heartofdakota.com

Hello to you all! This is my first time to join an online board. I have been reading your posts for about a week now. I think you ladies are awesome! What a wonderful job you all do to encourage each other! I am married to a wonderful husband and a mother to three beautiful blessings from God. I have a daughter who is 13 and today is her last day of 7th grade in public school. I have a son who is 5 1/2 and a daughter who is 4. I have been preschooling both of them at home.

Our Homeschool quest started when my oldest daughter was in the 4th grade. She would come home with 3-4 hours of homework almost every night. She was a good student and always made the honor roll, but we couldn't handle all the homework. My husband asked me if I thought I could homeschool our son who was just a baby at the time. I told him I could at least go through the 4th grade because it was still fresh on my mind!! (I cannot homeschool my daughter - long story).

As I began searching for information about homeschool and praying for guidance I knew that this was what the Lord wanted me to do. My husband only wants me to homeschool our younger children for Kindergarten. I know that God intends for us to homeschool a lot longer than that. I also have faith that God will impress upon my husband's heart the same when the time is right.

I will be using LHFHG with my son for Kindergarten. I had already purchased BJ Math K-5 and SSR&W for my son before I found HOD. I am not going to purchase a separate curriculum for my 4 year old daughter. I am just going to let her tag along with what she is capable of and see how things go. I am sooo excited to begin!!

In Kentucky I am required to teach 175 six-hour days for a total of 1050 hours for the school year. I am thinking of starting school in July so that I have a little bit of a time buffer since I am new at this. Our public school starts August 5th.

Hi and Welcome!

We homeschool one year at a time My dh would like the kiddos go to public school before they hit high school so my time is running out for my oldest.

I would love to school them through high school. I keep praying about it.

My oldest will be in 5th grade in the Fall so at least I know I will have the rest of my kiddos up until the 5 grade

We will start Little Hands too with my two youngest who are 4 & 5 yrs old.

Blessings,

Welcome to the boards! looking forward to getting to know you better.


LHFHG is a wonderful program. I am starting it for the second child in the fall.

Hello Happy!

I am new too. How exciting to begin this journey. I feel like a kid in a candy store. I want it all and I want it now.

So sorry you are not able to homeschool your daughter. Good friends of ours have a son in 4th grade and he too has had 3-4 hours of homework a night. His parents have done everything they can do to find a solution with the teacher and nothing has changed. Poor boy can't stand school now, and he is so young.

I hope and pray that your husband will see the merits of homeschool long term. My husband wasn't excited about it at first, but now he is very pro-homeschooling! It has taken well over a year but now we are two oxen pulling in the same direction instead of opposite ways and it is making the dive into homeschooling a lot more exciting!

Good luck to you.

Just poppin' in to give a warm welcome too! I love this great group of like-minded moms, and I'm sure they'll be a blessing to you as well!

Kathleen

Hello and Welcome!!

Sounds like you have a plan. I was in that same boat when I found HOD. I had already bought LLATL and RightStart math and they worked out just fine with Little Hearts. You can sub those two areas with pretty much anything and still make the program work, but I did go ahead and switch this year to all HOD for Beyond!

We look forward to hearing from you as you start your HOD journey!
Mel

PS....we have to track hours here in MO as well, but not days. There is a free program called HomeschoolTracker that you can download from their site that works great for tracking hours and days. We have to do 1000....where do they come up with these numbers????

happy@home,

I just wanted to pop-in and welcome you too! We're glad to have you here and pray HOD may be a blessing for your family.

We'll look forward to getting to know you better.

Blessings,
Carrie

Welcome! You are going to love LHFHG! I am using it with my 6 year old and my 4 year old. They love it. I am also using the Reading Lesson with them as well. That also works well for kids on different levels.

I pray that your homeschooling will be blessed and that you will be able to homeschool as long as it is your hearts desire. You'll love using HOD. It makes it so easy!

Welcome!

Just wanted to share that back in '93 my dh gave me the same conditions yours has given you-- I started K with a 4 yo so that I would have two years with him before sending him off to school. The next year he gave me through 1st grade. And so on. As you can see below, we've graduated one and soon to be two. My dh is now my biggest supporter. So it is possible yours will change his mind. You will have lots of ladies praying with you.

Enjoy the year! You'll love Little Hearts--I just started it with my 5yo--we're in week 4 and loving it!

I just want to say that it is sometimes hard for husbands/dads (and moms too!) to let go of what they know. I know mine at first was kind of concerned that our kids have the same kind of education he had. It didn't take him long to realize that the homeschool education is so much wider, and better. We will be praying for you that dh will see the fruits of your labor the first year...and continue to allow you to teach your children at home! Please keep us posted on how things are going. God will bless you abundantly for heeding His call on your life.

Thanks Ladies for your warm welcome and advice!

I am so excited about HOD!

I have faith that God will draw my husband to continuing our homeschool journey when the time is right. Especially since it was my husband's idea to start the journey.

Water2wine

Where are you in LHFHG? I am encouraged to see that you are including a four year tag along as well!

Thanks again!!

Welcome to the board and welcome to the wonderful world of homeschooling!
I lived in Louisville,KY for almost two years about 8 years ago. Kentucky had the easiest homeschool laws of any of the four states I have homeschooled in!

We are all here to help! Dont be afraid to ask questions..these ladies are very wise!

Ruth

I just started LHFHG with my 4.75 yo dd, so I think it will work great to let your younger one tag along! This program is so great, it easily fits with different levels. You'll love it!

(As a completely OT sidenote, I was planning on waiting until August since DD turns 5 in Sept. She really really really wanted to start it, and begged and begged me, so we've started it v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y. She's loving it! I knew I should've waited to get it though. )