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hsmom
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| Posted: March 28 2012 at 8:15am | IP Logged
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I am having to put together a high school curriculum for my special needs dd. I am looking for some British lit that is easier than the norm but could still pass for hs lit. She's not into anything scary.
Also, how many books/poems/plays are necessary for a full literature credit?
TIA
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guitarnan
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| Posted: March 28 2012 at 9:08am | IP Logged
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If you want to include Shakespeare, you could try the No Fear Shakespeare series, which has one page of the play facing a modernized "translation" of that same page, making the dialogue easier to understand. There are some graphic novels, too, by the same writers, which might be a good way for your daughter to understand the plot of the play before reading all or part of it.
Certainly Jane Austen's books are shorter and easier to understand than, say, Paradise Lost or Beowulf.
Other ideas:
Animal Farm (not scary, exactly, but thought-provoking)
The Hobbit
Sherlock Holmes short stories
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Elena
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| Posted: March 28 2012 at 7:35pm | IP Logged
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You might enjoy Lightening Literature from Hewitt. I am using these with my boys and the selection is appropriate for high school and the comprehension questions helped guide them through the books. I use audio books along with the regular book to help them get through the books a bit quicker. Maybe that will help you too?
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JodieLyn
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| Posted: March 29 2012 at 12:01am | IP Logged
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CS Lewis?
James Harriet?
Alice in Wonderland? I read it recently and while it was "fantastic" I don't really recall the book being scary at all.
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SallyT
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| Posted: March 29 2012 at 8:17am | IP Logged
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You might consider easier-reading versions of things like Beowulf, Canterbury Tales, etc. I don't know what your daughter's reading level is, or what she might have read already, but here are some thoughts for a Brit-Lit course which would expose her at least to the great narratives of the tradition:
1. Anglo-Saxons
Look at Anglo-Saxon culture/language (incl. audio of someone reading in Anglo-Saxon)
Caedmon's Hymn in a modern translation (short!)
some Anglo-Saxon riddles (fun!)
Beowulf the Warrior (Ian Seraillier)
2. Middle English/Middle Ages
culture/language/how Norman Conquest changed everything
learn about mystery plays (there are some good snippets on YouTube)
Canterbury Tales (Geraldine McCaughrean)
3. Renaissance/Shakespeare
again, look at history, culture
do an in-depth study of Shakespeare and his world --
read one or more plays from something like No Fear Shakespeare
rent DVDs of plays to watch; if possible attend a Shakespeare play (I highly recommend the 1996 Trevor Nunn film of Twelfth Night, which my 8-year-old requested to watch the other night)
4. You might fast-forward through the metaphysical poets, Milton, the Romantics, etc, if reading/analysis of complex poetry is going to be a bridge too far -- though you might pull some poetry from these periods to read and enjoy (I could make recommendations if you like), and do a unit on British novels. Again, I don't know what kind of learning difficulty your daughter has, or what her reading level is, but you might consider doing audio or read-aloud versions of Jane Austen, Dickens, and some twentieth-century novelists. Barbara Pym, for example, is kind of an undiscovered jewel. She wrote short, often hilarious novels about women in little English villages, or around Anglican parishes -- Excellent Women is a great read to follow something like Pride and Prejudice. I would also recommend Pilgrim's Inn by Elizabeth Goudge.
I would think that if you have 3-4 good, thorough literature units for the year, covering major periods, plus grammar and composition, then you've got a solid high-school English credit in British literature.
Incidentally, I'm a former high-school and college English instructor, and I've continued to write high-school English/history curriculum for my own kids, for co-op classes I've taught, and for general consumption. If you want more ideas for a Brit-lit course, you might check out my page here. The course as it stands is just a huge, fairly rough listing of e-texts and online resources -- videos, audio, interactive stuff, background information, etc. Eventually I'll write up actual plans, but I'm not there yet!
Hope this helps you.
Sally
eta: the Seraillier Beowulf is available from Bethlehem Books; like the Canterbury Tales I recommended, it's a younger-readers' version.
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hsmom
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| Posted: March 29 2012 at 12:11pm | IP Logged
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Thank you ladies. So many great ideas. My dd's learning issues are developmental delay and comprehension. I do not really know what her reading level is.  I hope to put together a program of interesting (to her) books.
SallyT, I like the idea of breaking it down into units of time periods. That link was a wonderful resource. You lost me on the "metaphysical poets". I guess I need an easy lit program to teach as well. I would appreciate other suggestions.
I will also check into a easier versions or maybe excerpts of Canterbury Tales and Beowolf.... there is no way we would make it through those in their entirety.
