New User Intro

[school4princesses]

Hello everyone,

I thought I'd introduce myself as I am new to HOD, but not new to homeschooling. I have homeschooled my crew of four girls since my eldest was in preschool nine years ago. I have a seventh grader, fifth grader, first grader and preschooler. I am coming to HOD from another curriculum, which I have used for four years, and though I love it, we are not seeing the fruit from it that I had hoped. Several real-life friends and blogging friends use HOD, and I began to take a close look at it about a month ago. This has been an extremely difficult year for us. Without going into all the details, suffice it to say that we all just want to be done with this year.

I've spent hours upon hours pouring and praying over the placement chart and considering the unique issues and makeup of my crew. I have decided upon the following, with my thinking listed after each. If anyone has any similar situations and has encouragement, or sees a potential problem that I might not be thinking of, please let me know. I'm looking at using four guides next year - which I'm slightly terrified at the thought of - but really think it is necessary for our situation.

Youngest DD - 4 years 5 months - I plan to use LHFHG at half speed. This year I used an eclectic mix of things I found free on the internet for her. She can identify all of the capital letters and most of the lower case ones. She knows all the consonant sounds and the short vowel sounds. She has a bit of a time with math concepts, but all my kids (and myself quite frankly) are not math minded. So it doesn't worry me. She is a lefty, so I have a bit of a concern about her tendency to mirror write. She can do it perfectly without thinking. I'm planning to use a special left-handed writing book with her. We will use this four days a week.

Next DD - Just turned 7 and in 1st grade - I have had conflicting thoughts about this little one. She had some speech issues and went through speech therapy during her K year, and we set aside reading until she was to say all the phonetic sounds she needed to learn to read. She has finally begun to take off with her reading (has read most of the emerging readers list now) but I know that she is going to need vision therapy. (We went through it before with her older sister so I know all the tell tale symptoms.) However, we cannot afford it right now. We will continue with the math and grammar that we are using, as it seems a good fit for her, for now. I plan to do HOD four days a week, so I know that this will take more than a normal school year to finish, and I'm fine with that. In fact, I may even begin it at half pace and speed it up a little later on after we've found our groove.

I'll address my next two DD's together, so that I can explain my thoughts more clearly. I have a DD who just turned 11 and is in 5th grade, and my eldest DD is 3 months away from 13 ( ) and in 7th grade. My eldest is in a pre-teen funk this year , and realistically will be repeating her 7th grade year. We started over at Christmas, but things went to heck in a handbasket. My 5th grade DD has ADD and SPD issues, but is also on the gifted side. The child has an almost photographic memory - when the topic or information interests her. If it doesn't, good luck getting much recall or comprehension out of her. She is very artistic (think pictures on EVERY.SINGLE.PAPER,) but has horrible handwriting, due to her crazy pencil grip which she inherited from DH. Therefore, I often allow her to type up answers and such on the computer. She can make an awesome drawing and give it a three sentence description though. She is scatter-brained and horribly organized, despite my best efforts. She has a hard time following a schedule, or a checklist, or anything that requires a set time frame. (At the moment, I'm not looking for advice on these issues as we have more pressing issues we are dealing with as a family.) Looking at the placement chart, both of these girls place between CTC and Rev2Rev for everything. We just spent this year on Ancient History, after having done it four years ago as well. I cannot in good conscience have them do it again. A good half of the books on the book list we've already read anyway. I thought about placing them both in RTR, as that would be the next history rotation anyway, but I started thinking about what sharing books would mean. 11 year old has days where ADD and SPD mean she gets nothing accomplished, so keeping them on the same schedule is a pipe dream. 11 year old loses everything, and draws on everything, so the reality is that eldest DD would never have what she needed because her sister would lose or deface everything. If my little two would need to be on the same schedule, I would have no qualms about just buying two of everything and keeping them together. But the little two will most likely never be on the same schedule. So I decided to put the 5th grader in RTR and my eldest in Rev2Rev. I plan to continue our math and language arts that are working for us. Because we already did the science topics in RTR, I will be using something different for her for science. I realize this means a large outlay of money for the first year, but everything but LHFHG will be used again several times. For this first year, I plan to try to find as many things used as I can in order to make the switch to HOD. We also have a great inter-library loan system. I plan to take my 11 year DD's guide apart and put it in page protectors (so she cannot write on it) and only give her a weeks worth at a time.

