Placement help of 3 boys

[Patty_Momof3]

Hi,
I have 3 boys and I would like to get recommendations about placing them, my hope is to use either 1 or 2 guilds only.
I have read and studied up and have a good idea where I think they would fit, but it's always nice to hear from ppl who have used the curriculum. This will be our first year using it and it is a different approach compared to what I have used in the last 7 years.

My oldest is 12 (in March he will be 13), his school strengths are in reading, math, grammar. Writing is his weaker subject. I'm thinking he would go straight into Revival to Revolution.
My middle is 10 (Oct he will be 11), his strengths are math, grammar, and writing, but he is a slower reader. I'm thinking of Creation to Christ.
My youngest is 8 (Jan he will be 9), he is a very strong reader, writer and math. He seems to be the one that is the most above grade level for his subjects. I want to combine him with the Creation to Christ guide.

Here are some things I want to find out to make sure my choices will be ok. Will my middle son struggle to keep up with the reading? Do you feel that the guides are true to grade levels listed or are they above/below? Will they get plenty of writing practice in different varieties of ways (we will use a writing curriculum in addition to this curriculum)? My biggest hope is that we will be writing much more this year and working to strengthen some weakness we have in that subject. I also want to encourage them to move forward in their education, but I don't want it to be too much or too challenging and end up frustrated or not learning anything. We have done a classical approach to our education up to this point, it has worked well, but I really like the whole CM idea and am looking forward to some changes in what we have done.
Thank you for all your help!

[StephanieU]

With your youngest being 8, I wouldn't put him higher than Preparing. Most 8yos use Bigger, with Preparing being the very advanced option. If you want to combine the younger two, Preparing might be the best option, but I would consider Bigger as well.

[Jennymommy]

I also have three boys, and combined the older two for several years. What I discovered was that the oldest was really under challenged, and the middle was letting the oldest lead in the discussions and narrations. This was no good. I ended up skipping two guides for the oldest (he's missed out on some good stuff because of it), and placing each boy in their own guides. What a relief it has been to have each boy doing work that really increases their individual learning and talents. It is a bit of challenge for me some days to figure out my schedule, but mostly due to my lack of discipline, not because it is inherently difficult.
That said, it is easy to tailor grammar and math for any guide, so I would choose based on the amount of writing each ds can do without undue frustration. Understand that the volume of writing increases considerably one guide to the next, and placing a young man in a challenging level early on may well lead to extreme frustration in a year or two (I speak from experience here).
So, I would look at Beyond for ds 8, Preparing for ds 11, and RtR or Rev2Rev for ds 13. My own very motivated and independent ds 12 1/2 is just finishing Rev2Rev, and has done well with it, though it was a challenge at first. You can increase the learning and challenge of each guide by adding extensions and DITHOR as needed, but I would start by getting used to the basic workload first, then add to it when the routine is established.

[LovingJesus]

Your 8 year old sounds a lot like my 8 year old who will be 9 in January. I have added a lot to Beyond for her: harder science, R&S grammar, note booking for the history with written summaries, and she is reading a lot of books far above grade level that we already own. She is enjoying Beyond history and activities, but she is also almost finished with it. I wouldn't place your child, that is her age and sounds similar in skill level, in Beyond. I am planning on having her skip Bigger since for reading, writing, and science she now places higher then Bigger at this point.

Would your two youngers place well in Preparing together? Or, could the 8/9 do Preparing & the 11 CTC & the 12 / 13 Rev2Rev?

Just random thoughts....

[Nealewill]

I would never recommend putting a younger child in a guide that is higher than their age range. My youngest is an excellent reader and while she is in Little Hearts this year at 7, she started at 6. Last year I put her and her bother in Beyond and she was 5 while her brother was 7. So she was actually too younger for the age range. She actually had a fantastic year and it was perfect for her. But.....after having my oldest do Preparing at 8 and then going in CTC at 9, I could see that the topics just got to be for an older audience and more mature. Plus, with every level, there is an increase in work load. I can't even imagine having my dd start Preparing at 7 and having to complete that much writing and reading. I prayed about it and ended up dropping my youngest dd down to Little Hearts for this year so that she would at least be the youngest age in the age range for each level.

