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Im not sure what to do. I have a daughter who will be 5 in january and a son who will be 4 in january. Next fall i had wanted to start my daughter on the little hearts for his glory but i feel that it may be a little much for my son. I guess i dont understand how you use 1 curriculum for 2 kids on different levels. Would my sons work be more pre k geared and my daughters work be more K geared. I have looked at other curriculums where you can combine 1 curriculum with more then one child and i just dont understand it. I feel like if i do the LHFHG my son will be draggin and if i choose to do LHTH my daughter will be bored. Could someone who has used this cirruculum please explain to me how this works?? Thank you

Usually if you want to combine two kids together the recommendation is to use the curriculum that fits your younger child the best, adding on skills/materials for the older one to make sure they are at the right level with reading, writing, math, and perhaps if they need it additional history selections and things.

So in your case, if LHTH is right where your younger one would place, you would do LHTH but add in some of the LHFHG plans for your older one. There are K options in LHFHG you could use with the older one in fall 2012, then the following year if you did LHFHG with both you could do K options with the younger and 1st grade options with the older. Each guide does have flexibility written into it to allow a range of skill levels, but the child really needs to be able to understand the history and do the activities in the main part (L side - history, Bible, storytimes) in order to be able to follow the guide. That's why the recommendation is to do the lower one, because you can add in challenging things for an older child but you can't really "dumb it down" for a younger child.

Welcome to the HOD board! The pp gave good advice. Have you checked out the placement chart? The first page is super helpful in choosing what to do. Here is a link to that...
http://www.heartofdakota.com/placing-your-child.php

After you check out the chart, if you share your findings with us (especially in regard to the first page LA and math), then we'll chat through options with you. We love HOD so much - I bet you and your dc will too!

In Christ,
Julie

Hello and welcome! As Melissa said, you could combine them quite nicely in LHTH, as it is designed for ages 2-5. LHTH goes through the alphabet and some preliminary math such as counting, along with colors, shapes, and great Bible lessons and activities to tie it all together. If your daughter already knows her alphabet and is ready for phonics, you can still get LHTH and add in a phonics program to get her started in reading (I'm finishing up with The Reading Lesson with my 5 year old and it has worked beautifully in only minutes a day). You can also add in K-level handwriting/fine motor options for your daughter and K level math (if you want). LHTH was such a great progam, I look forward to going through it again next fall with my younger!

The ladies are giving you such great advice to ponder. If you desire to keep your two kiddos together, you have a couple of options you could consider. You could place both children in LHTH and add the 3R's from LHFHG (teaching much of the right side of LHFHG to your 5 year old in addition to LHTH). This would mean adding either The Reading Lesson or Reading Made Easy for phonics, adding Do It Carefully/Finding the Answers and either A Reason for Writing K or Italic A, and adding Earlybird Kindergarten Math for your 5 year old. You would follow the daily plans from the right side only of LHFHG each day for your 5 year old's 3 R's. You would wait on the rest of LHFHG. Then, your 5 year old would join your 4 year old in LHTH for everything else. Your 4 year old would only do LHTH.

If, your 4 year old is close to 5 and seems ready for some K level work, you could instead place the pair in LHFHG doing it half-speed to allow your 4 year old to grow up a bit. In this scenario, you would do the left side of the plans of LHFHG one day and the right side of the plans for LHFHG the next day, slowly working your way through it with both kiddos together. This will only work if your 4 year old is ready for a handwriting book with writing letters, knows his letter sounds and is ready for a bit of phonics, and is able to trace to write numbers and ready for a formal K type math. If he doesn't seem ready for these things, then I'd lean toward doing LHTH with both and adding the 3R's from LHFHG as I outlined above.

If you have other questions, ask away. We love to help!

Blessings,
Carrie