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I am trying to decide where to place my boys next year. At this point we are not currently using HOD although I did use Little Hearts two years ago with my oldest. The following year we started Beyond but didn't get very far once school became very frustrating. I continued with the level of work in Beyond but wrote my own unit studies based on what my oldest was interested in. At this point I am very ready to come back to a program that is written for me and I loved my year with Little Hearts.

ds1 Bryce (2/03) currently in 1st grade.
He is reading on a 4th grade level and we are doing 4 genres in DITHOR this year. He will complete Singapore 2B, and R&S 2 by the end of the year. When I placed him on the chart I felt he would place in Preparing for Reading, Math, Grammar and History. All other areas he would be in Bigger. He will be 7.5 when we start. At this point I am leaning towards putting him in Bigger and getting the extension pack so that he has more to read. He loves to read and loves to learn more about what we are learning.

ds2 Micah (3/05) currently in Pre-K
By the end of this year he will be ready to start the emergent reader set, start Singapore 1A and will be copying bible verses. So for Reading, Writing, and Math he places in Beyond. In all other areas he would place in Little Hearts. I am leaning towards placing him in Little Hearts and just finding more copy work for him so that his writing continues to improve.

ds3 Matthew (5/07) will be tagging along and possibly doing Little Hands

Does Bigger with extensions (that we will drop if they are to much) sound like the right placement for Bryce? Does Little Hearts sound like the right placement for Micah?

I am hoping to figure this all out soon so I can just feel like I know what I will be using next year. I am getting tired of writng unit s all of the time although I do enjoy it and I am sure we will take breaks next year to focus on the boys interests from time to time.

Hi Karen! Well, thank you for sharing such helpful details about each of your dc. That is so beneficial when discussing placement. I agree your oldest sounds ready for BHFHG, as long as he can write fairly well already. I would challenge him with more difficult books or genres in DITHOR rather than have him do the Extension Package though. The titles in the Extension Package begin with 4.5 (fourth grade, fifth month), and go up to 6.8 or higher (sixth grade, eighth month). Many of the books are in the upper half of this range. Since your ds is on the younger side of BHFHG, and you do enjoy letting him explore his own interests, it might be fun to do BHFHG four days a week, leaving the fifth day for ds to explore his own interests and/or read some challenging material, etc. With this plan, BHFHG would take about 11 months to complete instead of 9 months, since it is a 5 day plan. Just a fun idea to consider!

For your middle dd, I think LHFHG sounds like a good placement. You can use the Appendix of Beyond (which I understand you already own) to do the Emerging Reader's Set schedule and comprehension questions with her. We loved this set, and the questions did an excellent job of improving our dc's comprehension. For some extra meaningful copywork, you could have dd copy her Bible verse each week. My ds did this and loved seeing his little binder of verses grow over the year! Since your dd is also on the young side of LHFHG, you could do LHFHG 4 days a week with her too, and have the fifth day for her to explore her own interests (or just play) too. Then she and Bryce would finish the same time.

You may want to wait to start Matthew in LHTH until you get the other 2 going first. Then, you could consider mid-year adding LHTH for him. We did this type of stagger starting this year too. It worked great! We started CTC and Beyond, and then about a month or two into school, we started LHTH half-speed with our almost 3 yo. It has been just the right amount of time for him, and it helps me have mommy time with him I probably wouldn't get otherwise. We just do half of the boxes one day, and the other half the next. We are loving our year together!

You will certainly know best about the details of your placement for your dc, but I think you are right on track with your thoughts here. You are going to have such a nice teaching rotation set up here. It is nice to have a year between reteaching a program. I have that same type of situation, and by the time my next one comes around, and I need to teach an HOD program I already did with my oldest again, I'm excited to return to it! Like coming home to a long lost friend. Anyway, sounds like you have a great plan forming!

In Christ,
Julie

Karen,

It sounds like you've already had some great advice, so I'll just chime in to say that from what you've shared I'd agree that Bigger Hearts and Little Hearts with some adjustments upwards in the 3 R's sound like a good fit for your kiddos.

If you have other questions, ask away. We love to help and encourage. It's good to see you again at HOD.

Blessings,
Carrie