AP English. It was harder than college Chaucer, believe it or not. Faulkner’s As I Lay Dying was tougher for me to understand than Middle English.
And if you don’t want to count AP courses, I’d say Physics.
How about you?
Not to be dumb, but toughest or toughest for me? I found Algebra II very difficult, but my math skills are terrible, so it’s probably not the toughest class I took in high school… that would be Anatomy and Physiology.
AP = BC Calculus
Non AP = Geometry. My brain just can’t handle spatial relationships at all.
When I got to college and found out that there was no math requirement, it was one of the happiest moments of my academic career.
AP Physics. Barely passed, and didn’t even try to take the AP exam.
I’m not sure why, as I thought I would enjoy the course. Turned me off to physics for good, and I never took another course.
OP here. The toughest as in the most difficult for you personally, so Algebra II.
Surprisingly enough, it was typing class (yes, typing class - college bound students were expected to take typing - how else could you be ready to type all the papers you were going to need to type for your courses? I just about failed that course; my fingers just weren’t fast and accurate enough (and I suspect that being left-handed didn’t help).
I’d definitely add another for Algebra II. Physics and college Anatomy that I took in HS were tough, but I had more experience teaching myself. Algebra II was the first class I really had to buckle down and teach myself the material on, and that was tough to learn
Home Ec. Got a D- since I don’t seem to be capable of sewing or baking (something about the rubber spatula getting chewed up in the beater bars and the vice principal eating some rubber bits)… got the D instead of an F because I can cook a little bit.
Algebra II for me as well. I put it off until my senior year. I got accepted to a good college with a full scholarship and I was honestly worried the whole thing would collapse when I couldn’t graduate high school because I failed Algebra II at the very end. The thing is, I don’t think I really passed it at all. The teacher just liked me enough to not screw up my future. When I got my final grade and saw that shining ‘D’ in Algebra II, it was like Christmas morning to a 4 year old. I still have nightmares about it. That course should be banished as a high school graduation requirement forever. I still couldn’t tell you what it is supposed to be about.
Mine was Chemistry though geometry is a close second. When I was in HS, both typically fell during 10th grade.
Both classes I passed because I had done all the work and turned in every piece of homework and extra credit work, but without that, I do not believe I would have passed. And in both cases, it was barely passing.
Unlike others in this thread, Algebra II was not so bad for me, for several reasons. I dropped from honors to regular after geometry, which meant a different teacher than Algebra I. And the summer before my junior year, my mother sent me to a foundations math course at a nearby private school. That took things back to pre-algebra, which is where I’d started to stumble math-wise, and worked forward through Algebra I, and put in in actual good shape to take Algebra II.
AP European History, taught by Mr. Wingo.The teacher was as tough as the info he was passing on to us… But nobody who took his test, and the the AP test failed to get the college credit.
Geometry - I couldn’t understand proofs .
Chemistry - I didn’t study the first few weeks. This was my first hard science class. I found out you can’t get behind in a science class. It’s nearly impossible to catch up if you don’t learn the basic concepts. I really struggled to pass.
For me, it would be freshman English. Honors and AP English in subsequent years weren’t so bad (though I was definitely behind where I was in my math and science courses), but the teacher I had freshman year was just terrible.
Senior English was certainly the class I hated the most, but not because the material was conceptually difficult to learn. About half a semester was devoted to public speaking. Writing the speeches was easy enough, but forcing myself to deliver them in front of my classmates and teachers was certainly the hardest thing I ever had to do in high school. Another half semester or so was devoted to writing a 5,000 to 10,000 word report on local history based on primary sources. Why this was an English requirement and not a history requirement I don’t know. I was required to track down and interview four or five people, almost all of them strangers. This was a task I dreaded almost as much as the public speaking. I passed the class with an A-, but I hated almost every minute of it.
Geometry (grade 10). I had no problem with the algebras or trigonometry, and very little with calculus. Second-year calculus I hit a wall with my brain and could go no further, but since I was the only one in the class, it ended up not mattering much. I found physics (very difficult as well until I took calculus, and then wondered why on earth they made us take physics first.
Band. I had to practice an hour or two every day; during the fall, I had to carry a 35 pound sousaphone while wearing a wool gabardine uniform on some of the hottest days of the year. I had to give a public performance several times a quarter, and I couldn’t afford to miss any classes because I was the only tuba player.
I took the equivalent of AP French. It wasn’t so much difficult because the subject was hard (I grew up bilingual and languages, particularly the spoken part, have always come quickly and easily to me), and I’m really rather very conversational in the language, to the point where I can almost make myself interesting in French.
But my God, the teacher was absolute dross. Half the class failed, and I simply couldn’t muster up the will to take her tedious, mumbling, and vaguely senile grammar lessons seriously. I got a C, which was absolute stinking guttershite by my personal high school standards (for reference, my overall GPA was in the 99th percentile for the entire country), in the written exam, although I did ace the oral examination.
Orchestra. I was the concertmaster and was expected to play a Senior solo. My teacher picked the first movement of Lalo’s *Symphonie espagnole, *which was a real challenge for me. I practiced for hours every day, and ultimately aced it.
Physics, chemistry and all the advanced math were easy in comparison.
I’ve never been good with my hands, so I thought I would take a shop class in high school to try to help myself get better. What I learned was that if there is any other option available other than me doing it, I should take it.
Latin II because I’m not a fan of tons of rote memorization.