heartofdakota.com

HI,
We have been homeschooling our two girls since birth, and they are almost 11 and just turned 9. We've used a variety of things over the years, mostly Sonlight, and recently switching to Tapestry of Grace last year. We have found our stride and plan to continue this course with them.
The adoption process for our 3 foster children should be finalized in March. They are 6 year old boy currently in K, almost 5 year old girl currently in PreK, and 3 1/2 year old boy currently in Preschool. Even though they are separated by age at their school, they are very much like triplets academically. As I have been researching curriculum options to homeschool them, prayerfully together, I am drawn to HOD. I've poured over the catalog and carefully studied the samples online. I'm still can't decide as to where I should begin. All three children are auditory learners and the boys especially like hands on activities. The youngest keeps up well with his siblings except in writing, where he is just beginning to trace his name and letters. I would like to start with the first level and continue systematically up through all the years. It's not obvious to me whether I should pick geared towards the oldest, middle or youngest. Should I pick on the easier side at the risk of boredom, or on the more challenging side at the risk of frustration? How easy will I be able to adapt HOD to meet the needs and learning styles of my "littles"?

Also, as I've been looking over the older levels, I really like the Bible study and Hymn studies. I see a lot of overlap in the books used between HOD, Sonlight and TOG, so I might consider switching my older girls over to HOD eventually. Are there any easy ways to combine two levels similar to how some Sonlight cores can be combined and how TOG has everyone learning the same topic on their own levels?

If there are previous posts that discuss my questions, I certainly appreciate links to those threads rather than rehashing the discussion here.

Thank you very much for your help!

Blessings,
CAthy

Hi Cathy! Welcome to the boards!

Have you looked at the placement chart http://www.heartofdakota.com/placing-your-child.php at all? It will help to determine where your kids fit skill wise and then we can talk about different ways to combine. If you wanted to start at the beginning and keep them together, you might be able to do LHTH with all your kids and then get the LHFHG guide and only do the right side (Learning the Basics) using the K options for motor skills & handwriting with your 5 year old and the 1st grade options with your 6 year old and math if either of them are ready. You could also add phonics for either of them if they are ready. Then the following year you could do the entire LHFHG guide with all 3 of them using the K options with your youngest, 1st grade options with the middle one, and then use the right side of BLHFHG for the oldest and then just continue on that way through the guides. So you would always be using the same core guide, and just adjusting the LA, math, and reading skills to their level.

I'm sure Carrie or Julie or some of the other ladies will chime in and give you some other options.

Congratulations on your adoption! I think HOD would be such a blessing to you as you homeschool your precious dc. HOD plans for combining by having parents choose the younger program and beef up for the older. This works well for many reasons. First, young dc are not asked to things they can't do, and likewise older dc are still challenged by the extensions (which begin in Bigger Hearts for His Glory on up). Second, young dc are not hearing/reading content that is too mature for them, which often happens when choosing one program with just the oldest in mind. Last, skills are taught incrementally in HOD, so it's important for even older dc to have initial instruction on skills to be able to do them later independently. This is especially true for Charlotte Mason type LA skills, such as oral narrations, written narrations, dictation, and copywork.

So, I really like the pp's ideas, and think if you want to combine your younger 3 in one program, that is the way I'd go. For your older dc, I think you'd love the older HOD guides! We certainly have. I could ooooh and ahhhh over the living book choices, the beautiful student notebooking pages that match the history they complete, the guides that are written to the student and make independent work go smoothly, the experiments dc do totally on their own that are excellent, the balance of hands-on/writing/reading/seatwork, etc., etc., etc. BUT, I'll just say we are loving our days with HOD with all of our dc, and though we are doing 3 guides, we are finding it very manageable. By looking at the placement chart, you'll probably be able to see where your oldest 2 dc fall best, but just coming into HOD, I'd probably choose the younger of the 2 guides you may be picking between, just to be sure to get those foundational steps to skills down pat. I'd guess PHFHG with extensions for your older, or CTC with the option of extensions for your older would work. HTH!

In Christ,
Julie

Cathy,

If you get a chance to pop back in and share where your kiddos each fit as individuals on the first page of the placement chart that Samuel'sMommy linked above that will help give us some common ground and guide us a bit more as we talk through possible placement options.

From what you've shared so far, I'm thinking that the 5 and 6 year old would probably place in LHFHG, but that guide will be a stretch for a 3 and 1/2 year old. For a child that age, we would recommend Little Hands to Heaven instead, as much of the information in Little Hearts would go over the 3 year old's head. Even if the 3 year old could somehow glean some things from Little Hearts, in the long haul there would be no way for that child to keep up in the future guides from year to year without being overwhelmed eventually for being so much younger than the recommended age range of each of the later guides.

With that thinking in mind, I see a couple of options that you can ponder. You could place your 5 and 6 year olds in Little Hearts and place your 3 year old in Little Hands. Or, if you felt you really needed to keep the 3 children together, then you could have all 3 children do Little Hands to Heaven and add a higher level of the 3R's from Little Hearts for the 5 and 6 year old. Whether this would work or not depends on how much of the Bible the new little adoptees have had up to this point, whether or not they have any language barriers or auditory adjustments to make in listening to longer stories read out loud with few to no pictures, and whether they have had exposure to most of the readiness type skills. Normally, we wouldn't recommend this for a 6 year old, but it could be a possibility to consider in this situation. Then, the following year, the 3 kiddos could move into Little Hearts together, when they were aged 4 and 1/2, 6 and 7. At HOD, we actually find it much easier to beef up a program for an older child than it is to water one down for a younger child. I'm assuming that you're thinking of starting the younger kiddos in HOD now, but if you somehow were intending for this placement advice to be for 6-8 months from now, then my advice would different. I wasn't sure as to the time frame, since you'd shared that your 3 little sweeties are currently in a school outside the home.