For your 8 year old, I think he would do great in Preparing. I also think if your 10 year is struggling with reading, I would hands down place him in Preparing. HOD is actually a very robust program! There is quite a bit of reading and writing in this guide. With CTC, they start off reading the Ancients book (which I believe is written to a junior high reading level) and then even the Streams of History books are wordy at times. The science starts off with Junior Apologia Series and they read one chapter a week. I can be a lot. My dd is an okay reader and she finished Preparing very strongly. We had to go 1/2 speed for quite some time this year because of the sheer volume of reading. It was good! But we had to just take it day by day. She started CTC when she was 9 and turned 10 in November. One thing I have done with my dd though to help offset the challenging reading is I put her in the level 4/5 book pack for literature study for this year with CTC. This way the literature books were books she could easily read and enjoy. I didn't want to push her all day long. The writing assignments for CTC are much longer too. There is daily writing in several subjects. It is a very full day. For your 10 year old, I personally think he would be much happier in Preparing. If you want to give him a push, I would put him in the level 4/5 book pack. This is geared at advanced 4th graders or regular 5th graders. Then for your 8 year old, I would choose the level 3 book pack. That is what my dd did last year while in Preparing. The books range from 3.5 grade level to 5.1 grade level. The books are awesome! To make things easy on yourself you could get either the student book 2/3 or 4/5 for the 8 year old and then I would get the 10 year old the 4/5 student book. The 2/3 student book has about 6 pages of writing per genre and then the 4/5 book has about 10 per genre. So it is just more writing activities. I would have them both do the same projects at the end of the study though using either the projects form the level 2 book or the projects from the level 4 book. Both are great. The level 4 book has more complicated projects and they can have more writing.

For your oldest son, I would probably put him in Res to Ref. I know that will put him on the oldest end of the age range but you stated he hated to write. Rev to Rev has a lot more writing! I think Res to Ref has quite a bit of writing. The books are very enjoyable for this age range and it is quite a bit. Since you come from the classical approach, it may take some getting used to doing written narrations. In Res to Ref, you will be doing 2 per week. Preparing starts off with one and is the first level that teaches written narrations. This will be great to do with your younger boys and have your oldest do Res to Ref. Even though he is in the age range, if you feel like he needs more reading, I would have him read his story time to himself rather than you reading it out loud to him. But I do think he will feel very overwhelmed with the volume of writing in Rev to rev.

I know this may be lower than you want it to be but HOD in my opinion is very advanced. Most kids in the program do use it in the middle age range or the oldest age range. It really great because you can place your child exactly where they will thrive the most. And the age range really does speak well to the kids that are placed into it.

[Patty_Momof3]

Thank you for the responses. I appreciate your thoughts on this.

I am concerned that my youngest wouldn't be challenged enough in Bigger, but I do like how Preparing looks for him. I really want to avoid more than two guides since this is my first year using HOD. I will look more closely at the Preparing guide for the younger two boys with maybe the extension pack added on if my middle son needs more challenge.

Just to clarify, my middle son doesn't struggle with reading, he just takes a long time to read because he would rather be outside playing. He is a great reader, but he is slow to get it done. He reads very well/quick when he is motivated.
Also, my oldest son doesn't hate writing, but it isn't his strength and he needs more opportunities to practice.
We do use a good writing program that has had the boys writing narrations two days a week and dictation 2 days a week. They know how to do narrations. My oldest needs more writing opportunities throughout his lessons and I am not good at making those up. One of my hopes with HOD is that the guides will give lots of suggestions for writing, hands on activities, and prompts or questions to check for comprehension of material read.

Thanks again for all the suggestions.

[Nealewill]

Thanks for your clarifications. Rev to Rev will probably fine it if he does quite a bit of writing already.

As for your middle son, the extensions are fantastic! Most of them are going to be above his grade level but they are just wonderful. I ordered them because I love to read out loud to my kids at night and I was just wanting to have more books to choose from. We have read several. If your son does well with reading, although extensions aren't required, they are very interesting and you may enjoy having him read them.

[Jennymommy]

We also really enjoyed the extensions in Preparing