Hi, new here/ question for Carrie

[homemommy83]

First I want to say to everyone this year, so hey-lol. I hope everyone is having a great year.

My name is Brenda, and I used HOD Little Hearts and Beyond Little Hearts with my "oldest DD" a bit back, and I also did Preparing with my oldest at that time; I loved all of those programs, but decided to combine the children into a homemade cycle for quite a while due to family needs at the time. Lord willing, I will be placing my oldest son 14 in the HOD Geography guide in February (we are strengthening essay writing skills/ dictation skills right now). He has always been extremely advanced in reading, a little ahead in math (of the "typical" sequence), loves history and science anyway you serve it-lol, but didn't enjoy writing. He is starting to enjoy writing now, which is so exciting to me to see. My children are DS just turned 14, DD just turned 12, DS turning 9 in a week, DD 6, DS 3 (has apraxia, but is highly intelligent, so we are not sure how this will end up affecting our choices for him yet, and DS just turned 1); we have school plans for the next year for the "middles" and "littles" this year, but will probably use HOD again down the road for them again. I really like the looks of Bigger and I loved Preparing (I may do that after we finish Adventures this year) as I feel my son who would be just turned 10 and my 7 year old advanced daughter would fit Bigger well with extensions followed by continuing the cycle.

My oldest daughter is who I am not sure where she will place when we begin her next fall, as she really taking off in her reading and writing over the last year, and grammar is finally sticking; she was vaccine-injured at 4 and has had to work extremely hard to get where she is. She was a later reader (the weirdest thing happened, we took a respite from one on one tutoring for two months, and when we picked it back up she was reading- I just required her to read what she could during "quiettime"). Once she started reading her spelling and writing abilities began to take off, she is making great gains consistently now. The main issue we have had with her is that I could read something aloud or she could read it to herself- and her recall was extremely low; this is getting better this year. So I am leaning toward doing either Preparing or Creation to Christ with her beginning in September; I have read aloud all of Preparing to her/ my middle son before, so I am not sure if it is the "best" placement, but I do feel that she would remember more the second time around and requiring the written work would benefit her. I was thinking of adding the extra interesting books for her from the extension package, as she is loving reading now. But with us focusing on reading, writing, and grammar with her this year heavily- she may be ready for a higher level come next fall-KWIM, so I guess time will tell.

Now for my ? for Carrie-lol. I noticed in your HS guides that you schedule gently the Spanish program, and add in other languages (I love this), and I was thinking "Hey, maybe down the road she could make another guide to incorporate the rest of the Spanish program into to another program", and add in something like a Church History or Classical Music or Artist through the Ages, or some other nontypical sequenced type of program, schedule Calculus or Statistics or Consumer Mathematics, Advanced Biology or another nontypical Science, add in any awesome Bible curriculum, and poof we have another amazing guide. I guess this isn't a question, more of an amazing idea-lol. I love your guides! Now I am giving you permission to rest, lol, but had to tease about "just one more"-lol.

Brenda



Thank you Carrie for all of your hard work!

[my3sons]

Hi there, and welcome to the board! I enjoyed reading about your family and hope you have a fantastic homeschooling year using HOD! Carrie is taking some much needed time off before delving into the next projects HOD has ahead. I had fun reading your ideas for Carrie's writing at the end of your post, and I am sure she will too! She has a ton of work already laid out for her for years to come within HOD - please be in prayer for her, for Mike, for me, and for all of our sons to know how best to prioritize those tasks among our families. Thanks so much for sharing, and God bless!

In Christ,
Julie