As far as your older two kiddos go, without knowing where each child fits individually on the placement chart it is hard to know whether Preparing or CTC would be a better fit. If you get a chance to pop back in and share a bit more about them, then we could be more specific in our advice for your older two.

Blessings,
Carrie

Thank you for your replies and helpful suggestions.

I've looked at the placement charts and none of the children fit cleanly into any one level. I would say that the almost 5 year old girl and 6 year old boy would fit into LHFHG. Our girl is sounding out and decoding short vowel words, starting this week. I don't think our boy is close to this milestone because he is still learning letters and letter sounds. He has a good attitude and doesn't get frustrated, but he just isn't there yet. The youngest boy isn't too far behind his siblings, except in writing.

As a benchmark, over the course of the last year, I have read all of Sonlight's PreK Core and some of their Core K as read alouds, plus many other books. They have a long attention span and high level of understanding. We sing hundreds of songs, memorize Scripture and rhymes and read many many books. I'm thinking that I could place the two older at their appropriate level and let the youngest glean whatever he catches. I know he will want to do what his siblings are doing and will do a great job of keeping up with them. He will hear a story that he's never heard before once and recite it perfectly a week later. His verbal skills and memory are amazing! If I placed him into his own level, I know his older siblings would want to join him too, and I'd be doing two guides, and my older girls, lol.

I've seen a bit about doing one side of one level and another side of a different level....is that something that might be appropriate here? How does one narrow down all the choices?

Blessings,
Cathy

We do 3 HOD programs, and honestly, it's pretty easy to do overall. When one of the programs is LHTH, it is not difficult at all. However, I think it is good to begin with 2 programs, making the best combining decisions overall to get going, and then reassess if a third program would be better and actually make things easier anyway.

So, to start with, your older 2 dc can be combined in the program you think fits them best overall according the placement chart. It is good to choose a program they can solidly do rather than one that is stretching them to begin with IMO. HOD's guides work well to choose with the younger in mind because the extensions make it easy to beef up a program for the oldest. The guides are harder than they look, and they are full of academic skills (as well as living books that I feel like sneaking off to read myself. ) But I'd really look at the first week of each of the guides and read through what dc are learning - it's meaty, and it's solid - so it's good to keep in mind how important it is that dc can do the "I" boxes independently, and the "S" boxes semi-independently - otherwise they become "T" teacher-directed boxes, which does not maintain that happy, healthy balance HOD has written so beautifully for us (and our dc) to be able to enjoy.

For your younger dc, you can choose either LHTH or LHFHG for your core program to begin with. Your 3 1/2 yo would get much more out of LHTH. Your olders could do the K options for the right side of LHFHG along with LHTH if you choose that route. If you choose to do LHFHG, that would fit your older 2 dc's needs well, but your 3 1/2 yo would not get as much out of it and will not be getting the skills LHTH teaches so well. Also, the following year, it would not work to have your then 4 1/2 yo do Beyond Little Hearts, and it definitely wouldn't work the next year to have a 5 1/2 yo doing Bigger Hearts. So, if you feel very strongly about combining them all, I'd do LHTH with right side LHFHG for the olders right now. Or, if you are open to separating them, I'd start with LHFHG with the older 2, letting little one sit in on whatever you want him to, and then start LHTH with him the following year when you begin Beyond with the older 2. HTH as you choose what to do - HOD makes our homeschooling days happy. In our experience, as long as it's a good fit with the placement chart, whatever guides you choose will be wonderful!

In Christ,
Julie

Sounds like you have already been given great advice. Just wanted to say congratulations on your three blessings! I think you are really going to love HOD and your children will really benefit from the bonding that HOD naturally facilitates with your children. I have found for my children it has been a great forum for discussing deeper things as God brings them to our hearts. Congratulations on your adoption! There are several other HOD moms with children brought through adoption.

Thank you for the additional replies, ladies!

I have printed out the sample weeks for every level of HOD and have read them all multiple times, as well as studied the catalog. I read on the message boards that the sample weeks don't show everything, like spelling lists, for example, and those things can give a more accurate picture of the actual demands of each level. So I take your suggestions from experience seriously. I have a friend who uses HOD, and I will ask her if I can look through her younger guides.

The comment about the special bond the kids will build stuck me, because when the children were first placed with us 15 months ago, they were so extremely co-dependent that the state asked for them to attend daycare, to give them time away from each other. They are still very close and caring, but they are now competitive in a lot of things. I'm wondering if combining them would cause even more competition, especially if the middle child is out pacing the oldest. Then I can also envision all children wanting to participate in everyone's school time, which is how it is now when the oldest completes his homework.

Eye Yi Yi! I need to spend more time in prayer and seek more guidance from the Lord!

Blessings,
Cathy

Hi I wanted to welcome you to the board as well I have 2 adoptees and they are in one program.
I school some parts together and some parts apart. It's got kinks but it has been working! The younger is rapidly catching up to her elder (but delayed) sister. Keeping that competition down is always fun.

Huggles and Happy parenting!

I also have four adopted and one with special needs so I know about all those competition and one being behind stuff too. The first thing is to get them set academically in the right fit. Then you can finagle if you need to in order to solve competition or having one that is older and academically behind. HOD really caters to their developmental and academic level so getting them set there is first place. The rest you find ways to work it out. The issues would be the same even if you were using textbooks with competition or one feeling bad because a younger is ahead. The great thing about HOD is you can have them together for history, science and Bible yet still cater to them on LA and math. That works great if you have one that is delayed or ahead.