Online high school diploma curriculum

In this course, your learners will explore the amazing potential of your personality. The course begins by defining personality and showing its effects on life. Your learners will study some famous theories about personality and the possible ways that personality is formed. After taking a personality test, they’ll reflect on their results to understand more about themselves and their traits. Finally, your learners will decide how their personality can help them to build better relationships, excel as a leader, benefit their community, and succeed in their High School program and beyond.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Define personality and its effects on your life
• Explain three theories that contribute to the development of one’s personality
• Describe one’s own personality type and individual strengths and preferences
• Examine personality characteristics that can be influential to learning, leadership, and career success

This course offers an overview of important works that increase awareness, understanding, and acceptance of individual and group identities. Your learners will explore diverse artists and works of visual art that affect our societal and human interactions, such as gender identity, race, socio-economic status, disability, sexual orientation, religion, culture, and national and ethnic origins. Through these different lenses, your learners will be able to gain a greater understanding of inclusivity by evaluating the experience of these groups as perceived through various art medias.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Explain how visual art is an expression of identity and culture
• Investigate the role of visual art as a means of communicating cultural values
• Analyze the meaning of visual art according to principles of expression and aesthetic qualities
• Evaluate visual art through an aesthetic and cultural lens

This course serves as an overview of physical, emotional, mental, and social health, and how to balance all these areas. The first lesson of the course discusses the differences between health and wellness and the eight dimensions of wellness. Your learners will study the unique factors that can affect their wellness, such as heredity, environment, and culture. They’ll also learn about how their own decisions can affect their health and start creating a personal wellness plan to access their wellness in multiple areas.

The rest of their course breaks down the discussion about wellness into physical, emotional and mental, and social topics. Some readings and other content in this course will include topics that some students may find offensive or traumatizing, but they’re important topics to discuss and understand for their personal development and wellness. They’ll also be provided with a number of national services and help resources.

In Physical Wellness, your learners will cover topics such as drug and alcohol awareness (including discussion about substance and alcohol abuse) and chronic diseases and illnesses, as well as preventive measures they can take to protect their health. In Emotional and Mental Wellness, they’ll explore the characteristics of good mental health, learn about mental health disorders, and discuss topics surrounding self-harm and suicide. Your learners will also discuss activities or solutions to maintain and enhance mental well-being. In Social Wellness, they’ll gain understanding about safe and healthy relationships with those around them, which starts with having a good relationship with themself. They’ll review content about different forms of abuse and bullying. This lesson touches on topics of sex and gender as well as gender identity and sexual orientation. Your learners will also study the importance of adapting to social situations, setting personal boundaries, and how to manage conflict. The last portion of their course will give an overview of important skills to balance relationships and responsibilities, like effective time management, organizational skills, and focus techniques.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Explain the concepts of health and wellness, factors that can influence overall well-being, and strategies to enhance personal wellness
• Identify strategies for improving their physical wellness through nutrition, physical activity, drug and alcohol awareness, chronic disease prevention, and good personal hygiene practices
• Explain characteristics associated with good mental health and strategies for promoting mental well-being
• Summarize strategies for enhancing their social wellness through the development of healthy relationships

Statistics play a key role in sports, including ranking schemes, player assessment, and comparisons. This course is a study of how statistics are utilized in sports and presents exciting investigations for the sports enthusiast. Your learners will study the statistics used in various sports and how they relate to performance.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Identify sports statistics and how they’re used in baseball for team and player performance
• Interpret basketball statistics for team and player performance and for making comparisons and predictions
• Explain how data is used in football for rule changes and evaluating player and team performance and how fans use statistics
• Interpret sports statistics for women’s sports and how data is used to gain equal opportunity

In this course, you'll learn how to build your digital literacy skills and become a strong digital citizen. You'll learn to use technology to find information in ways that are ethical and effective. You'll be able to recognize how to protect your digital privacy during online activities and describe why it's important for everyone to have access to technology. You'll also learn to think critically about sources of information and determine the best methods to research and communicate ideas. By the end of the course, you'll be able to identify appropriate methods for using technology in education, the workplace, and daily life.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Recognize how to use digital technology ethically and effectively to obtain information
• Describe the importance of access to digital technology to communicate and perform tasks
• Explain how to protect digital data and safely use digital technology for commerce
• Use effective communication and research skills in education
• Interpret visual information and effective communication in a professional environment
• Carry out research related to personal, local, and global issues

