HL Courses

[KyleAdams]

The IB website and booklets of information state that no more than 4 HL courses may be taken. What would happen if you signed up for four HL courses? Would they prohibit you from taking them? Would you still get the diploma if you did take them? I am not planning on doing this, just curious as to the details, and as to the reasoning behind prohibiting students from taking advantage of academic opportunity.

[Abu]

You can do 4 HL courses in the IB but not more than 4. You'd have to maintain an average of 4 points per subject.

[Kristyna H.]

The IB actually advices you to take only 3 HL courses and 3 SL. You can take 4HL if you feel like you can manage all that. No more than 4 subjects though. First of all, the IB org doesnt even allow that and second of all, it would be too difficult to take on that much studying. HL courses are more difficult than the SL, therefore more topics are looked at at depth. You wouldnt even be able to manage that 4 point average per subject. Besides, there isnt enough time for you to study that much.

I am taking 4 HL and I feel soo overloaded with work! And that is just quater 1!

[skillet]

It cannot that it is 'too difficult'. Difficulty is relative. It can only be difficult for yourself. I think the reasoning behind a 4 class limit is expected HW/study time. Classes in and out of IB are designed with HW/study time requirements in mind. They want to limit our HW/study time so that we can actually learn and live instead of drill ourselves to pass the class without really learning anything.

There is a balance to life.

Meditation

Classes

HW/Study

Fitness

Personal Care (sleeping, eating, cleaning ourselves)

Chores

Personal Administration (planning/scheduling, budgeting, journaling)

Socializing/Religion/Spirituality

Job (for those who don't have rich parents)

I don't know what else anybody wants to add. Do any of the classes teach time/ife management?

[Sandwich]

The IB doesn't really have any set homework or study time length - the general ethos of the IB is to prepare you for self-directed learning at University. So you do as much as you want or as little as you want outside of coursework (unless your teacher demands something in particular). It's different from some other programmes (I think in the USA they have quite a lot of emphasis on homework and such). To my knowledge the reason for the HL/SL limit in terms of how many subjects you can take is actually just to do with the fact they can't have divisions of diploma. Once you've got somebody taking 5 HLs and 1 SL, they're doing so much more than everybody else but are still only eligible for the 45 points. There's only so far in either direction you can push it before the final outcome (the diploma) would no longer be right - short of offering "first class" and "second class" diplomas or something.

You could probably do a diploma and as many certificates as you wanted, if you were mental enough, but just not that much within a diploma.

Also, the IB is an additional academic programme, not a part of the national curriculum, so it doesn't really have any necessary social outcomes - it teaches subjects as opposed to life skills. Technically it would be hard to get through without learning some time management as you move along.

[CommeDesEnfants]

Personally, in some courses, I don't really see that big of a difference between HL and SL. For English, I know that the expectations are much higher and HL English requires more pieces for internal assessment, I don't find myself working as hard in that course (in terms of homework and studying) as I do for something like Biology HL, or even Chemistry SL. I can see that there's a significant difference in the more science-y courses, but not so much with the more social science ones. <br>

[KyleAdams]

Yes I agree it isn't to do with the difficulty factor. After reading your responses, I think it may have to do with the IB's wanting you to be involved in other areas, aka CAS. I think that they don't want you to only focus on taking hard classes, and to stop and look at other things that are important.