Because of our hard year, I am considering ending our school year this week (except for the two classes we do with other people) and taking a few weeks off. Our homeschool convention is in a week and a half. I will get the guides there and spend a week studying them and then think to start everyone at a half pace for a few weeks to ease into a new way of doing school, and then begin full pace after a month or so. We will have some weeks off over the summer, due to vacations, church camp, swim lessons, and DH and my 15th anniversary outing, so we probably won't get very far until our normal August start time anyway. I won't start my littlest at all until the fall.

Sorry this got long, but I really needed to explain my thoughts in order to solicit advice. I'm looking forward to sharing this journey with you all.

Blessings.

[deltagal]

HI Jennifer,

I'm looking at your oldest 2 and it sounds as if they both place in RTR. Is that correct? But for practical reasons you want them in separate guides. And so, you are looking to put your oldest in Rev to Rev.... Could you elaborate a bit more about their placement? What are the reasons the oldest doesn't place in Rev to Rev? Depending on the answer I may have some thoughts for you!

[leimarie]

I don't have any great practical advice since we're still leveling out of a *ahem* complicated year. This was our 2nd year home-schooling and 1st year with HoD. We are in 3 different guides for 4 children. HoD is the only thing redeeming our academic year. I just wanted to give you a virtual ((hug)) and welcome.

[school4princesses]

I'm looking at your oldest 2 and it sounds as if they both place in RTR. Is that correct? But for practical reasons you want them in separate guides. And so, you are looking to put your oldest in Rev to Rev.... Could you elaborate a bit more about their placement? What are the reasons the oldest doesn't place in Rev to Rev? Depending on the answer I may have some thoughts for you!

Both of the girls could place in Rev2Rev, actually. But seeing as how we've not used CM methods before, I can see that with the difficulty of the physical aspect of writing, my younger one might have a harder time with that transition. Both girls are excellent readers, though my younger one is better at comprehension (if it is a subject that interests her) and perhaps a little more intuitive. My elder, however, is by far a better writer. Both are very strong in grammar knowledge, though my elder is better with mechanics and usage. The further down the chart you go, both girls would place in CTC as far as math and science go. But as I've mentioned, we're using a different math program anyway, and have already covered the material in CTC science. Does that help?

Blessings.

[deltagal]

I'm looking at your oldest 2 and it sounds as if they both place in RTR. Is that correct? But for practical reasons you want them in separate guides. And so, you are looking to put your oldest in Rev to Rev.... Could you elaborate a bit more about their placement? What are the reasons the oldest doesn't place in Rev to Rev? Depending on the answer I may have some thoughts for you!

Both of the girls could place in Rev2Rev, actually. But seeing as how we've not used CM methods before, I can see that with the difficulty of the physical aspect of writing, my younger one might have a harder time with that transition. Both girls are excellent readers, though my younger one is better at comprehension (if it is a subject that interests her) and perhaps a little more intuitive. My elder, however, is by far a better writer. Both are very strong in grammar knowledge, though my elder is better with mechanics and usage. The further down the chart you go, both girls would place in CTC as far as math and science go. But as I've mentioned, we're using a different math program anyway, and have already covered the material in CTC science. Does that help?

Blessings.

Yes, that helps! I think your plan is a good one. I think that placement is really key for the writing and comprehension. If they are correct for that then you are good to go. Your younger girl being in RTR will not be an issue, at all. You can always start half speed with both girls until they get into a groove. It will be a great year!

Now, what about your younger children. I missed where you are placing the older of the younger 2.

[school4princesses]

Now, what about your younger children. I missed where you are placing the older of the younger 2.