In this course, you’ll learn different reading strategies that can be used to help with comprehension of information, including workplace writing. Organizational structures and reading strategies work together to reveal key details, and to effectively deliver informational texts. You’ll learn different organizational structures, and how these structures are used for writing. You’ll learn how point of view and purpose shape the content and structure of multiple text passages. You’ll analyze information to learn how to distinguish between fact and opinion. You’ll examine the basic conventions of English grammar, usage, and mechanics. This course also discusses how to identify the main themes, key details, and literacy devices in poetry and short stories. You’ll be introduced to drama and learn about different theaters throughout the history of drama, the different genres of plays, and reading strategies that will help you when reading a play.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Identify close reading strategies that can be used to comprehend informational text passages
• Analyze different types of writing including historical, informational, fact, and opinion
• Apply basic grammar rules, punctuation rules, and proper writing practices to workplace writing
• Apply basic conventions of standard English grammar, usage, and mechanics in narrative writing
• Identify main points, key details, and literary devices in poems and a short story
• Summarize central themes and supporting evidence in plays

It can be said that the pursuit of knowledge drives humanity to become better. Every day, people subconsciously consume an abundance of information from the environment around them. However, not all of that information is meaningful. Most knowledge consumed daily may not mean anything in the long run. Today’s weather has a very small impact on making plans for tomorrow. How do you sort through all that information you take in around you into what’s meaningful or not? How can you gain new information, even though it may not have been in your environment or part of your experience? In this course, you’ll gain and apply close reading skills to help you sort through all of the information around you.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Apply close reading strategies to make inferences in nonfiction texts
• Apply basic English language conventions in nonfiction texts
• Use evidence from informational texts to support a position on a topic
• Recognize the use of figurative, literal, and non-literal language in poetry and a short story
• Restate details and examples from the text when explaining how characters develop and interact in a novel
• Apply theories and styles of nonfiction writing to create effective personal and professional writing

In this course, you’ll analyze and cite evidence to support analysis of history, social studies, science, and technology-related texts as well as their graphics. Next, you’ll review the use and impact of word choice, tone, and figurative language in a play. You’ll then explore the theme in literary narratives. Finally, you’ll summarize key details, events, and characteristics in a novel and write a structured argument with relevant evidence to support a claim.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Use evidence to support analysis of history or social studies texts and paired graphics
• Cite evidence to support analysis of scientific or technology-related texts and paired graphics
• Analyze the use and impact of word choice, tone, and figurative language in a play
• Infer a clear central idea or theme in somewhat challenging literary narratives or their paragraphs
• Summarize key details, events, and characteristics in a somewhat challenging novel
• Write a structured argument with relevant evidence to support a claim

In this course, you’ll review foundational history texts and conceptual science and technology texts using US primary source documents and multimedia or quantitative formats. Next, you’ll draw simple, logical conclusions about more challenging world literature passages. From those literature passages, you’ll analyze how an author’s word choice and structure shape meaning, style, and tone. You’ll then explore a cultural experience in world literature, citing text to highlight key details and themes. After that, you’ll study one act of Shakespeare, using close-reading strategies to explain character relationships and thematic structure. Finally, you’ll write an informative assignment to examine and convey complex ideas, concepts, and information clearly and accurately through the effective selection, organization, and analysis of content.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Use multimedia to support academic presentations and writing
• Draw simple, logical conclusions about more challenging world literature passages
• Recognize how an author’s word choice and structure shape meaning, style, and tone in more challenging literature
• Examine one act of Shakespeare, using close reading strategies to explain character relationships and thematic structure
• Analyze primary and secondary history, science, and technology texts
• Apply content area literacy skills to craft a research paper

A study of the fundamental operations with whole numbers, fractions, and decimals, preceding the more advanced topics of weights, measures, ratios, proportions, and percents.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Solve real-world problems involving whole numbers
• Solve real-world problems involving fractions
• Solve real-world problems involving decimals
• Compare the English and metric systems of measurement
• Explain ratios, proportions, and percents

Your learners will study simple ways to apply mathematics to the everyday areas of life, most of them involving money; employment, purchases, home, car, insurance, savings, and investments.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Apply basic math skills to everyday life
• Determine best practices for money management
• Analyze financial areas of your life

Your learners will go through a review of basic mathematical skills that provides the foundation for more advanced topics such as order of operations, factors, multiples, powers, roots, equations, and inequalities. This course introduces geometry by covering the study of points, lines, surfaces, and solids.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Solve problems using basic operations, factors, multiples, powers, and roots
• Solve equations with variables, signed numbers, and inequalities
• Classify angles, polygons, and polynomials
• Classify triangles, cubes, cylinders, and rectangles