Just checked my library system and they have Greenhaven Press literary companion to British literature for several of the books posted here. 
Guitarnan, I was thinking of The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. I love the idea of short stories. No Fear Shakespeare sounds great too!
I will keep you posted of my plan.
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SallyT
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| Posted: March 29 2012 at 10:35pm | IP Logged
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Sorry, I didn't really mean "official" reading level -- just trying to get a read on whether the books I was thinking of (Beowulf the Warrior, the McCaughrean Canterbury Tales -- which is a picture book, but very lively and good) would seem too kiddie. I don't think they would, necessarily, and good retellings are an excellent way to give someone exposure to the important stories, as a way of imparting a sense of our cultural tradition.
What I think you might do is this: for a "big" work like Canterbury Tales, for example, look at a page of the work in the original Middle English, to see how different it looks from the language we speak now (Shakespeare is officially "modern" English, and you don't think about how modern his language really is until you look at what preceded it). Listen to an audio clip of the Prologue. Then read an easier version (selected tales if you like -- nobody reads the whole thing in high school, not least because some of the tales are really bawdy).
I'm reminded that your daughter doesn't like scary -- Beowulf is actually pretty gory, with a monster who comes and eats warriors while they're sleeping in the mead-hall at night, which is the whole reason why Beowulf gets to go be a hero, so it's hard to see how you could excerpt that out and still "get" the story. I don't know what's scary for your particular child, but just thought you might want a heads-up. The Anglo-Saxons were a bloody lot. But Caedmon's Hymn is a beautiful short poem, and Anglo-Saxon riddles are fun (some are really hard, but others are delightful -- the riddles Bilbo and Gollum exchange in The Hobbit come straight from the Anglo-Saxon tradition). So you could still do that piece of British literature and get a sense of the beginning of the tradition without necessarily taking on the big epic. And you can do the same thing, of looking at Old English/Anglo-Saxon, listening to some audio, and then reading modern translations.
Other suggestions: H.E. Marshall has a retelling of Beowulf, which you can access here.
She also has this book, which could work as a spine for your course. Note that H.E. Marshall was a Protestant author, and you'll want to pre-read and make decisions about chapters on, say, "How the Bible Came to the People," and on Saint Thomas More. You might opt not to assign those chapters,and to watch A Man For All Seasons instead (for More, anyway). But it's a beautifully written book which does give you the whole literary history of England in an accessible style. At the very least, it might be a useful read for you as you plan.
Sally
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SallyT
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| Posted: March 30 2012 at 9:05am | IP Logged
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More thoughts, if you can stand it! --
Have you and your daughter read Augustine Came to Kent, If All the Swords in England, and other historical fiction dealing with British history? There are some very good children's/young adult novels which might act as "pegs" for your course as well, providing historical context for the literature you choose.
If you follow the H.E. Marshall English Literature sequence, you could start with a unit on King Arthur -- there are many, many retellings of the Arthurian legends accessible to readers of all ages -- with background history about the end of the Roman Empire in Britain, and struggles between the Britons and Saxons.
Then a unit on Saxon England (ie the Anglo-Saxons), using Marshall's chapter on Beowulf, which is a brief retelling, the next two chapters on Caedmon and the return of Christianity to England, followed by Augustine Came to Kent. With the retelling of Beowulf you could also look at the "real thing," plus listen to audio. The Marshall chapters on Bede and Alfred the Great would round out this unit.
A unit on the Middle Ages could begin with the Marshall chapter on the Norman Conquest and subsequent chapters through Chaucer, skipping the chapter on the Bible, which puts a distinctly Protestant spin on the Catholic culture of the day. You might pre-read that chapter and decide if and how you wish to present that material. After the chapter on The Canterbury Tales, you could look at an excerpt in Middle English and listen to audio. This would be a time to read If All the Swords in England or The Hidden Treasure of Glaston. Then at this point I would be tempted to jump forward several chapters to "The Beginning of the Theatre" and the next two chapters about mystery plays.
Your next unit could be on Tudor England and Shakespeare, following the same kind of routine: reading chapters from Marshall, then some actual literature. At this stage, if you could find them, there's a series of historical novels, the Mantlemass series, by Barbara Willard, who wrote Augustine Came to Kent and If All the Swords in England, dealing with a family during the Wars of the Roses. These were actually Willard's personal favorites of her novels, and I don't know why Bethlehem Books hasn't reprinted them! Anyway, they're especially nice for girls. All of this would be a good setup for dealing with Shakespeare and his world.
