A Recent Question

Here at the PHEA office we are in the thick of printing transcripts and sending out notices regarding the Senior class ranking.  Not surprisingly we receive a lot of questions about which categories certain classes might fall under.  Below is Martha’s response to a question about how a Christian Worldview Course might be categorized.

Question:  Can Christian Worldview count as a history credit?

Answer:   When I answer questions like this, I keep in mind the freedom we have as home schoolers to direct the education of our children according to their gifts and needs.  I also keep in mind that the children will need to be able to function in the world as adults and this probably means further education beyond high school.  I try to advise parents with both of these points in mind.  Parents can choose to cover history on a totally different scope and sequence than the public school starting with ancient history and covering all areas of the world (including Biblical history) simultaneously so that the various histories are integrated.  These kids will likely walk away with a much more integrated knowledge of history than their public school (and home school) peers.  As long as the parents are covering the subject, they have that freedom.

The home school law only states that each of the subjects must be covered each year.  I have always told parents that this part means that they need to cover some of each subject but they are not required to complete a credit in it.  For some families this means doing a math class for two years then assigning the credit when they finish.  For others it may mean reading histories of a time period they are interested in or biographies of scientists or outside reading on a particular part of science with no plans for it ever be on the transcript or part of a credit.  (For my daughter in law, this took the form of studying how medieval people used herbs as medicine - research she needed to know for a novel she was writing.  I am pretty sure she has learned more science since she graduated in doing this sort of research than she did in high school!)

I also encourage families to use the public school requirements as a guideline.  For example, they only have to do 3 histories - two credits of which are specified. We do not have to do ANY of the requirements yet if the home school student is going on to college, they will be competing with all the other students for a spot at the university they want to attend.  If they do not meet the requirements that the universities set, their student will not be accepted.  The public school requirements codify what the majority of the universities require so that the majority of public school kids will be accepted into college.  So it is wise to follow those requirements as a MINIMUM of what should be covered.

At that point though we have to loop back around to the needs of the student.  You may have a student who is exceptional in music and is totally lost in math.  For this student, the parent needs to continue to cover math but at a pace that the student can actually grasp the concepts.  In the end, there may be only one or two high school math classes on the high school transcript.  For this student, if they do want to go on to college, there are ways to do that - either being accepted by a college that wants the talent of the musician so will do remedial classes in the math, or doing the same thing themselves at one of the community colleges.

The Christian Worldview class is actually a philosophy course so on the transcript it would either go under electives or under religion. Because it covers history within its scope and sequence, the parent is fulfilling the law as far as teaching history, but the class itself is not a history.