A study of the scientific method, the formation of the solar system, the moon’s phases, the movement of the earth, plate tectonics, the formation of the oceans, and erosion. Thiscourse also looks at chemical principles, rock and mineral analysis, soil formation, and weather patterns.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Explain the basic principles and methods of Earth Science
• Discuss the various surface processes on Earth
• Identify features of Earth's atmosphere and oceans
• Explain the causes of geologic activity
• Describe the impact of human activity on natural resources
• Explain the formation and properties of the solar system and universe

This Biology course begins with a presentation on the topic of ecology. The cell and its processes are examined in detail. A discussion of genetics and evolution follows. The course provides a detailed description of the biology involved in the structure and function of both plants and animals. The course ends with a lesson on human body systems and disease.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Describe the characteristics, chemistry, and ecology of living things
• Analyze cells and their processes for obtaining energy and reproducing
• Explain how traits are passed on from one generation to the next
• Explain how different species of living things have evolved and are classified
• Identify the characteristics and behavior of plants and animals
• Summarize the anatomy and physiology of the major systems in the human body

In this course, your learners will go through a study of matter and energy: their nature and the relationships between them. This course explains the role of atomic structure in chemical and nuclear reactions and emphasizes problem solving skills and discusses the relationship between science, technology, and the environment. Your learners will covers topics such as water, the chemistry of building materials, fuels, natural and synthetic rubbers and plastics, energy in relation to motion and force, machines, sound, light, electricity, and magnetism.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Explain how objects move when forces are applied
• Describe the role of energy transformation in daily life
• Explain how changes in matter can be measured and manipulated
• Analyze waves and radiation
• Apply the principles of chemistry
• Apply the principles of electricity and magnetism in various situations

Your learners will study a discussion of people, events, and sociopolitical forces that have shaped America, from its discovery to the present. This course shows how American history affects today’s events and global conditions.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Describe settlement of the colonies in America and the events from the American Revolution to the ratification of the United States Constitution
• Explain expansion and industrialization in the United States from 1790 to the 1850s
• Identify the causes and lasting effects of the American Civil War
• Analyze how the events leading up to World War I shaped the United States
• Discuss the effects of the Great Depression and World War II on the United States
• Recognize changes in America from the 1960s through today

Covers the rights, freedoms, and responsibilities of American citizens. Reviews the roots of American government and studies the modern U.S. government — its branches; the Constitution and Bill of Rights; the roles of federal, state, and local governments; political parties and elections.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Analyze the US government’s functions
• Interpret the US Constitution
• Identify the levels of US government
• Explain the rights and responsibilities of citizenship and the political process

This course will provide your learners a broad survey of the history of the world, from the earliest humans who emerged from Africa to the modern peoples and nations that exist today. They’ll learn how people adapted to live in different environments, developed tools and technology, created political institutions to govern, and spread ideas as they interacted with one another. By following the stories of different peoples and cultures through time, your learners will observe how key developments and events that took place over thousands of years have shaped the world today.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Recognize features and achievements of ancient civilizations
• Recognize features and achievements of the Byzantine Empire, Middle Ages, and Europe during the Renaissance and Age of Exploration
• Compare society and politics of world regions during the period of 1500–1800
• Explain causes of revolution, impacts of industrialization on society, and factors leading to development of global empires during the late 1700s to the early 1900s
• Describe how the Great War, Great Depression, and nationalism affected world regions
• Describe how World War II, the Cold War, and economic globalization affected world regions

This course covers a wide variety of topics to help your learners understand the principles of physical fitness. Topics included are nutrition basics, developing healthy eating habits, the functioning of muscles, posture, the heart and lungs, strengthening body parts, flexibility training, preventing injury, and stress management.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Describe techniques for managing stress and developing healthy habits
• Explain healthy nutrition and digestive processes
• Identify the principles of weight management
• Outline a comprehensive cardiorespiratory fitness routine
• Describe the elements and benefits of resistance training
• Develop personal fitness and nutritional goals

In this course, your learners will study the automobile repair field, engine parts and operation, and engine types. This course includes a practical exercise.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Connect your goals to the automotive repair technician profession and its essential knowledge
• Examine parts that make up the lower-end assembly and how they work
• Examine parts that make up the upper-end assembly and how they work
• Analyze work safety and equipment use
• Apply preventive maintenance and service procedures