And so on. These units don't have to be that long -- two weeks, maybe? Really, to call a course "British Literature," you want to cover as much of that tradition as you can, so that your student comes away with a sense of the whole sweep of its history. The more I think about it, the more I think that the Marshall book is a great resource at least for you, to give you an overview of English literature through the end of the 19th century, so that you can decide what you want to focus on. You can read chapters aloud, assign them as reading, or just pull information from them to use your way, as you deem appropriate. Again, I wish it were a Catholic resource (that would make it perfect!), but I've literally never run across another book that does quite what this one does, in terms of telling the story of English literature, so I think it's well worth your time to investigate.
Sorry to go on and on and flood this thread! Can you tell I like planning lit courses?
Sally
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hsmom
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| Posted: March 31 2012 at 10:07am | IP Logged
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Sally,
Your posts are very helpful. I had not even considered a spine, but am looking at some options now, including H. E. Marshall's book. I must confess after looking over some of the sites and resources from this thread, I am beginning to realize that while my dd wants to do British lit, it may be better to wait until 11th and 12th grades. British lit seems harder than American lit. and I do think it will take 2 years to cover.
We have not read When Augustine Comes to Kent or If All the Swords in England. Those would probably be good options too. The picture books for Beowolf and Canterbury Tales will be very helpful. Scary can be as simple as Nancy Drew mysteries. Graphic violence is definitely out. Passages of Black Beauty had to be skipped over. Literature is tricky here to say the very least; however, she is making progress with the issue. I do not really know how far to push until I have pushed too far, and I have not done that in a while.
I am still looking over the suggestions here. Right now (not necessarily in this order) these seem like good possibilities:
King Arthur
Beowolf
Canterbury Tales
When Augustine Comes to Kent
All the Swords in England
Shakespeare - this is proving tricky too!
Pride and Prejudice
Adventures of Sherlock Holmes or short stories
A Cold Wind Blowing (Mantlemass) ETA: Others of this series look good too. I like that the books aren't lengthy.
All Creatures Great and Small
Dickens?
C.S. Lewis?
Thanks to all of you who posted. I appreciate the time it takes to do this.
I will be revisiting this often.
ETA: It looks like the Gutenberg Project has H.E. Marshall's book on-line!
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SallyT
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| Posted: March 31 2012 at 12:45pm | IP Logged
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You can read the Marshall book either at Gutenberg or at The Baldwin Project -- whichever you find most readable.
Those Barbara Willard books are great. They're readable at a late-elementary/early-middle-school level and are geared for readers at about that age -- the plots can be intense, but they aren't graphic or frightening, and they are just beautifully done. My older daughter adored the first two (I think) of the Mantlemass books -- A Sprig of Broom, and I forget the other title (maybe it had the word "Laurel" in it?), at about 12, when she also loved "Dear America" and "Royal Diaries"-type historical fiction.
I don't know that British lit is necessarily harder than American -- there's some pretty dense reading in 19th century American literature! It's just that there's a lot of it, because the history is so much longer, and much of it is in forms that we don't tend to read/experience as much in our current culture -- fiction didn't arrive on the scene until relatively late in the day. So part of learning to cope with British literature is acquiring some language/context for understanding poetry and drama.
So far, I've been through my high-school cycle once, and we did our history/literature this way:
9th: ancient and classical history/lit
10th: British lit through the Renaissance
11th: U.S./New World history/lit
12th: I did a sort of history/philosophy/literature course using Anthony Esolen's Politically Incorrect Guide to Western Civilization in the first semester, then a study of poetry using Laurence Perrine's Sound and Sense second semester.
You raise a really interesting and important point, though -- we did manage to cover the "modern" era from Shakespeare forward in my Esolen course, but really, now that you mention it, British/European literature and history are a more-than-one-year proposition. So now, for myself, for my rising 9th grader, I'm thinking:
9th: ancient/classical
10th: Anglo-Saxons-Renaissance
11th: Renaissance-20th century (including New World?)
12th: American lit? semester-long seminars? I really want to do Esolen and Perrine again, but maybe I can get it all in . . . ???
All this is really tangential to your concerns, but you've just helped me have a breakthrough moment. Thank you!
Sally
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hsmom
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| Posted: April 18 2012 at 3:23pm | IP Logged
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Sally,
So many things I want dd to study and so little time. I managed to get an inexpensive copy of England in Literature to also use as a spine. I am really starting to look forward the course.
Oh, I am glad I helped you have a breakthrough moment! 
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Topic: British literature- special needs
