For those of you who have experience with single subject acceleration, what sort of ways have you circumvented the dreaded timetabling issues that arise?

Had a meeting today re Science acceleration for my 12yo ds & while Head of Science at his school seems in favour, we're struggling to work out how it can be coordinated with the resulting timetable clashes.

Any creative ideas / experience would be appreciated.

Cheers,
Cassandra

I'm not sure what you mean by "timetabling" issues? Are you talking strictly about scheduling? I'm imagining a situation where the missed science and the advanced one don't line up, but I'm not sure that's what you are talking about.

Yes, I mean scheduling issues. Not only do the missed Science & the advanced one not line up, but the advanced class options line up with either all his History or all his German classes (both favourites!) Short of either dropping one of these classes, which is really not an option, or working independently on course content during the time he should be in a missed class, which is obviously not the optimal solution, I don't know how we can make it work. I had expected the advanced science to be scheduled at the time of a different current subject for each period per week, so he might miss 1/4 of his scheduled lessons in 4 different subjects & be able to make up the work in his usual science time - shows how much I know about high school scheduling!
I guess I was just hoping someone might have experience in this area & have ideas as to what might have worked for them that I can try & apply to this situation.

Good morning...I'm still trying to play catch up after some time away.

Is your son in middle school otherwise? We deal with these same issues, but fortunately our staff is at least trying to help. This upcoming year will be our first with high school level acceleration. DS has missed a lot of class for the acceleration, but at the elementary level, it's been easily made up and typically nothing he is upset with.

Without a flexible homeroom class though, you are forced to make compromises. Is there only one time slot for the advanced science? Are the history/German classes also at the high school? Or are they part of his base class day?

It's so hard to compare strategies when schools have such crazy individual scheduling plans. How do the two different schools operate? I've found it hardest to superimpose rotating on top of rotating, and am grateful that this year at least one schedule is fixed. Again, without cooperation somewhere, this can be a recipe for disaster.

Hi Dottie,

Sorry, I should have explained myself better. All my son's other classes are in 8th grade (first year of high school here) & all on the same campus. So thank goodness I'm not contemplating trying to coordinate travel between campuses - now that would be scary!

Actually, we're hoping we may have found a solution if he can accelerate in German as well. It seems that just as the Year 9 Science class is held at the same time as Year 8 German, so Year 9 German is held when my son has his regular Yr 8 Science class. So if he accelerates in both, no problems with the timetable. I'll have to find out if his German teacher thinks he can cope with Yr 9 German, though.

The only other problem we have at his school is that all classes in Yr 9 go away for a 5 week extended camp during term, one class at a time. If the class he accelerates into hasn't already been away, I'm not sure what will happen when they go & he's left without a science class for 5 weeks!

Oh I just LOVE when the "solution" allows for other accelerations!!!!! A bit of reasonable struggle in that class could be just what the doctor ordered.

Yuck on the 5 week deal....I'm sure if it's not in the immediate future though that we can brainstorm some viable options. Fortunately we've only had the occasional field trip and activity day to deal with in that regard.

***fingers crossed for the German acceleration solution!!!***

Hi Cassandra,
Subject Accelerations are wonderful, but scheduling is the downside. If everyone is flexable, then a lot can be accomplished. You can always work on Greman a bit over the summer to help fill in the gaps.

Best Wishes and Welcome,
Grinity