In this course, experts explain everything step-by-step: the benefits of child day care, licensing requirements, managing staff, and details on child growth and development. This course features Ages and Stages Chart and Student Observation Guide.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Explain the need for child care professionals
• Describe theories of child development
• Discuss children’s physical, social, and cognitive development
• Identify guidance strategies to use with children
• Identify guidance strategies to use in special circumstances
• Explain how various factors affect child development
• Describe how to work with different stakeholders to support child development
• Describe how observation and assessments are used in child care settings

Your learners get a look at what it’s like to work side by side with doctors in the rewarding health-care field. Topics include learning strategies, time and stress management, interpersonal communication, and law and medical ethics. This course includes supplements on speaking and communication skills.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Identify the role of the health information management technician in the medical field
• Explain the components and importance of oral and written communication
• Summarize the skills and characteristics required of an administrative office assistant

This course provides your learners an introduction on how to prepare to start their own business and learn the basics of a business plan. This course discusses market research and business connections.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Outline the steps for starting your own business
• Analyze how to choose a business
• Determine your business goals and mission statement
• Examine networking and business relationships
• Perform market research
• Create a business plan

In this course, your learners start learning the skills they need to become a veterinary assistant. Topics include introduction to animal care; animal behavior, handling and restraint; and veterinary terminology. This course includes access to an audio CD, pronunciation guides, and flash cards.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Describe qualities, requirements, functions, and professionalism of veterinary practice
• Identify scientific approaches and characteristics of animal behavior
• Navigate large and small animal handling and restraint
• Define veterinary terminology, language, and procedures

This course provides a study of basic operations with signed numbers, monomials, and polynomials. Also includes formulas, equations, inequalities, graphing, exponents, roots, quadratic equations, and algebraic fractions.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Solve simple equations
• Solve advanced equations and simple inequalities
• Graph equations and inequalities
• Perform operations involving square roots of monomials and polynomials
• Solve quadratic equations using factoring and the quadratic formula
• Solve linear and quadratic equations containing algebraic fractions

This course is a study of algebraic functions, ratios, proportions, logarithms, variations, progressions, theorems, matrices, determinants, inequalities, permutations, and probability.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Solve problems involving ratios, proportions, and logarithms
• Analyze variations, progressions, and theorems
• Apply matrices and determinants to solve real-life problems
• Determine inequalities, permutations, and probability

American Literature is designed to help your learners navigate the works that helped to shape America, particularly some of history’s most notable texts and writing. The speeches, poems, and prose that they’ll read in these pages helped to shape not only American writing, but also the way we read and think today. As your learners read through their assignments, they will consider how these texts are still having an impact on us, from literature to pop culture.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Analyze informative articles and determine how an author’s claims are developed
• Evaluate persuasive texts through the author’s stance and rhetorical devices and how these rhetorical devices might advance the author’s point of view on the issue
• Identify the key components of narratives, including how an author chooses to structure a particular text in order to effectively tell his or her story
• Analyze the elements of fiction, including citing strong and thorough textual evidence to support a claim and determine a central theme
• Identify the elements of poetry, including figurative language and how it is used in a text

This course is an introduction to various forms of art throughout history, from prehistoric to modern. It also discusses elements of design, symbolism, and purposes of art to enable students to evaluate the meaning and quality of individual works. Your learners will study the most important artists of each era, as well as the cultural influences that shaped their approaches to painting, sculpture, or architecture.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Outline influences of early civilization on Western art
• Discover influential artists during the Western Roman Empire, European medieval period, and Italian Renaissance
• Investigate influential artists during the late medieval period to modern era
• Determine social and historical forces that shaped art’s “isms” from 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries

In this course, your learners study the composition of matter from the subatomic level to the molecular level to the macroscopic level. They’ll see how the same building blocks can be rearranged to form countless substances. This course will help learners predict properties of different substances and the reactions that they undergo. They’ll learn about chemical bonds and phases of matter. They’ll see why water is critical to life on Earth and examine various types of chemical reactions that happen in solutions. Your learners will be introduced to branches of chemistry like thermochemistry, electrochemistry, organic chemistry, biochemistry, and nuclear chemistry. They’ll discover why chemistry is critical in biology, engineering, and everyday life.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Examine terms and processes related to chemistry
• Use the periodic table to predict the properties, reactivity and types of molecules and compounds that are formed by different elements
• Use bonding models to predict the type of bonding in a molecule, to accurately draw and name the shapes of molecules, and to write reactions
• Differentiate among states of matter, use stoichiometry, and apply the ideal gas law
• Examine acid-base and oxidation-reduction reactions and water's unique properties
• Investigate reactions in organic chemistry, biochemistry, and nuclear chemistry

