heartofdakota.com

I want it to serve as both K & 1st over two "school years".

Option 1. Use 1st options and only do 2 1/2 days a week
Option 2. Do left side one day and right side the next with 1st options
Option 3. Do it all one year with K options and repeat but with 1st options next year

Any other ideas?

OR, my other idea is to use LHTH with K options from Little Hearts and then do Little Hearts year 2 with 1st options.

I would tell you to go with your 'option 1'. 2 and a half days per week is more than enough "schooltime" for a five year old.


You will know what to do. You know your child best!!

But that is what I would do.

Having a 5yo right now, I completely agree. We do a half-day a day, if that makes sense, so that one unit stretches nicely into two weeks. Then we have time for piano, swimming, church, playdates, etc. If you find yourself needing to do more school, do the RH every day, and the LH every other day so that you do MWF/TTh, finishing a unit.

Once you get done with K options, you can move into first grade options. Or, do what you're suggesting and just do 1st grade options half-speed. I just find there is some math my Ker has to do out of the Earlybird Math book, so we are doing that now.

I started LHFHG with my son when he was 4 1/2 and wanted to stretch it over 2 years. This is what worked well for us:

Day 1:
Rhyme in Motion
Reading About History
Handwriting/Fine Motor Skills box
Review Bible verse/Listen to CD
Phonics
Math Activity from the guide
Rotating Box

Day 2:
Rhyme in Motion
Usually we would read one of the supplemental history books from the appendix if I could find them in the library
Handwriting/Fine Motor Skills
Bible Study Box
Phonics
Math page from Earlybird
Storytime

This kept our days pretty even as far as workload and amount of time it took. When we got through the K handwriting/fine motor skills books, we just started over with the 1st grade books. Hope that helps!

I think the best placement depends on where your child places best according to the placement chart. Where would you say your child places best - in LHTH or LHFHG?

If your child places best in LHTH or places best somewhere between LHTH and LHFHG, I like your "other idea" option best because it will keep things fresh and moving along nicely each day...

melissamomof3girls wrote:...my other idea is to use LHTH with K options from Little Hearts and then do Little Hearts year 2 with 1st options.

If your child places best in LHFHG, and you want to stretch it to be over 2 years, my favorite option is Option 2. This would move things ahead in a consistent way slowly enough for your child to start Beyond at 7 yo.

And, just to probably make things more confusing, I'm throwing out another option that is probably my all-time favorite... why not do LHFHG 4 days a week, Beyond 4 days a week, and Bigger Hearts 4 days a week? You could start LHFHG half-speed for awhile, and then finish out LHFHG full-speed, Beyond, and Bigger Hearts 4 days a week, resulting in doing 3 guides (LHFHG, Beyond, Bigger Hearts) in 4 school years. I would LOVE this! 4 days a week is a delight. Just an idea you can toss out if it doesn't appeal!

It depends on your child, but we have done LHFHG with two of our sons starting half-speed when they were about 5 yo, and proceeded with 4 days a week, and found it to work beautifully for them. HTH - but what are your thoughts?

In Christ,
Julie

I absolutely agree about the 4 days a week plan! I am going to go with the 4 day a week plan with my up and coming K'er. I was planning to stretch LHFHG out for two years. Instead, I am just going to wait until the fall and do LHFHG 4 days a week. I will also be doing Bigger 4 days a week with my 3rd grader (young 3rd grader), and CTC with my 5th grader which is written as a 4 day a week program. We started Preparing this year and have fallen in LOVE with the 4 day a week program. It just seems natural to have all my children on a 4 day a week plan.

We did option 2 so that whenever we wanted to go full-speed, we would be able to quickly switch to just doing a day within a day. Often we've found that we really don't need half-speed for a full year but rather only a part of the year. Then, we're ready for full speed the next year for sure. In whatever option you choose, make sure that it is easy to jump up to full-speed at any time without it being too confusing as to what to do each day.

Blessings,
Carrie

We are doing it a little bit differently with Julianna. She just turned 5 in October and just started unit 3 today. We are going half speed with everything except full speed fine motor skills and handwriting. But we are splitting it up a bit from the typical left side / right side.

Day one:
Awana verse
History
Bible (sing Bible verse)
Rhymes in Motion
Fine Motor Skills / Handwriting

Day two:
Awana verse
Rotating box
Rhymes in Motion
Story time
Math
Fine Motor Skills / Handwriting

We do music in the van, so there is no cd time during the school day. And we don't do phonics... if we did phonics I'd put it on Day One. On Day Two I read the Key Ideas from all the boxes on the left side to remind her of the lesson, and we'll spend a minute or two discussing it or any questions she has.

I agree with however you do it, you need to make sure that when your dc is ready to go full speed, that you have a way to go full speed fairly seamlessly. We will continue FMS/HW full speed and then when we finish the K options we'll move on to 1st options. I will continue the 1st options into Beyond, which we will start half speed. We'll switch to poetry copywork when we finish the workbooks.

I did LHFHG 3 times a week when ds was 5 with the k options last year. Doing three R's daily. This year in 1st grade we did 4 times a week a with 1st grade options and went to 5 times a week as he was more than able to handle full speed. We are about to finish this coming week
Than we are going to do BLHFHG 4 times a week.
Success