Goodness, I realized I added it to my signature but forgot to actually type it in my post. I am thinking to put her in Bigger, but at half pace for a while. I mentioned that she has read most of the emerging reader books. She has started reading chapter books on her own for enjoyment as well. She likes to write, and enjoys making her own stories. She is very creative! I have done some oral and written dictation with her, and she does better with dictation than copy work, but I believe that she has a visual tracking issue and that is what causes the problems when copying things. She is having issues with math and still doesn't have basic math facts memorized. The big reason I'm thinking Bigger is because she has two friends close to her age who are finishing up Beyond, and I'm hoping there might be potential in the future to do some activities together. Anyway, that's where I'm at with her.

Blessings.

[blessedmomof4]

Hi I was just thinking, though you have been poring over the placement charts, if you could do it again looking just at the first page and for each individual child. The reason I say this is, skimming your posts, I notice the particular issues you mention for your children, two of them falling "between" guides, and mention of having covered certain topics already. The most important thing in placement is where they fit in reading, writing, grammar, and math, because it will affect their success in the other subject areas. The rest of the chart is for "fine-tuning".
Based on the things you shared, I would actually think of the following for placement:
Youngest LHTH to cement preschool concepts and make the most of your time (only 30 min a day for this guide)
7 yo in Beyond to give time to grow into needed skills, and also less time intensive for you than Bigger to allow you time to work with 11 yo
11 yo in Preparing so that there is a combination of working together with you and learning to be independent-CTC requires a lot of independence and has longer independent readings
13 yo in Rev to Rev if she is a very independent worker
I don't mean to throw a wrench in your thoughts, I just want to encourage you to take age, history cycle, and science topics out of the equation while pondering placement. You ultimatley know your kiddos best

[Carrie]

school4princesses,

Welcome to the HOD Board! We're glad to have you here. The ladies are doing a wonderful job of helping you sort through your options. In looking over what you've shared about your kiddos so far, I would lean toward placing your 4.5 year old in LHTH and your just turned 7 year old in Beyond. If you desired to try to combine your 4.5 year old and your just turned 7 year old, you could possibly consider doing LHFHG with both and just adding the Emerging Readers, spelling, math, and gentle grammar lessons from Beyond for your 7 year old to do along with LHFHG. This is also a possible plan and would allow you to combine this pair of kiddos for the long haul.

As far as your older kiddos, in order for HOD to work well for your family, when choosing a guide we have to consider how much independent work your kiddos are able to do as well as how well they read and follow lengthy written directions on their own. The reason these skills have to be weighed is because in order for things we code in our guide as 'I' to be truly independent, the child has to be able to read and follow the directions on his/her own and truly be able to do what we are asking independently skill-wise. Otherwise, you will end up taking over much more of the plans than we are thinking you will doing, and your day will quickly get way too long for both you and your students.

With these thoughts in mind, I would lean toward placing your 5th grader in Preparing Hearts. This would ease her into some independence and give you daily accountability for her without handing too much off to her all at once.

As far as your older daughter goes, with these same thoughts in mind, and the year you mentioned she's had this year, I would lean toward CTC for her. This would also help stair-step her into more independence and greater accountability, without dumping her into too much too soon. If you get a chance to look at the resources within CTC, you will likely notice that you have used very few of the main books in the past. Even if your daughter has read some of them, we would be using the books in a totally different way through CTC.

If you really feel that your older daughter could handle RTR, you could consider that instead for her, but I would not jump her all the way up to Rev2Rev.

I'd love to hear your thoughts after you'd had time to only look at the first page of the placement chart for each of your kiddos individually. If you can also set aside the history cycle too that would help you as you ponder the best skill placement for your kiddos. The skills on the first page of the chart alone make such a big difference in how successful a child is within HOD.

Blessings,
Carrie

[school4princesses]

Thanks for all the input. I am definitely considering the suggestions for my little two. In fact, I would say I already own at least half of the books for Beyond already. I don’t think I want to keep them together at this point.