This course offers a study of the properties of points, lines, planes, and angles; polygons and triangles; circles; solids.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Explain the relationship between points, lines, planes, and angles
• Define polygons and triangles
• Describe the principles of circles
• Classify solids

This course covers appreciating music; roles of composer and listener; principles of music theory and instrumentation; historical periods; varying styles of music.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Categorize types of musical styles used during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance
• Discover new forms of music that emerged during the Baroque Era
• Examine the unique approach to music that emerged during the Classical Era
• Analyze the Industrial Revolution’s influences on music during the early 19th century
• Interpret the newly beautiful, emotionally powerful ballet music of the 19th century
• Evaluate influences and characteristics of American music forms of the 20th century
• Analyze influences and characteristics of folk music forms of the 20th century

This course provides your learners an introduction to the roots and the development of modern psychology. This coure discusses states of consciousness, and theories of intelligence, development, and personality. It also looks at gender roles, stress, psychological disorders, and social factors that affect people in groups.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Summarize psychology’s history, science, and biology
• Describe elements and functionality of consciousness, learning, memory, thinking, and intelligence
• Explain the stages of human development from infancy to old age
• Analyze various psychological dimensions of what it means to be a person
• Explain various principles of social behavior

In this course, your learners will study topics that include articulate speaking, active reading, and comprehensive listening. This course covers the details of Spanish vocabulary and grammar, and improves fluency through listening to and creating stories. Your learners will be enabled to learn and use the language for business situations and other purposes.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Identify the gender of Spanish nouns; recognize word breaks in Spanish sentences; and use third person affirmative and negative verb forms
• Form noun phrases that agree in gender and number; use gustar correctly with personal nouns and object pronouns after infinitives
• Use hay and había, the forms of éste, era and eran, present tense forms of regular verbs, the singular command forms, and the present tense forms of ser correctly
• Place object pronouns correctly in sentences and conjugate the verb comer in the present tense indicative
• Comprehend the Spanish version of stories which you have heard in English; use the preterite and imperfect tenses correctly, and recognize the occurrence of the subjunctive mood in dependent clauses
• Respond with appropriate rejoinders to brief questions and comments in Spanish; form the past participle of regular verbs; and use the past participles of at least 11 irregular verbs and the compound tenses

This course is a review of basic math skills and principles along with a study of various business math topics such as income, maintaining a checking account, interest, installment buying, discounts, and markups.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Investigate business problems involving whole numbers
• Solve business problems involving decimals, fractions, and measurements
• Examine business problems involving percentages

This course compares and contrasts the economic systems that people use in various parts of the world. Your learners will study the function of money, the law of supply and demand, and the role of banks and government within capitalist economies.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Explain the fundamentals of economics
• Describe the role of the consumer and labor force on the economy
• Describe the role of businesses and governments on the economy
• Identify the aspects of the global economy

This course explains how to avoid grammatical errors when writing sentences and paragraphs; how to make words work; and how to improve image by using the right word in the right place.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Navigate word usage through vocabulary and spelling
• Define root words with appropriate prefixes and suffixes
• Construct paragraphs with topic sentences, related details, transition sentences, and grammar

In this course, your learners will be introduced to several branches of science and engineering, including environmental science, agricultural science, oceanography, human anatomy and physiology, biotechnology, and engineering design.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Examine human impacts on the Earth’s environment and the ability of individuals and communities to influence environmental policy
• Explore the societal, financial, and environmental impact of the agriculture industry in the United States
• Investigate the geography, physical and chemical properties, and biology of the oceans
• Discover principles of human anatomy and physiology and how the human body maintains homeostasis
• Explore aspects of the biotechnology industry, techniques used in biotechnology, and applications of biotechnology
• Investigate engineering design theories, models, processes, and applications in various industries

In this course, your learners will study how to use Microsoft® Word™ to create, edit, and illustrate documents. They’ll learn about the most widely used spreadsheet program, Microsoft® Excel.™ Excel™ can perform numerical calculations and is also useful for nonnumerical applications such as creating charts, organizing lists, accessing data, and automating tasks.

By the end of this course, your learners will be able to:

• Identify how to create various Microsoft Word documents
• Identify how to create various Microsoft Excel documents