Philosophy.  This curriculum uses the Benjamin Franklin Learning Style. 

Our Thoughts

My daughter using this curriculum is starting her senior year this year.  She started this course a bit early for the purposes of this review but it will go on her transcript as her senior English.  

For our review, we received the full physical High School English Curriculum for English IV as well as the digital downloads.  These are normally purchased separately.  The physical is our favorite. 

Normally I would have two children using this(because we got a physical and a digital download) but my son who normally is at the same grade level as my daughter was not quite ready for this curriculum.  It is definitely a bit advanced to what he had been using plus he is technically only going into his sophomore year of high school. 

So for this review, my 17-year-old daughter who plans to go to college is our main reviewer.  As her parent, I shall share my thoughts as well!

The Books

With our books there was a catalog with all of the courses offered by Paradigm Accelerated Curriculum as well as a sheet on how to best use the curriculum. 

Our books arrived well boxed.  The books themselves were also shrink-wrapped together to help prevent any damage that shipping can cause.  I liked this because too often we do get damaged books in the mail here in our rural area.  

The teachers book is not bound.  It’s loose pages but they are hole punched so you can put them in a binder.  And when you open it it tells you how to put them in a binder or two for the most ease of use.  I like how it’s set up and tells you exactly what to do and how to use it. 

The student books were different than I expected. 

There are four student text books.  They’re numbered one through four.  And with each Text or Chapter there is also an activity book.  So all in all there are eight student books. 

Now to the actual content!

These definitely are intense.  You have to know that going in.  It’s going to take work.  This is not just a simple curriculum that you can open and read a few sentences plus answer a couple one word questions and tada.  No.  This requires thought and is definitely preparing you for college. 

While I said intense if your child is used to doing work with literature and reading then this won’t be so bad.  We have always had a very literature rich curriculum in our household as I believe reading to be the key to learning. 

Here is the table of contents for the first book or chapter one of the course.  It covers quite a wide variety and really gives you so much information.  It’s not just information about literature though.  Through the literature you’re learning history as well and I love that!

If you’re not familiar with the Benjamin Franklin Learning Style you do get a bit of a crash course when you start using the curriculum so don’t worry.  It’s really all self explanatory and not hard to figure out. 

I enjoyed that there are illustrations throughout.  They’re not a vivid as the cover as they’re in black and white but they are wonderful none the less. 

To work the best you should be reading and looking at the assignments together.  So you don’t read the entire lesson and then try to do all the assignments for it.  Read each segment and then go to the assignment to see what you should be answering.  This is something they suggest and it makes amazing sense. 

There are also some assignments that you can pick and choose from.  These are suggested assignments.  So you can choose to assign them all of only part of them.  Honestly I loved them!  I’m huge on writing and debating a good topic and this was so much fun.  Some of them I took and just had a good chat with my daughter over while others I assigned her to actually do. 

This is supposed to be(and is) student intensive and parent lite.  The parent is just there for support and grading.  However, I loved this and am a huge literature buff so I found myself having lots of discussions with my daughter on what she was reading and the assignments.  

You don’t have to do that but I loved it.  I’m sure if it was my son doing this curriculum he would rather just do it and get it done and not really care for my chats and debates making school time take longer. 

Final Thoughts

I think this is a great curriculum.  I love the literature and passages they are using in this curriculum.  If I were to choose a High School English Curriculum to use for grades 7-12 for one of my younger children I would start her out in this.  She’s going into 7th grade this fall and I’m thinking I will purchase the grammar for 7th grade to see how she likes it.  I know I love it so hopefully she will too. 

All of my children are readers.  We are forever reading and getting crates full of books from the library.  If your child does not like to read I think they would really struggle with liking and using this curriculum.  I think this would be a great one to use consistently instead of just starting in the senior year but we have loved doing this review and plan on finishing the whole years worth of curriculum. 

Learn More

You can learn more about Paradigm Accelerated Curriculum and its products by visiting its website.  Learn about the seven options that review members were given by reading all of the blog posts linked up on the Main Blog Post over on the Homeschool Review Crew blog.  We are enjoying our High School English Curriculum and hope you give them a chance as well. 

Paradigm Accelerated Curriculum can also be found on Facebook.