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I am really second guessing things.

Even though my 9yog (June bday) is a great reader she struggles with cursive and I really want her to get a good handle on working more independently this year using Bigger. So I am 99% sure that is where she should be.

My 5yog (March bday) fits perfectly into LHFHG. Really. I have no question about that.

Just turned 3yog will play around some with LHTH. Not much but a little here and there.

My 7yob (May bday) is the one I am concerned about. He is struggling with reading. His 5yo sister is actually doing better than he is. Which is fine. I know that it will click with him one day. I am just unsure of when it will click. I have him in Beyond. We are supposed to start on Monday. He can write basic letters. He sometimes gets the correct *first* letter of a word. Other than that it's not happening yet. So I don't see him writing sentences anytime soon. He is still having trouble spacing words and such. He will finish a word somewhere else on a paper entirely if he runs out of room as he is writing. I am worried he will struggle with Beyond and even if he doesn't....what if he is still not ready for the Emerging Readers when it's time for him to begin Bigger?

I am also questioning because of spacing. I was hoping to not have to do a level two years in a row. Ideally I would put 7yob in LHFHG and he would be 2 years behind big sister. But that leaves my 5yog (who is ready for LHFHG) waiting around. I could combine the 5yo and 7yo but I don't want to rush her. Plus I was actually hoping to keep those two apart so that big brother wouldn't realize little sister was doing so well with reading. I know he will notice, but I thought it would be better for them to not be working together. But it seems like that would be the best placement.

I also thought about doing Beyond 1/2 speed with him. But if 5yog does LHFHG full speed then I will have 2 in Beyond at the same time at two different places in the book. Would that be crazy? Talk about back to back.

Any suggestions appreciated!

Hi and welcome! It sounds like your 5yo and 7yo would both do great in LHFHG! I would just work with them individually for phonics, and maybe handwriting too, as in, have the 5yo doing something elsewhere. Playing or watching an educational dvd with 3yo...whatever it takes My ds wasn't yet writing when we did LHFHG, and I just had him trace any writing during storytime, or skipped it if I saw that he had already done his fill of writing that day. HTH - you're gong to enjoy the year!

I would likely do the same thing--combine them in LHFHG, and just work on phonics with each one separately.

I agree with the others. It sounds like they both place well in LHFHG. We do everyone separate for reading, spelling/dictation, math, etc. and it works well. My 7 year old is in with my newly 6 year old with Little Hearts, but she is actually a better reader than my 9 year old son in Bigger. He has figured this out only recently, but it hasn't seemed to bother him. But when he was 7 and she was 5, he didn't notice at all. Since we did them separately for reading/phonics, he had no idea what she was doing with me. The only reason he has figured it out is by seeing the books she reads for free reading.
HTH!
Angie

So when you combine for Beyond and later how does it work? I already have the boy and girl interest sets of books for example. Would I just do them both? What about when children are older and they are combined? Do they just schedule some of their independent work at alternating times or what?

For both my sets that are combined (two in Bigger and two in Little Hearts), we do the left side plus storytime together. We do the right side (minus storytime) separately.

So for yours it would look something like this....

You would be with your 7yo only. You would do handwriting, Phonics/Reading, and math. Then you would move to your 5yo and do those same subjects. Then after both are completed with those assignments, you would do Reading About History, Rhymes in Motion, the Rotating Box, Bible Study Box, Music, and Storytime with your 5 and 7 yos together.

It would work basically the same in Beyond and up. As far as storytime, you could choose a combination of boy interest, girl interest, and classic. That's what we did with my boy-girl combination. I found that my girl liked the "boy" interest and my boy liked the "girl" interest, so this wasn't an issue. (I just didn't mention to them that "this book is the girl book" ). Depending on where they are when at the time, one may need to go ahead and start R&S 2 in Beyond, while the other does the language lessons in the Beyond guide. One may do spelling list number one, and the other do spelling list number 2, etc

Does that help? I hope I didn't confuse you anymore.
I'm going to try and find a thread that talks more about this. If I find it, I'll come back and post a link.
Angie

eta: ok. This thread is not your exact situation, but it may help.viewtopic.php?f=6&t=9688&p=70679&hilit= ... ath#p70679

Thanks Angie. That is helpful. That is right along what I was thinking.

Oh I just don't know. ack!

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I just had him do a few spelling words out of list 1 Beyond. He could spell the word immediately, but when he wrote it he had to ask me "what word?" after each letter. Of course my 5yo wanted to do it too, so I gave her some words. She had no problems at all. I can see that he is not ready to write thoughts down. Copywork maybe in small amounts. Thoughts not yet.

After thinking some more, what if.....

-I could combine my 7yo and 5yo in LHFHG but do the Spelling List 1 from Beyond with 7yo. Then he would hopefully be ready for list 2 when he does Beyond. It looks like 5yo would also be ready for list 2 then as well. Maybe I could start her toward the end of List1 so she would be a few weeks behind him??
-I could also throw in an extra read aloud book for him here and there. Maybe something out of the extra books listed in the appendix.
-I was also thinking I could focus more on him for things like science. Both would do the projects, (My 9yo would probably participate too!) but I could specifically say it was for him. Honestly, just the fact that we would do any experiments is more than my older two got at 5yo.

I don't know. I am just really concerned that he will notice they are on the same level and be discouraged.

Or.....

Should I have him do Beyond 1/2 speed? Would I have him do it literally 1/2 speed or have him do his phonics and handwriting every day but do the other stuff 1/2?

HI Tammy,
My question for you is "has your son already been through Little Hearts?" if not, then I think he might ought to do that manual as the others have suggested. If he has already done Little Hearts, then possibly do Beyond for two years. I don't know if you need to do 1/2 speed as much as repeat the whole manual again when he's 8, using different read aloud storytime books. If you have not done Little Hearts with him, then it is definitely worth it -- he will need the maturity of the readers from Thorton Burgess and the history readers in Little Hearts. My son was 8 yrs old and in 2nd grade when he went through Beyond and it was a perfect fit...amazing what 6 months or a year will do. I didn't think he was going to be able to spell or read for Beyond (thinking I was almost a year behind) but everything was just perfect with Beyond for an 8 year old.