heartofdakota.com

I am considering Heart of Dakota for our curriculum for next year. I have already a different English and Math program than they recommend, but would use HOD for History and Bible and some science. Next year, I will be teaching a 4th grader (who has read since she was 4), a 1st grader (who is just learning to read) and an eager 4 year old. I like to do our reading time together (history, Bible and science) and wonder which curriculum you would recommend. I especially want to make sure I am not "dumbing down" too much for my 4th grader as she loves to read!

Thanks for any and all advice!

It would be great for you to check out the placement chart from the main Heart of Dakota page. It's on the right hand side. Come back and share what you find out and we can help more.

But, from what you said so far, I would think Preparing for your 4th grader. If she's a great reader you could have her read the extension books. It's possible she places in Creation to Christ, depending on her skills of writing, and narrating. Especially if you are new to these skills, Preparing is an awesome guide to teach so many skills to properly prepare them for the guides to come and their increasing independence. It is one of my favorite guides, and my daughter loves it and actually says, "I'm looking forward to school today". There are some independent boxes, and my daughter does even more of it independently because she is a great reader also. I don't read anything to her, she's on the older end and doing the extensions. (we got a late start with HOD but so happy to be here)

Little Hearts for your 1st grader--I'm doing that one this year also for the second time.

Little Hands for your 4 yo. It's possible to do this 1/2 speed as well, meaning basically doing 1/2 the boxes one day and 1/2 the next day. Depends on how much you can fit in time-wise and how much she likes. It really only takes about 30 min a day as is.

Welcome to HOD! I know you won't regret it if you choose it.

If you want to combine all of your children, HOD is probably not a great option for you. That is not how it is designed. It is designed meet each child where they are. If you were to pick something appropriate for your youngest, then it would be too baby-ish for your oldest. If you were to pick something appropriate for your oldest, the youngest wouldn't learn much at all, and some material might be more graphic/mature than is appropriate. If you pick something for the middle child, then you are going to be spending a lot of time trying to make it work for the others, as the activities are age-appropriate. There is no way I would combine a 4th grader and a 4yo. You might be able to use 1 guide for the 4yo and 1st grader OR 1 guide for the 1st grader and 4th grader. But, even that might be more work than placing each child in the appropriate guide, and giving them customized instruction at the educational and maturity level.

I should clarify. I am interested in using a Heart of Dakota curriculum for its history, Bible and science with my 4th grader, 1st grader, and 4 year old. I use other grade specific programs for mat and English. So with that being said, do you think Preparing would work for those ages ?

Well, I think HOD is really set up to not be combine. It is set up so that the 4th grader would read all of the science to herself and then about 1/2 of the history reading to herself. She also would complete weekly hands on projects alone, science projects alone, 1/2 of Bible time is done alone. So HOD isn't really set up for you to do all of the reading outloud to the student. They are taking that on themselves as they go up in guides.

I originally came from the mind set of keeping everyone together. I found it very challenging. Even though my 3 kids are only 3 years apart (from oldest to youngest), they still were very different children. My middle child and younger child couldn't really understand what my oldest could. She was not being challenged or I spent way to much time try to include the younger two. This was our first year with HOD and I have LOVED IT! My oldest LOVES it! Her day only takes her about 4 hours. I spend about 1.5 hours with her total out of that. My younger two are kept together. But at some point I may split them but just don't know when. I spend about 2-2.5 hours max with the younger 2 total. So I only spend a maximum of 4 hours a day on school.

Before doing this - I was very hesitant and figured this would be an epic fail. Instead, I found this to be an epic success for us!

So - to answer your question, I do not think Preparing would be a good fit for the younger kids. With the age difference of the 1st grader and 4th grader, I think you would have a difficult time finding a level that spans them both. Next year, you could do Bigger when the 1st grader turns in to a 2nd grader but Bigger for a 5th grader would probably be boring for your dd. I know my dd would want to do something more challenging for 5th grade. So I am sorry to say, I don't know that I think you would be able to combine those 2 ages.

Just out of curiosity - are you completely opposed to splitting them up? I have been amazed at how well it has worked, especially for the child who is in Preparing and all the independence she has taken on and thrived with it.

If all you are wanting out of the curriculum for the 1st grader and the 4 yo is to listen to the history, Bible and science being read, then yes, you could use Preparing. If you'd like the 4th grader to have a curriculum that she could do and learn many skills from, yes, Preparing is great. Your 1st grader and 4 yo won't be able to use the guide to its full potential because they are too young and haven't learned the skills necessary to really complete it. I believe that your 1st grader would love the Little Hearts guide or possibly the Beyond guide (depending on where he/she is on the placement chart) as it's a fun guide with many activities and projects and stories for that level. The Little Hands guide is so fun and only takes 30 min a day if you do the whole thing. The littles love having the time with mama and the fun activities that aren't in the older guides.

I can relate to where you are in your thinking, of wanting everyone to be together for history/Bible/science. I have a couple of "sets" of children. I have 10, but there is a gap. I have schooled them all for all of their years of schooling. The oldest is 26 and my youngest is 2. My first set that are all graduated now, we did everything together. I loved all of the read alouds, etc. Looking back--it was great for my oldest 2. The younger two really missed out in many ways. I never did anything more on their level. They never learned many of the skills they needed. My youngest of the 4 olders really missed out. She doesn't remember most of what we did--she was just along for the ride. Of course, I assumed she got most of everything and didn't pay much attention to what she lacked.

