Help in choosing curriculum...

[cshepherd11]

My son is 6, soon to be, 7 years old. I am considering the Beyond Little Hearts for His Glory. My biggest concern is his reading. We used Alpha Omega Lifepac First Grade last year and it was awful. I don't feel that it enriched his reading at all. I am not sure if he would need the Beyond Little Hearts for His Glory or if he would need the Bigger Hearts for His Glory. In some areas, he seems to be more advanced when I look at the placement chart. However with reading, he fits perfectly into the Beyond Little Hearts for His Glory. Could you offer any advice?

[StephanieU]

I would go with Beyond. It is so much easier to beef things up if you find you need to than it is to water them down.

Last year, I was very tempted to do Beyond with my daughter. She was int he early stages of Horizons 1 math and phonics, and according to the placement chart, the only area I was concerned about was writing. She could do what was listed, but normally it took lots of convincing for her at that point. I prayed about it, and I realized I was really pushing her hard in so many areas (AWANA, reading, and math mainly). So, I decided to go with what thought would be easy and fun. Well, it was fun, but it wasn't always easy! Carrie picks very meaty books for history, devotion, and story time. These really challenged my daughter in LHFHG. We just finished Day 3 of Beyond today, and the same holds true for the books choices in Beyond. Many of the books have a suggested grade level higher than 2nd even (history books are 3rd-4th grade according to CLP for example), although they aren't too hard for a 6-7yo to understand when read aloud in small chunks and combined with activities. I think you will find Beyond challenging enough.

[cshepherd11]

Wow! Thanks so much Stephanie! I appreciate your input and that's helped a lot. Do you know anything about All about reading? I have looked at it as well and considered this to maybe help with his reading.

[StephanieU]

I haven't used AAR, but I know many moms have used it with HOD. I considered moving my daughter to that int he fall because Horizons wasn't working well, but I found that in many ways she would place past Level 3 but in other ways would only place into Level 1. And with the cost of the program, it wasn't worth it for us. So, we stuck with Horizons, which worked out at a slower pace. We also bought Phonics Pathways and Reading Pathways for my son, and if my daughter hits a wall in the Emerging Readers, we will use those as a refresher/reinforcement.

[dschurma]

We use AAR with our 6.5 year old. He started Level 1 a few months after he turned 5, and we're now approaching the halfway point of Level 2. I love that you can set your own pace as you go through the program - we sometimes split a lesson over several days if needed. It's not intended to be one lesson/day five days a week unless you and your child WANT to work at that pace.

I absolutely love it, and my son enjoys most lessons as well. (He's 6...he'd rather play with his Batcave or build a marble run with his brother...but he enjoys it as much as your average 6 yr old boy would enjoy a reading program! )

AAR is pricy, but I love their approach to phonics. I will be able to use it with our younger children over the next several years, so I don't mind too much. It also has a great resale value.

I hope to complete Level 2 by the end of August (we will not be schooling during the summer, but I want to continue with AAR and some math games to keep skills fresh), and then we will set aside AAR in favor of using HOD's Emerging Reader set.