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Hello, I just joined the boards as I am strongly considering HOD for my younger bunch for next year. I am trying to decide between Beyond and Bigger for my girls who will be 7 and 8 (pretty much 1st/ 2nd and 3rd/4th) in the fall. Here is the situation. My 8 yo is wildly advanced for her grade--truly academically gifted in all areas. My 7 yo is definitely accelerated, but is not at the same level as her older sister (only 14 months older). While 8yo is 100% ready for the concepts in Bigger, I amnot sure younger dd is. I am already doing LHFHG for sure with my dd who will be 5 in the fall, so running three levels is out of the question. I think older dd will be bored in Beyond, but the whole point is keeping them together. I have two ideas to rectify this and wondering what you all think:

1. Do Beyond and have older dd do BJU Science 3 in addition to what's there. She loves science, so it would be good for her to have a little more challenging science while the younger dd would find the Beyond science just right.

2. Do Bigger and just let younger dd pick up and do what she can.

Which is a better plan?

Younger dd will be doing the emergant reader program, while older dd is totally read for DITHOR-- she reads comfortably at the 5th-6th grade level and already is asking many big questions. Thanks so much.

We use CLE for LA and Math.

I'm doing Bigger with my DD who will be 8 in April. We are about 10 weeks in. BUT we did Beyond last year and she got used to how HOD works.

I do not think she could have done Bigger at newly 7 (we started in December right after Christmas... she was over 7.5) And I do not think she could have been as successful as she is now with Bigger at 7.5 without starting half speed with only one vocab word and no written English.

If I were in your situation... With doing LHFHG with your younger one, I would start them with Bigger at half speed until your 7yo caught on. Emerging readers is scheduled in Bigger And also there is a spelling list as well as dictation in Bigger. You could have your 7yo doing one vocab word and your 8yo doing two. Same with copywork, etc. And with English you could do most of it orally with your 7yo and have your 8yo do some written.

Just throwing out another thought:
You could put the 7 yr old with your youngest in LHFHG, but doing the right side of Beyond and the emerging readers. The next year they could both do Beyond with older child doing right side of Bigger (maybe choosing spelling list instead of dictation depending on where she is at) and the following year both in Bigger with older doing extensions, dictation, and math and language arts at whatever level she falls and continuing that path. If your 7 yr old places squarely in Beyond, but Beyond is not an option due to older sister, I think I would go the above route instead of placing her in Bigger to always be trailing her older and more advanced sister.