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Hello. I've used Beyond Little Hearts....for my 3rd grader, and am planning to continue. My question is for my upcoming 9th grader who has not used any of the HOD programs except for the literature program. I have looked at the placement chart and looked at various threads. But I have become confused with the beefing up threads. I noticed the dates of most of those entries are quite a few years ago, so maybe the advice has changed over the years, so I want to make sure I understand and have the most up to date recommendations.

Based on placement chart, I believe my 9th grader would place well in the Rev to Rev book---mostly because she's never done any written narrations, and her grammar. Based on what she has done, she actually is quite scattered among the Rev to Rev book, the Modern Book, and the Geography Book. Her reading skills are good. She has done some writing, but never narrations, and also her English/Spelling/Writing skills are probably below average. I have 3 basic questions (one with regard to English/Writing, one regarding Science, and the other with the history and credits for those).

First, for the history part. I *think* I have determined that for history/social studies that this would be the way of it:

9th Grade Rev to Rev (with extensions)
10th Grade Modern Book (with extensions)
11th Grade Geography Book as it is (with regard to history)
12th Grade World History book as it is (with regard to history)

I would then be able to award one credit for each of American History, Geography, World History. (3 credits in history) Is this correct? I see things in the "beef up" thread about adding more to make it "credit worthy" , but the course descriptions say "with extensions for 9th and 10th grade"----this is what is throwing me off. Would I need to add more than the extensions for these 3 credits?

Our state does require Economics and Government, as well as State History. I do understand I would need to add the econ and govt, so my question is dealing with JUST the history credits awarded. (Which actually brings up another question-----is the State History in the Modern book acceptable for credit (only need half I think) for State History.


English/Writing/Literature: I'm not sure what to do here at all.
English--we do use Rod and Staff, but she only just finished the level 5 book.
She has never done dictation of any sort. Her spelling and vocabulary are both below average.
Reading---She completed the level 7/8 of Drawn into the Heart of Reading this past year.
Writing--She did the same medieval writing program that is listed in the Resurrection to Reformation Book, but she did it with a co-op so I don't know if there were any differences in the use of it.

I have NO idea what we should do about writing. (?????) My plan at the moment for English and Lit is to continue where we left off with the Rod and Staff English, and do the Bob Jones University Literature that is scheduled in the World Geography Book, but am willing to rethink that if needed.

Science: I see that the Rev to Rev science is worth credit but only if you do the 5th day. I don't think that will work with us because we do school for 5 days already, but we would just plan to do the next day--not take an extra day (I'm not sure that makes sense). Anyway, I was thinking we may do the IPC that is from the Geography, but I don't think we'd do the lab----it would still count as a science credit (just not a "with lab" science), right?

She will be taking Algebra I outsourced, so that part is covered.

Currently, her college/career path looks like she will go 2 years to community college for pre-reqs and then 2 years to a "specialty school". (It is a program that has a direct path from the local cc into the spec. school). This may change, of course, but right now this is her plan.

Sorry that was so long.....any suggestions?

For the history, if you want to award a half credit for Rev2Rev and a half credit for MtMM, you wouldn't have to add anything beyond the extensions. And the extensions may not even be necessary. In order to award a full credit of history for each year, you would want to add at least the extensions if not more.
With Rev2Rev, you would add the government material, as it lines up well. And then you would add something for economics with MtMM. The state history curriculum Carrie suggests is enough for high school (it has an option for high school as well as grades 3-8).

For English, I would do the writing as scheduled in the guides. The programs Carrie has scheduled I think will be fine at least for 9th and 10th. The one is Rev2Rev is written for 7th-9th graders ,and the one in MtMM is for 7th-12th graders. When you get to WG, you may want to use a different level of EIW, but I am not sure if that would be necessary or not. Then, you would continue with Rod and Staff daily in Rev2Rev and MtMM and as scheduled or daily in WG and WH depending on where she is at that point. For literature, I think you have a few options. You could do DITHOR again if she liked it, using the books Carrie recommends for the new American History guide. Or you could do the literature from WG like you considered.

As for science, that is the big area that would need some modification through high school. Do you only do school for 28 weeks? The guides are four days a week starting in Preparing and are only 35 weeks. So, if you continued on to the next day, you would only have 28 weeks of school. I personally would do the science in Rev2Rev as written (advanced) and use the rest of the 5th day for government and state study and any extensions that didn't get done during the week...

Thank you for the confirmation on the history portion.
I didn't realize that DITHOR could be used for high school, so I may consider that as well. I don't see a book package for anything above the 7/8, but I will look at the beef up threads again. I'm guessing it may be a separate list there.
I also didn't think about the fact that since it is scheduled at 4 day weeks, it would take shorter time to get through (with our 5 day schedule) that other curriculum. We are year round schoolers, taking one, two, and three weeks vacation throughout the year, and working 5 days most of the weeks we are "on". We've always used curriculum that was fairly well packaged into 180 day years (roughly). So I may reconsider using the science as is in Rev to Rev. and do economics on the 5th---that may actually be a good plan. But that wouldn't take very long to do....I would feel as though we were skipping days, especially as my 3rd grader would still need to do a regular day. Hmmmm....I will think about it some more.
Thank you for helping me figure this out.

On top of the science and economics, you would probably have math as well. If you chose to do DITHOR for literature, I would do that 5 days a week as well (and complete all 9 genres). Is your 3rd grader going to be doing HOD? If so, you will notice that the younger guides have shorter days than the older guides. For Bigger, it is only about 3 hours a day...

Great answers already! I'll just add you could do DITHOR 6/7/8 with harder books for 9th grade as an Intro To Lit course, move on to R & S English 6 for the Grammar part, and do either the Creative Writing as planned in RevtoRev or borrow the writing (WWTB Vol. 2) from MTMM. These 3 portions make up your English 1 credit. The following year when doing MTMM for 10th grade, you could borrow the BJU/Girl Set Lit from WG, continue with R & S English, do either WWTB Vol. 2 from MTMM or borrow the writing from WG EIW. Grade 10. I'd probably borrow the writing from the next guide up. This would be English 2. You could continue to follow this path for English 3 and 4 in 11th and 12th grade. For science, yes, you can do the Micro Phy Sci set without lab for credit; it just won't be a 'with lab' credit. HTH!

In Christ,
Julie