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HI. I am wanting to order all my HOD tonight and I am wondering if it is easier to do my 2 boys on the same level student notebook and take home projects? Or is there no difference if I ordered a 2/3 for one and a 4/5 for the other? Just thinking it would be easier if they were doing the same projects..yes or no? Also if they are doing the same do I need to order 2 take home project books or just one and do I need to order 2 student books or can I copy one? If you read this please answer so I can order..thanks so much.
Wendy
boys ages 5,8,10

I can't really answer personally about what it would be like to use 2 different levels of DITHR at the same time. My dc are in the same book, but I have read others that use more than one and say it is easy to use several of the levels at once. Several days throughout a unit is done as a group with all levels together. Then the other things are more individual anyway so it shouldn't matter much if they are on different levels. With the projects if you choose the group project in the teacher's guide, all levels would be working together. I think it would be possible to use the same type of book project as well if you wanted. I believe they are often similar. For example I noticed when we did humor, the book project for humor level 2/3 was to make a character tube puppet. The book project for humor level 4/5 was to make a character puppet using a paper bag. As far as the books, you only need one of the book projects books for each level. They are not consumable. The student book is a consumable, but it is allowed that a family can copy the pages as they need within the family. It can be more difficult and expensive to copy so many pages though so many people just get a student book for each student. Hope that helps and you can celebrate your box day soon!

In the manual, it states that if your children are new to DITHOR, you should start them in the 2/3 student book, because the other books build upon concepts learned in the 2/3 book. I have 2 kids that will be doing DITHOR this coming year for the first time and I just decided to put them in the 2/3 book, along with the coordinating Book Projects To Take Home. My kids will be in 4th and 5th grade, fyi.