heartofdakota.com

Carrie,
Do you think DITHOR would be challenging enough for a ninth grader? Would I just try to find books on a harder reading level and use the student book for middle school? I do have the teacher's guide that I am using for my 4th grader. Any suggestions for books for a 9th grader? Also, could I adapt Ancient History Cycle for him? That might be stretching it!
Thanks,
Susan

Susan,

Yes, the 6/7/8 Level can be used for freshman year literature study. We have had many moms do it! I've also had quite a few high school literature teachers, my older sister included, tell me that they'd be thrilled if their outgoing freshman knew all of the literature concepts that are covered in DITHR.

In order to give credit for it, you'd want to cover all 9 genres and choose more difficult reading material. You would also want to add an additional writing component for the comp. part like the Igniting Your Writing II book that we carry (or even Write with the Best Vol. II or The Elegant Essay by IEW, which are more difficult but are high school worthy). You'd also want a grammar text, either Rod and Staff or possibly Hands-On English by Fran Santoro Hamilton.

The Ancient History cycle would be more of a stretch. It will work pretty well for an eighth grader but would need quite a bit added to be a freshman level course. It depends which areas you are looking for the guide to cover for your 9th grader as to how much would need to be added? 9th grade is typically a geography year, so if you added a geography text (like ABeka or Bob Jones) that would help in that respect. Then, the history coverage in the Ancients guide would be a bonus.

Blessings,
Carrie

Carrie,
Thanks for your reply. I'll check into the geography for him and I'm so grateful I can use the DITHOR for him while I'm using it with my 4th grader. She'll be excited that her big brother is using her curriculum for literature. We can do the genres together!
Susan

My 9th grader BEGGED me to let him continue with DITHOR this year! He's used since he was in...3rd grade? OR 2nd? So he's very familiar with it; he's done all the workbooks, but he still wanted to use it! Now there's a testament to the program, eh? lol!
He's using the 6/7/8 book, and we chose books to read that are at his level or slightly above.

6timeboymom wrote:My 9th grader BEGGED me to let him continue with DITHOR this year! He's used since he was in...3rd grade? OR 2nd? So he's very familiar with it; he's done all the workbooks, but he still wanted to use it! Now there's a testament to the program, eh? lol!
He's using the 6/7/8 book, and we chose books to read that are at his level or slightly above.

Wow! That's pretty exciting, Darci! I'd love to be doing DITHOR with my ds yet then too.

In Christ,
Julie

my3sons wrote:

6timeboymom wrote:My 9th grader BEGGED me to let him continue with DITHOR this year! He's used since he was in...3rd grade? OR 2nd? So he's very familiar with it; he's done all the workbooks, but he still wanted to use it! Now there's a testament to the program, eh? lol!
He's using the 6/7/8 book, and we chose books to read that are at his level or slightly above.

Wow! That's pretty exciting, Darci! I'd love to be doing DITHOR with my ds yet then too.

In Christ,
Julie

I agree!! I am brand new to DITHOR this year, and I'm looking forward to MANY more great years with it! This week we're working on a "Radio Theater" project to go with Grant's mystery. FUN! is all I've got to say about that!

Kathleen

Susan,

I just wanted to pop back into this thread one more time, because I have actually been knee-deep in researching high school literature options these past few months. My beloved sister and I finally got a chance to really dig into evaluating the various literature guide options first-hand last evening by having many of the actual guides in-hand to give them a good run through.

We both came away with the feeling that DITHR is much deeper or just as deep as many of the high school level literature options. Now, I don't mean that in a Rah! Rah! DITHR is so great type of way. I just mean that most of the guides we looked at for high school were a step back in literature study from DITHR. There wasn't much deeper thinking involved in the set-up of many of those guides. The few guides that did have deeper thinking were so over the top in both the number of questions and in the composition exercises required that they also were not realistic to do in the day-to-day.

I share this so that you can feel very good about using DITHR with a 9th grader and know it IS enough.

Blessings,
Carrie

Carrie,
Thanks for that reassurance. I just noticed this reply. Sorry so late in responding. Again what a blessing you are to so many, as a person and educator! Thanks for sharing your gifts and talents with us AND thanks for all the time you take in responding to our questions!
Susan