I do miss those days of just the 4 of them and us sitting and reading for hours and hours. But, I'm so excited about this phase also. I'm excited for what my youngers are learning with HOD and that they are learning so many important skills. We still do so much together and we are together a lot. I thought it would make everyone so separate to do different things and we wouldn't have the camaraderie-but that isn't how it is. Carrie has some great posts on this topic. I'm lousy at finding them however, I don't get the search thing on here.

Anyway, I just wanted to give you some things to think about, I'm not trying to knock you for what you are thinking or trying to do. I'm not even saying that I think you are wrong necessarily--just food for thought from someone who's been there. My thinking is slowly changing. I'm dealing with getting my thinking to change a little as to the idea of slowly working through books and "chewing" on them from my experience of devouring lots and lots of books.

Another thought...I love having the one on one time with each of my children as we do school and I know that they love it also. They look forward to their time with mama. I'm so grateful.

Blessings to you!

I too am a reformed "combiner." At least at the beginning of this journey I thought I wanted to combine for History, read-alouds and things like that. Now I am glad to have each of them placed where they have activities and things they can do and I know their education is complete for where they are at. I was really hit and miss with my oldest and some of her areas have suffered because of it.

To do what you are talking about, and keeping in mind that you would not be using the curriculum as it is designed so enter at your own risk, I think Bigger Hearts might be something to look at for History and Science. Trying to keep it somewhere where it is interesting for your oldest and yet not too far above the younger ones. All of the history is really very interesting, just the lower guides don't go nearly as much in depth because they are trying to keep it short and simple for younger children. Bigger Hearts is American history and the science is also transitioned to the "living book" style science which I really like. Read a book about a person who did something in science and learn about the concepts that person was discovering at the same time. My second born is a tag-along girl she loves to sit and listen to her older sister's school time rather than run off and play and she loved listening to the Bigger stuff and doing the experiments. Your oldest could definitely do all of the notebooking and assignments and I might even get the extension books for her to read on her own.

No, I do not think it would work for those ages. Preparing is the guide where HOD ramps up the writing in other subjects. Skills are cross referenced in history, science, and Bible. Plus there are independent boxes meant to be done by the student to build independence in these subjects before hitting the middle school guides. If you were going to use it just for history, science, and Bible...I would suggest Beyond. Beyond uses Christian Liberty texts from 3rd and 4th grade levels.
I would not suggest combining any student that is 2+ grade levels apart in age/skill level even in history, science and more. The reason for this is because your 1st grader just needs exposure, your 4th grader needs to build independence and ready for middle school level of work which will have boxes meant to do independently, and your 4 yr old just doesn't need anything more than the 3r's at this time. While you may be doing the 3r's on grade level, you are not doing them any favors by keeping them together for the other subjects as they don't gain independence and you will have to tweak anything you use to fit a 4th, 1st, and 4 yr old. No matter what you use you will either be dumbing down for your 4th grader or dragging your younger kids along for the ride. I am going to repeat what others have said HOD just does not work that way. If you wanted to continue with HOD you would have to at some point uncombine for the kids to have the required skills for the higher guides. I don't suggest it and wouldn't recommend it unless severe life circumstances caused a need for it one year.
HOD is history led and a lot of cross curricular grade/age appropriate skills are worked on in each guide. Beyond would be the last guide that I could see combining the way you are talking about with HOD.

Hello Izzielou, and welcome to the HOD Board! You make an excellent point to ponder here...

Izzielou wrote:...I especially want to make sure I am not "dumbing down" too much for my 4th grader as she loves to read!...

What a good thought to have -one that many, many homeschool moms have come to ponder as well! This is precisely the reason the ladies are suggesting that you do different HOD programs for your very different aged dc! We don't want you to have to be 'dumbing down' anything for your 4th grader, nor do we want your preK 4 yo overly challenged or simply off to the side doing something like coloring while you attempt to teach 4th grade material to everyone. Here are some wonderful posts for you to read and ponder as you consider your family and what is best for each of your dc and your family overall...

What are we considering, when you ask us which guide your family should use?
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=9338

Why do we ask you to look at the placement chart for each of your individual children when considering the best placement for your family?
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=9339

Why don’t we recommend having children younger than the target age range of the HOD guide simply listen in with the older student’s guide?
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=9341

What would my child be missing out on if I did choose to combine him/her in a guide that doesn’t fit him/her on the placement chart?
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=9342

How will we be learning as a family, if we do separate guides?
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=9343

How can I get my different-aged children into the same guide, or how do I know if I should try to combine them?
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=7019

I hope this helps as you consider what is best for your dc. Here is a link to the placement chart - let us know what you discover!
http://www.heartofdakota.com/placing-your-child.php

From what you've shared, I'd say your 4th grader needs to be in her own guide, so she can soar! She will be able to take over her science readings and a portion of her history readings, which is a necessary skill for her age anyway, and this will free up much time for you to focus on teaching your 4 and 6 year olds to read, write, etc. Your 4 and 6 year old could potentially be combined eventually, or they could easily be taught separately, depending on what you discover from the first page of the placement chart. HTH!

In Christ,
Julie