But as for my big two, I have been looking at the first page again. (The thing is that we are going to continue with the math we’ve used since K, and with the Grammar, Lit and Writing programs we’ve used for the last two years that have worked well for us.) As far as age, what I’m looking at puts them in the middle of the age range. Both girls are very good readers. I actually think my second DD is a better reader than her older sister. Eldest has had literature studies with terms; second has just started them in the last several months. We have a separate literature program that we are using, but I was planning on incorporating literature selections from HOD to that program. My eldest is a very good writer. Her sister is a good writer as long as she is typing it on the computer. As I mentioned, the physical act of writing is difficult for her, but that doesn’t affect her ability to write a variety of types of compositions well if she can type them. We’ve used IEW for two years, and they are doing well with it. Both girls have strong grammar skills. They can diagram fairly difficult sentences easily, identifying parts of speech, parts of the sentence, and types of phrases and clauses. Eldest is better able to proof her own papers, but both have improved a lot over the last year.

My eldest daughter’s difficulties over the last year have been due to a bad heart attitude and an extremely strong self-will that hasn’t been completely surrendered yet. She simply refused to put forth the necessary effort to do the work expected of her, not that she couldn’t do it. That is part of the reason that I am planning to make this switch, because I think that HOD will better address these issues for her. My second DD’s difficulties come from the fact that she has ADD and SPD factors. If she gets bored, her mind will wander. I fear that might happen putting her in Preparing or CTC due to the fact that many of the books she has already read, regardless of whether they are used differently or not. I think that the fact that HOD divides the day up into smaller chunks than she is used to will help with the focus factor, as it will not require as long of a focus on any one area. I also think that the way that the guides are organized, into boxes with all directions in one spot, rather than a vertical checklist with asterisks to look in other places for further information, will help her with her trouble in that area. When she was diagnosed with ADD she was also diagnosed as gifted and I think she needs to be pushed a little to step up to what she is capable of. Realistically, since we’re using our own math, grammar, lit, and writing programs, what I’m looking to fill is what is on the second half of the placement chart. Yet, I’m still taking the skills listed from the first chart into consideration for the placement. That’s where my thoughts are after contemplating the lists again. Blessings.

[Homeschooling6]

Hi, Jennifer,

Welcome to the HOD If I can be of any help feel free to email me. So happy to see you here.

[Carrie]

school4princesses,

Thanks so much for stopping back to share a bit more about your older two and for taking one more look at the placement chart. As I'm trying to wrap my mind around the skills your older two have in place (and how these fit with the HOD guides), I'm wondering if you would be willing to share a couple of more things? It would help me so much to know whether or not they each have been responsible for their own history and science readings, or whether you have been reading these aloud? It would also help to know whether they have had much in the way of CM-style skills (like oral narration and written narration, copywork of paragraphs at a time, studied dictation) in the past, or whether these skills will be new? Another thing that would be great to know is whether they have been responsible for reading and following written directions and completing work on their own, or whether you typically help them with most of their assignments? Last, if you can give us a few titles of books that your older two are reading independently right now that will help us better understand their reading level.

I know this is a process to sort through correct placement, but it is so worth it as finding the right fit will make such a difference! On a sidenote, while you can keep your own math, grammar, literature, and writing, there are a few things to keep in mind if you do so. One is that the kiddos will be doing quite a bit of writing across the curriculum, so you'll have to be careful not to overdo this area. Second is that we schedule a writing program in each of our guides to address areas that are not covered in other areas of our guide and with care not to overlap with areas already covered in our guide. So, writing is one area in which you may wish to consider what we schedule in order to better balance your day.

Another thing to keep in mind is the time that we allot for each of these areas in our guide, because if the programs you are using happen to take much more time than what we're thinking, you may find your days getting very long. We allot 35-40 min. or so 3 times per week for formal literature study with DITHR. We allot 5 min. 3 times a week for studied dictation (which is spelling, proofreading, listening skills, grammar, usage, and punctuation are rolled into one). We allot two or three 20 min. sessions 3 times weekly for a writing program (plus writing across the curriculum daily in various fashions). We allot 35 min. daily for math. We allot 20 min. twice weekly for grammar instruction (doing Rod and Staff at half-speed in CTC and RTR). We allot 20 min. four times weekly for grammar in Rev2Rev and MTMM. If you do use your own programs, I would encourage you to try to stay fairly close to these time frames in order to keep your day in balance.

Blessings,
Carrie